Phillips v. Franchise Tax Board
- Thomas Hixson
- 3:25-cv-07231
- U.S. District Court · Northern District of California
- 1
In Demetrius Phillips v. Franchise Tax Board, Judge Donato denied a temporary restraining order and stayed the case because state tax refund procedures were available.
Demetrius Phillips and the California Franchise Tax Board; the order also stays the case in its entirety pending further order.
What happened
In Demetrius Phillips v. Franchise Tax Board, Demetrius Phillips, who is representing himself, asked the court to stop the California Franchise Tax Board from garnishing his wages to collect unpaid taxes. He argued that the Tax Board lacked legal authority over him.
The court denied Phillips’s request for a temporary restraining order. It relied on the Tax Injunction Act, which generally prevents federal courts from stopping state tax collection when the state provides an adequate remedy. The court said California’s tax-refund procedures were an adequate remedy and that Phillips had not shown otherwise.
Judge Donato also stayed the entire case until further order. The opinion does not state that the court decided the validity of the taxes or Phillips’s underlying legal theory.
The detailed version
- Phillips v. Franchise Tax Board · No. 3:25-cv-07231
- Thomas Hixson
- Sept. 30, 2025
Background
Demetrius Phillips, appearing without a lawyer, asked for a temporary restraining order (TRO), an emergency order intended to prevent immediate harm. He sought to stop the California Franchise Tax Board from garnishing his wages to collect unpaid taxes. Phillips’s theory was that the Tax Board lacked legal authority over him.
Ruling
The court denied the TRO. It applied the Tax Injunction Act, 28 U.S.C. § 1341, which says that federal courts may not enjoin, suspend, or restrain the assessment, levy, or collection of a state tax when the state provides a plain, speedy, and efficient remedy.
The court cited California tax-refund procedures as an available adequate remedy. It found that nothing in Phillips’s complaint or TRO application showed that those procedures were inadequate to address his concerns. On that basis, the court concluded that a TRO was not warranted.
Disposition and effect
The case was stayed in its entirety pending further order. The opinion does not decide whether Phillips’s taxes were valid, whether wage garnishment was lawful on the merits, or whether the Tax Board actually lacked authority over him. The opinion is signed by James Donato, although the supplied case metadata identifies Thomas Hixson as the judge.
Read the full 1-page opinion on CourtListener, the free public archive maintained by the Free Law Project.