Sepehry-Fard v. Lee

Background

Fareed Sepehry-Fard filed the case representing himself. The defendants remaining when this order was issued were Santa Clara County Sheriff Laurie Smith, Detective Michael McRoberts, and Deputy Hakeem Lee. The court had previously dismissed the other named defendants, including the Bank Defendants, Amar R. Patel, and Nationstar Mortgage LLC.

The First Amended Complaint described a February 2020 incident involving McRoberts and Lee. Sepehry-Fard alleged that they approached him, tried to speak with him, stopped him from recording them, twisted his arms, handcuffed him, and kidnapped him. He also alleged that Lee tied his left hand to a chair with severe and unwarranted force, and that McRoberts did not allow him to take prescribed medication after he reported heart palpitations, anxiety, pain, sickness, and weakness. He alleged that McRoberts and Lee searched his wallet and phone and violated his constitutional rights.

As to Sheriff Smith, Sepehry-Fard alleged that she had agreed that each constitutional violation was worth $100 million and that she, McRoberts, and Lee were incentivized by the Bank Defendants to harass, threaten, kidnap, torture, restrain, and attack him. The complaint also included general allegations that all defendants violated his rights to private land, engaged in racketeering, owed him $300 million, and acted with deliberate indifference to his medical needs.

Motion and legal standard

The Santa Clara County defendants moved to dismiss under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 12(b)(6), which tests whether a complaint states a legally sufficient claim. The court explained that a complaint must provide enough factual matter to make relief plausible, rather than merely possible. Because Sepehry-Fard was representing himself, the court applied a less demanding standard, but said the complaint still had to give defendants notice of what each allegedly did wrong.

The court also considered Sepehry-Fard’s request for judicial notice. He asked the court to recognize what he described as an “Original 13th Amendment” ratified in 1812 and an affidavit asserting that he was a United States citizen. The court denied the request because the matters were not appropriate for judicial notice and the affidavit was unnecessary to the court’s analysis.

Court’s analysis

The court found that the First Amended Complaint did not describe a discernible legal cause of action against the Santa Clara County defendants. An earlier order had said the original complaint appeared to seek relief under 42 U.S.C. § 1983, a federal law allowing certain claims for constitutional violations by state actors. But in opposing dismissal, Sepehry-Fard expressly rejected that characterization and said his claims were based on the Fourth Amendment. The court stated that the First Amended Complaint mentioned the Fourth Amendment only once, in a footnote that did not mention the Santa Clara County defendants. Because the court could not use the opposition brief to supply missing allegations in the complaint, the nature of the claims remained unclear.

The court separately found that the allegations against Sheriff Smith lacked comprehensible supporting facts. Sepehry-Fard’s opposition described alleged failures to perform official duties, racketeering, failure to train deputies, and a conspiracy, but the court found that the First Amended Complaint did not contain those factual allegations in a usable form. The court also found that the complaint did not adequately allege Smith’s personal participation in a constitutional violation. The allegations that the Bank Defendants bribed or incentivized Smith were conclusory and insufficient by themselves.

Finally, the court found that the general allegations against all defendants did not identify which claims were asserted against which defendants. The court characterized those allegations as incomprehensible and concluded that they did not show entitlement to relief under the complaint-writing requirements of Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 8(a).

Disposition

The court granted the Santa Clara County defendants’ Motion to Dismiss. It dismissed the First Amended Complaint with leave to amend, allowing Sepehry-Fard 21 days to file a second amended complaint addressing the deficiencies. The court stated that if he did not file one, it would assume he had abandoned the case. Judge Edward J. Davila also vacated the scheduled hearing.