Mandawala v. Ne. Baptist Hosp.

16 F.4th 1144

Symon MANDAWALA, Plaintiff—Appellant,

v.NORTHEAST BAPTIST HOSPITAL, COUNTS 1, 2, AND 11; Blaine Holbrook, Counts 4, 5, 6, and 11; North Central Baptist Hospital; St. Luke's Hospital; Baptist Medical Center; Resolute Hospital ; Mission Trails Baptist Hospital; Tenet; Nicki Elgie, Defendants—Appellees.

No. 20-50981

United States Court of Appeals, Fifth Circuit.

FILED October 26, 2021

Symon Mandawala, San Antonio, TX, Pro Se.

Nicki Kay Elgie, Blaine A. Holbrook, Evans, Rowe & Holbrook, P.C., San Antonio, TX, for Defendants-Appellees Northeast Baptist Hospital, Counts 1, 2, and 11 and Blain Holbrook, Counts 4, 5, 6, and 11.

Before Jones, Smith, and Haynes, Circuit Judges.^*

Jerry E. Smith, Circuit Judge:

Symon Mandawala flunked out of a medical sonography program, so he sued. Seven complaints, three venues, and two appeals later, the trial court dismissed nearly all the pro se plaintiff's dozen-or-so claims and all but one defendant, the school. Mandawala asks us to reverse and to order the assignment of a different district judge. We disagree on all counts and affirm.

I.

A.

A few years ago, Symon Mandawala attended a medical sonography program at Baptist School of Health Professions. After failing to graduate, Mandawala sued the school in small-claims court to recoup his cost of attendance and damages for emotional distress. In his small-claims petition, Mandawala alleged that he flunked the program because the school did not staff its clinics adequately, which prevented Mandawala from completing his clinical duties. The petition contained no other allegations. The court dismissed, deeming the claimed damages to exceed its jurisdiction.

Mandawala then brought the same claims in state district court. Unable to comprehend Mandawala's complaint, the school issued a general denial and moved for a more definite complaint. The court so ordered, and Mandawala filed an amended complaint. The new complaint, though no clearer than the first, added several new claims, including claims under various education and privacy laws. Mandawala also alleged, for the first time, that the school had failed him out of racial animus.

On the school's motion and after a hearing, the state district judge dismissed Mandawala's amended petition. During the hearing, Mandawala complained that he lacked adequate notice and time to prepare for the proceeding. He also stated falsely that the school had admitted his claim's validity and thus was estopped from opposing him. Noting those objections, the state judge announced her ruling and told Mandawala that he could appeal.

Rather than appeal, Mandawala sued again—this time, in federal district court—raising at least eleven claims. Among them were racial and sex discrimination, fraudulent misrepresentation, breach of contract, conversion, defamation, intentional infliction of emotional distress, and violations of the First and Twenty-Sixth Amendments.¹

The complaint also added the school's attorney, Blaine Holbrook, as a defendant. Just before the state-court hearing, Mandawala claimed, Holbrook left the courtroom with a stack of documents and returned empty-handed. A few minutes later, the judge entered the courtroom with a document that, like Holbrook's, bore a colorful post-it note. Mandawala concluded that Holbrook had given that document to the judge to rig the hearing against him. He sued Holbrook, claiming that Holbrook conspired with the state judge to deny him his civil rights and his right to a fair trial. The defendants promptly replied with a motion to dismiss.

Nearly two months later, and without seeking leave of court, Mandawala amended his complaint to add claims against Holbrook's colleague, Nicki Elgie. After implicating Elgie in Holbrook's alleged conspiracy, Mandawala's late filing accused Elgie of filing motions late with intent to violate his constitutional rights and cause "psychological injury." When the defendants replied that the pleading was tardy, Mandawala filed it again. The district court struck the amended complaint but let the plaintiff file a fourth to correct deficiencies in his earlier pleadings. That new complaint added Tenet, the school's corporate parent,² as a defendant. It otherwise restated or clarified old allegations.

Ultimately, the district court dismissed with prejudice nearly all the claims. Against Baptist School, the court dismissed the claims of racial discrimination, First Amendment retaliation, procedural due process, conversion, defamation, and intentional infliction of emotional distress ("IIED"). The court also rejected all claims arising from the state-court hearing and dismissed the attorney defendants from the suit. When the dust settled, only Mandawala's sex-discrimination and breach-of-contract claims survived. Because Mandawala had never served Tenet, the school's supposed corporate parent, the court dismissed Tenet, leaving Baptist School as the lone defendant. The court then ordered the parties to mediate the surviving claims.

Unhappy with those decisions, Mandawala sought a writ of mandamus, demanding that we disqualify both the district judge and the magistrate judge for bias. Mandawala never explained why we should replace the magistrate judge. As for the district judge, Mandawala claimed that he dismissed the claims relating to the state-court hearing to favor the state district judge, whom the federal judge knew from his time on the state appellate bench. Also motivating dismissal, according to Mandawala, was a friendship between Holbrook (the school's lawyer) and partners of a firm that employed the district judge before he joined the federal bench.

Finally, Mandawala suggested that the district court had applied Baptist law, rather than federal law, and pointed to the judge's membership in the Baptist church as another source of bias. Describing Mandawala's claims as spurious, unfounded, and speculative, we denied the writ. Only then did Mandawala file a recusal motion with the district court. That, too, was denied.

Since we denied the writ, the case has ground to a halt, despite the district judge's best efforts. The judge forged ahead with mediation, setting the first hearing before a new magistrate judge. But months after the date was set, Mandawala told the court that he would refuse to participate, asserting, without basis, that the mediation's "hidden purpose" is "to hurt [his] right to appeal." With progress stalled, the district court stayed the case until further notice.

B.

Mandawala presents several issues on appeal. His theories fall into four buckets. First , Mandawala contests the dismissal of most of his claims against Baptist School. He thinks that we should restore his claims of racial discrimination, First Amendment retaliation, loss of procedural due process, defamation, and intentional infliction of emotional distress.³ Second , Mandawala urges us to restore his claims against Holbrook and Elgie for their alleged misconduct during the state-court proceeding. Third , Mandawala disagrees with Tenet's dismissal from the case. And fourth , Mandawala renews his complaints about the district judge. He again accuses the judge of bias and demands his recusal. We reject all those arguments and affirm.

II.

On defendants’ motion, the district court dismissed Mandawala's claims against Baptist School of racial discrimination, First Amendment retaliation, loss of procedural due process, defamation, and IIED. We agree and affirm.

We review de novo the district court's ruling. Cicalese v. Univ. of Tex. Med. Branch , 924 F.3d 762, 765 (5th Cir. 2019). To withstand a motion to dismiss under Rule 12(b)(6), a complaint must present enough facts to state a plausible claim to relief. See Bell Atl. Corp. v. Twombly , 550 U.S. 544, 570, 127 S.Ct. 1955, 167 L.Ed.2d 929 (2007). A plaintiff need not provide exhaustive detail to avoid dismissal, but the pleaded facts must allow a reasonable inference that the plaintiff should prevail. Facts that only conceivably give rise to relief don't suffice. See id. at 555, 127 S.Ct. 1955. Thus, though we generally take as true what a complaint alleges, we do not credit a complaint's legal conclusions or "[t]hreadbare recitals of the elements of a cause of action." Ashcroft v. Iqbal , 556 U.S. 662, 678, 129 S.Ct. 1937, 173 L.Ed.2d 868 (2009).

A.

Mandawala says that the district court should not have dismissed his claim of racial discrimination, which he brings under Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. We disagree.

Federally funded programs may not intentionally discriminate based on race. 42 U.S.C. § 2000d. An official policy of discrimination, such as a university that refuses admission to a racial group's members, breaches that principle. But sometimes, the claimed discrimination does not arise from an official policy. In those cases, the plaintiff must allege that an official knew of the intentional discrimination but refused to stop it despite having authority to do so. See Gebser v. Lago Vista Ind. Sch. Dist. , 524 U.S. 274, 290, 118 S.Ct. 1989, 141 L.Ed.2d 277 (1998).

Mandawala is black. He claims that one of his instructors, Debra Forminos, gave him poor grades because of his race. Mandawala proffers three facts to back that claim. First, a former student of the program told him that she felt that Forminos dislikes nonwhite people. Second, Mandawala says that he felt as though he suffered discrimination. Third, after Mandawala sought a transfer to another hospital, Forminos told Melissa Moorman, the clinical coordinator, that she would accept another student to take his place. And that student happened to be white.

This evidence is bare and conclusory and does not come close to allowing a reasonable inference of intentional discrimination. At bottom, Mandawala alleges just that he and a former student felt that Forminos treated nonwhites differently. Subjective belief alone cannot prove intentional discrimination. See, e.g. , Mohamed v. Irving Indep. Sch. Dist. , 252 F. Supp. 3d 602,...