In Klayman v. Porter, No. 22-7123 (D.C. Cir. June 11, 2024), the D.C. Circuit strikes down the sanction of “restricting [plaintiff]’s ability to file any related actions or claims for relief in any forum, state or federal,” citing prudential and constitutional limits to federal equitable power.
“In recent years, the District of Columbia Bar’s Office of Disciplinary Counsel [ODC] has initiated multiple disciplinary investigations and proceedings against [plaintiff]. In response, [plaintiff] has brought a series of lawsuits against the District of Columbia Bar, the Office of Disciplinary Counsel, and individual D.C. Bar officials, alleging a variety of torts and constitutional claims.”
In the present case, plaintiff alleged that the ODC employees unlawfully “sent ex parte letters to courts to which [plaintiff] is admitted that notified them of the suspension order,” which he claimed constituted tortious interference with contract and abuse of process. Altogether, plaintiff filed three actions against the ODC officials in different districts alleging essentially identical claims (the cases were transferred and consolidated in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia).
Defendants persuaded the district court not only to dismiss the complaint but to place a ban on plaintiff filing any new actions against them. The injunction required plaintiff to seek “the consent of this Court or any other court where additional litigation is proposed to be pursued” against ODC and its current or former employees (emphasis added), or serving a subpoena or other legal process on them. “In imposing the pre-filing injunction, the court pointed to six of [plaintiff]’s complaints—including the three before it— that it characterized as raising ‘essentially identical claims of abuse of process regarding the [ODC Employees’] conduct’” and finding the present matters to be suits “frivolous[,]” “harassing[,]” and “well within the range that other members of th[e] court ha[d] deemed sufficiently numerous and repetitive to warrant a pre filing injunction.”
“In August 2023, the district court expanded its pre-filing injunction to prohibit [plaintiff] from ‘filing, in any federal court, state court, or any other forum, any new action, complaint, or claim for relief concerning any matter derived from the plaintiff’s disciplinary proceedings’ without the advance approval of the district court or the ‘court where additional litigation is proposed to be pursued[.]’”
On appeal, among other rulings, the D.C. Circuit tosses the pre-filing Injunction. “We vacate the pre-filing injunction because [plaintiff]’s litigation does not meet the very high threshold for a nationwide restriction on a litigant’s constitutional right of access to the courts.” The panel cites, inter alia, “[t]he handful of lawsuits on which the district court based its pre-filing injunction” as not being” sufficiently prolific, frivolous, or harassing to warrant broadly restricting [plaintiff]’s constitutional right of access to all courts and forums, state and federal.”
“Pre-filing injunctions . . . must be a tool of last resort and reserved for those rare and egregious cases in which the ‘frivolous or harassing nature’ of a litigant’s actions threatens the ‘administration of justice’ or the “integrity of the courts[.]” The panel cites several reasons why this case fell short.
“First, the filing of six lawsuits across several jurisdictions does not, without more, provide a sufficient predicate for the extraordinary relief of a pre-filing injunction barring litigation in the courts within the D.C. Circuit . . . . Tellingly, the district court here made no findings that Klayman’s six lawsuits confounded its docket management or otherwise obstructed the administration of justice.”
Second, there was no finding that the six lawsuits were frivolous or obviously lacking in merit. (Indeed, in this appeal, that panel reverses at least some of the dismissal on the merits.)
Third, there was no evidence of plaintiff’s “intent to harass” the ODC employees.
Fourth, “we recognize that repetitious lawsuits can take time and resources from those sued and the courts that adjudicate them. But those concerns must be balanced against the Constitution’s protections of due process and access to the courts.” At the least, there is an obligation to consider lesser sanctions. “[I]n this case, the district court neither tried alternative means of addressing any perceived improper litigation tactics nor explained why nothing else would work. There is no need to haul out a sledgehammer if a tack hammer will suffice.”
Finally, no injunction should have extended beyond the district itself, let alone against state courts and courts of appeals. “Courts must ensure that the breadth of any pre-filing injunction is commensurate with and necessitated by the extent of misconduct, harassment, or abuse. And courts should tread especially carefully when purporting to regulate access to other federal trial or appeals courts outside their circuit.” With respect to enjoining filings in state courts, principles of federalism especially counsel against blocking state court access.
“In this case, the record does not support the exceptional remedy of a pre-filing injunction even within the courts of the D.C. Circuit, and so it necessarily falls far short of warranting the nationwide pre-filing injunction the district court entered.”
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