Laureano v. United States

JEAN CARLOS LAUREANO, Plaintiff, v. UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, et al., Defendants.

19-CV-10986 (CM)

UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT SOUTHERN DISTRICT OF NEW YORK

January 24, 2020

ORDER TO AMEND

COLLEEN McMAHON, Chief United States District Judge:

Plaintiff, currently held in federal detention at the Orange County Jail (OCJ), brings this pro se action challenging either: (1) his current detention, arising out of his pending criminal matter in this Court, United States v. Laureano, ECF 1:19-CR-0666, 2; or (2) the filing of a warrant for his arrest by his probation officer based on a violation of his supervised release, arising out of his other criminal matter in this Court, United States v. Laureano, ECF 1:12-CR-0248, 17.

By order dated January 8, 2020, the Court granted Plaintiff's request to proceed without prepayment of fees, that is, in forma pauperis.¹ For the following reasons, the Court grants Plaintiff 30 days' leave to file an amended complaint asserting a malicious prosecution claim against Probation Officer Brooks. The remaining defendants are dismissed.

STANDARD OF REVIEW

The Prison Litigation Reform Act requires that federal courts screen complaints brought by prisoners who seek relief against a governmental entity or an officer or employee of a governmental entity. See 28 U.S.C. § 1915A(a). The court must dismiss a prisoner's in formapauperis complaint, or any portion of the complaint, that is frivolous or malicious, fails to state a claim upon which relief may be granted, or seeks monetary relief from a defendant who is immune from such relief. 28 U.S.C. §§ 1915(e)(2)(B), 1915A(b); see Abbas v. Dixon, 480 F.3d 636, 639 (2d Cir. 2007). The court must also dismiss a complaint if the court lacks subject matter jurisdiction. See Fed. R. Civ. P. 12(h)(3).

While the law mandates dismissal on any of these grounds, the court is obliged to construe pro se pleadings liberally, Harris v. Mills, 572 F.3d 66, 72 (2d Cir. 2009), and interpret them to raise the "strongest [claims] that they suggest," Triestman v. Fed. Bureau of Prisons, 470 F.3d 471, 474 (2d Cir. 2006) (internal quotation marks and citations omitted) (emphasis in original). But the "special solicitude" in pro se cases, id. at 475 (citation omitted), has its limits - to state a claim, pro se pleadings still must comply with Rule 8 of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, which requires a complaint to make a short and plain statement showing that the pleader is entitled to relief.

BACKGROUND

In his complaint, which is not a model of clarity, Plaintiff seeks release from custody and money damages. Plaintiff names as defendants the United States, the Federal Bureau of Investigation, U.S. Probation, Probation Officer Terry Brooks, and OCJ Warden Warren Middleton.

Plaintiff states the following: "the time assessment will be set in months and days . . . it will commence running to the date that the probation violation warrant/hold was lodged." (ECF 2 at 4.) The "time assessment [should] calculate[] in the same way for all U.S. probation violators for whom a time assessment has been imposed irrespective of whether the violator is in a local or state correctional facility and irrespective of whether there are criminal charges pending against the U.S. probation violator." (Id.) Thus, Plaintiff's warrant "was lodged [on May15, 2018, but] after Dec 3, 2018 U.S. Probation . . . didn't count [the time] and committed un-lawful imprisonment of four months." (Id.)

In support of this claim, Plaintiff refers to 9 N.Y.C.R.R. 8002.6, the New York State statute that governs time calculations for the "re-release" of a parole violator. Id. The allegations in the complaint quote verbatim from much of the statute.

Court records indicate the following: on or about December 11, 2011, Plaintiff was arrested and detained pending trial. See United States v. Laureano, ECF 1:12-CR-0248, 16. Judge Kaplan sentenced Plaintiff to 48 months' incarceration and three years' supervised release, and judgment was entered on August 6, 2012. Id.

On May 15, 2018, while Plaintiff was on supervised release, his probation officer, Defendant Brooks, "lodged" a warrant, seeking Plaintiff's arrest; on December 3, 2018, Plaintiff was arrested. On the day of the arrest, Magistrate Judge Wang held a bail hearing where the parties agreed to bail conditions of home incarceration, electronic monitoring, and inpatient drug treatment. ECF 1:12-CR-0248, 22. On April 9, 2019, at a revocation hearing, Judge Kaplan dismissed the specifications charged in the violation of supervised release memo, concluding that the facts alleged did not support a finding that Plaintiff violated the terms of his supervision for three of the specifications; the remaining four specifications were dismissed based on a joint application by the parties. See id.

Just over five months later, Plaintiff was arrested again, and new federal charges were filed. See United States v. Laureano, ECF 1:19-CV-0666, 2. On October 18, 2019, Magistrate Judge McCarthy held a hearing where she denied Plaintiff's request to be released on bail.

On November 8, 2019, Plaintiff placed this complaint in the prison mailing system at OCJ.

DISCUSSION

A. Challenge to current federal detention

In Younger v. Harris, 401 U.S. 37 (1971), the Supreme Court held that federal courts ordinarily may not stay or enjoin pending state court proceedings. Courts have extended the holding of Younger and concluded that federal courts also may not stay or enjoin federal prosecutions. Accordingly, when asked to intervene in pending federal criminal proceedings, federal courts generally have refused as long as the federal defendant may present a defense in the federal forum. See, e.g., Manafort v. U. S. Dep't of Justice, 311 F. Supp. 3d 22, 26 (D.D.C. 2018), appeal dismissed sub nom. Manafort v. United States Dep't of Justice, No. 18-5193, 2018 WL 4103307 (D.C. Cir. Aug. 1, 2018) (holding that "[i]t is a sound and well-established principle that a court should not exercise its equitable powers to interfere with or enjoin an ongoing criminal investigation when the defendant will have the opportunity to challenge any defects in the prosecution in the trial court or on direct appeal"); Ceglia v. Zuckerberg, 600 F. App'x 34, 37-38 (2d Cir. 2015) (summary order) (under Younger, a court may civilly enjoin a criminal prosecution only "where the danger of irreparable loss is both great and immediate," but "[g]enerally, no danger exists where the defendant has the opportunity to offer a defense in the criminal prosecution . . . in a federal forum." (citing Deaver v. Seymour, 822 F.2d 66, 69, (D.C. Cir. 1987) (affirming denial of an attempt to enjoin prosecution by an independent counsel, noting that "in no case that we have been able to discover has a federal court enjoined a federal prosecutor's investigation or presentment of an indictment"))).

Moreover, "where a defendant is awaiting trial, the appropriate vehicle for [alleging] violations of his constitutional rights are pretrial motions or the expedited appeal procedure provided by the Bail Reform Act, 18 U.S.C. § 3145(b), (c), and not a habeas corpus petition."Ali v. United States, No. 12-CV-0816, 2012 WL 4103867, at *2 (W.D.N.Y. Sept. 14, 2012) (quoting Whitmer v. Levi, 276 F. App'x 217, 219, 2008 WL 1849803, at *1 (3d Cir. April 28, 2008) (additional citations omitted))).

Plaintiff seeks release from his current detention. The proper vehicle for him to obtain release is a bail motion, which Plaintiff already filed, and Judge McCarthy denied. Plaintiff may not circumvent Judge McCarthy's ruling by filing a new civil action seeking the same relief. Thus, the Court denies Plaintiff's request for release.

B. Challenge to Calculation of Any Remaining Time on Supervised Release

Though the record in the 12-CR-0248 matter strongly suggests that Plaintiff is no longer on supervised release, if he is, he must move in that matter to seek early termination. See United States v. Johnson, 529 U.S. 53, 60 (2000) (noting that "[t]he trial court, as it sees fit, may modify an individual's conditions of supervised release," citing 28 U.S.C. § 3583(e)(2), and further noting that "the court may terminate an individual's supervised release obligations 'at any time after the expiration of one year . . . if it is satisfied that such action is warranted by the conduct of the defendant released and the interest of justice,' § 3583(e)(1)").

C. Claim for Money Damages

1. Probation Officer Brooks

The Court construes the complaint as asserting a Fourth Amendment malicious prosecution claim against Defendant Brooks for initiating the violation of supervised release proceedings. Because Brooks is an employee of the federal government, the Court also construes the complaint as asserting the claim under Bivens v. Six Unknown Named Agents of Federal Bureau of Narcotics, 403 U.S. 388 (1971). In Bivens, the Supreme Court implied a damages remedy against federal employees who violate a plaitniff's right under the Fourth Amendment. 403 U.S. at 397.

"[Bivens] is the federal analog to suits brought against state officials under [§ 1983]." Ashcroft v. Iqbal, 556 U.S. 662, 675 (2009)). Federal courts have analogized Bivens claims to those brought under 42 U.S.C. § 1983, which require a showing that defendants acted under color of state law to deprive a plaintiff of a federally protected right. Thus, caselaw from actions brought under § 1983 may be used to address issues raised in Bivens cases. See Butz v. Economou, 438 U.S. 478, 498-99 (1978); Shue v. United States, 466 F. App'x 51, 51 (2012) (citing Tavarez v. Reno, 54 F.3d 109, 110 (2d Cir. 1995)).

A Fourth Amendment malicious prosecution claim brought under § 1983 requires four elements: (1) the initiation or continuation of a criminal proceeding; (2) termination of the proceeding in the plaintiff's favor; (3) lack of probable cause for commencing the proceeding; and (4) actual malice as a motivation for the defendants'...