Kourani v. Department of Justice

Background

Ali Kourani filed the action without a lawyer while incarcerated. He sued the United States Department of Justice and alleged that information from confidential 2017 meetings with Federal Bureau of Investigation Special Agents Kerri Shannon and Joseph Costello had been disclosed. He asserted claims under the Freedom of Information Act, the Administrative Procedure Act, the Federal Tort Claims Act, state law, and federal constitutional provisions. He sought damages, declaratory and injunctive relief, a temporary restraining order, a preliminary injunction, and an order sealing his complaint.

The court summarized Kourani’s related criminal proceedings, including the earlier ruling that the agents’ alleged promise of confidentiality did not amount to an offer of immunity or non-prosecution and that his statements were voluntary. The court also noted that the criminal complaint and indictment had been made public years before this civil action was filed.

Rulings

The court denied the request to seal the complaint. It held that a complaint is a court document subject to a strong presumption of public access and that the information about Kourani’s meetings had already been public for years. The Clerk was directed to make publicly available the complaint, Kourani’s application to proceed without prepaying filing fees, and his initial prisoner trust-account report, which had temporarily been restricted to case participants.

The court dismissed, without prejudice, any claims Kourani attempted to bring for family members or other people because a nonlawyer cannot represent another person in federal court.

The court dismissed Kourani’s claims brought on his own behalf under the doctrine of sovereign immunity. Sovereign immunity generally prevents lawsuits against the federal government and its agencies unless the government has waived that protection. The court held that the Federal Tort Claims Act did not permit the damages claims to proceed because Kourani had not alleged that he first filed the required administrative claim and received a final written decision, or that six months had passed without such a decision. The court also dismissed those claims for lack of subject-matter jurisdiction, meaning the court lacked legal authority to hear them.

The court dismissed the claims for injunctive and declaratory relief under the Administrative Procedure Act, including the constitutional claims, because those claims challenged the unsealing of records by a federal court. The Administrative Procedure Act permits review of certain final actions by federal agencies, but not actions by federal courts. The court therefore concluded that sovereign immunity had not been waived and that it lacked subject-matter jurisdiction.

The court treated Kourani’s request to prevent disclosure of the information as a “reverse Freedom of Information Act” claim. It dismissed that claim because the information had been unsealed by the court in the criminal case, not disclosed by the Department of Justice, and actions by federal courts are not reviewable under the Administrative Procedure Act. The court also stated that the Department of Justice would remain protected by sovereign immunity even if it had made the disclosure alleged by Kourani.

The court declined to exercise supplemental jurisdiction—the authority to hear related state-law claims after federal claims are brought in the same action—because it had dismissed all claims over which it had original federal jurisdiction. It also denied leave to amend, finding that the defects could not be cured by changing the complaint.

Disposition

The court dismissed the action. It dismissed the federal claims for sovereign immunity and lack of subject-matter jurisdiction, declined to consider the state-law claims under supplemental jurisdiction, denied the request to seal the complaint, and denied the requests for a temporary restraining order and preliminary injunction as moot. The court certified that an appeal would not be taken in good faith and denied permission to proceed without prepaying fees for an appeal. It directed the Clerk to enter judgment dismissing the action.