Kevin Anderson, a former partner at accounting firm BDO USA, sued under ERISA to recover retirement benefits he claimed had accrued during the 54 months he worked as a salaried employee after retiring from the partnership in June 2019 but before fully separating from the firm in December 2023. He argued that the partnership agreement deferred those payments until his separation from service under IRC Section 409A, requiring BDO to pay them as a lump sum starting in January 2024. The court denied Anderson’s motion for judgment and granted BDO’s cross-motion, holding that the governing agreements provided only for prospective monthly payments of the annual retirement benefit beginning after a partner’s separation from service as an employee. The Retirement Agreement, whose terms controlled in any conflict, stated that Anderson would “start receiving retirement benefits commencing” the month after his separation, with no language providing for accrual or lump-sum catch-up payments during continued employment. Section 7.9(a) of the partnership agreement similarly conditioned the start of payments on separation from service under Section 409A but did not establish any right to benefits for periods before that date.
In Verduzco v. United States Department of Justice, plaintiff Susana Verduzco sued the DOJ, the Office of the Attorney General, the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of Arizona, and a government attorney, alleging that federal officials had improperly certified a VA doctor as a federal employee acting within the scope of her duties, removed Verduzco’s prior medical malpractice suit to federal court, and otherwise engaged in deceitful litigation conduct following an alleged non-consensual procedure in 2017. She asserted a Bivens claim for constitutional violations, an intentional infliction of emotional distress claim, and a “fraud on the court” claim. The U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia granted the defendants’ motion to dismiss all claims with prejudice under Rule 12(b)(1). The court held that sovereign immunity barred the Bivens claims because the defendants were federal agencies or an official sued only in her official capacity, that the IIED claim was not properly brought under the FTCA and had not been administratively exhausted, and that the fraud claim was similarly barred by sovereign immunity or the FTCA’s intentional-tort exception.
In Williams v. Department of Housing and Urban Development, plaintiff Juan T. Williams, a Georgia resident appearing pro se, filed suit complaining that it was “shameful” for unhoused individuals to camp outside the Martin Luther King Library in Washington, D.C., and seeking “reasonable accommodations” for unhoused people nationwide. The U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia granted Williams’s request to proceed without prepaying fees but dismissed the complaint without prejudice. The court held that it lacked subject-matter jurisdiction because Williams failed to allege any personal injury traceable to the defendants’ conduct, as required for Article III standing. It further ruled that, as a non-attorney, Williams could not represent the interests of other unhoused individuals in federal court.
In McKeeman v. Bush, plaintiff Rita Faye McKeeman, proceeding pro se, filed a civil complaint against Steven Bush and other defendants in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, along with an application to proceed in forma pauperis. The court granted the application but dismissed the complaint without prejudice. The dismissal occurred because the complaint contained no factual allegations supporting a legal claim, no statement establishing the court’s subject matter jurisdiction, and no demand for relief, failing to satisfy the short and plain statement requirements of Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 8(a) even under the less stringent standard applied to pro se filings.
In McKeeman v. Black Charley, a pro se plaintiff sued multiple defendants in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia and asked to proceed without paying filing fees. The court granted the fee waiver but dismissed the complaint without prejudice. It found that the filing contained no factual allegations supporting any legal claim, no statement establishing the court’s subject-matter jurisdiction, and no request for relief, all of which are required by Rule 8 of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure. Although pro se complaints receive a more lenient reading, they must still satisfy these basic pleading standards so defendants receive fair notice of the claims.
In McKeeman v. Jeffer Family Member, pro se plaintiff Rita Faye McKeeman filed a civil complaint in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia against the named defendants. The court granted her application to proceed in forma pauperis but dismissed the complaint without prejudice. The court explained that even under the more lenient standard applied to pro se filings, the complaint failed to meet Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 8(a) because it contained no factual allegations supporting a legal claim, no statement establishing subject-matter jurisdiction, and no demand for relief.
