WHY THEY DON'T CARE WHAT YOU THINK: THE ROOKER-FELDMAN DOCTRINE AND THE DOMESTIC RELATIONS EXCEPTION!

I just had a friend call me about her case which was recently thrown out of federal court. 

 

"What can I do?" she asked. 

 

I understood her frustration.  Throughout my devastating family court case, I always held federal court out before me as a beacon of hope.  If worse comes to worst, I said to myself, I can go to federal court and ask for relief based upon my constitutional rights. 

 

I had other friends who urged me to go there and knew of others who were there already.  What I didn't realize was that I was actually facing what I call "the stupidity factor" which is when people who know nothing make pronouncements about legal matters they actually know nothing about. 

 

What I mean to say is that going to federal court in order to obtain relief from state court judgments is not as easy as it seems.  There is the Rooker-Feldman Doctrine which states that litigants are not allowed to use the federal court as a court of appeals from state court judgments. 

 

Hello, people, wake up and smell the coffee! 

 

This is why you have to be careful about who you listen to.  I mean, don't even listen to me!  Make sure you double check what I have to say.  Look at my alert at the top of my blog--"I am not an attorney!" 

 

As much as I dislike and distrust attorneys, make sure you check with one before you start bothering the federal court with court actions that ultimately have no place there.  Do your homework first! 

 

Doctrines like Rooker-Feldman protect bad judges, bad attorneys, bad GALs and bad Mental Health Professionals from any kind of accountability for their violations of your constitutional rights.  They are immune, not only because of any judicial immunity they have in State court.  They are also immune because we cannot involve federal court so as to hold these people accountable. 

 

That is why judges and attorneys, etc. have so much fun laughing at us when we invoke our constitutional rights.  Without available federal oversight from the federal court system there is nothing we can do to enforce those constitutional rights.  All they are, when it comes down to it, are a bunch of words on paper given that nothing requires any personnel associated with family court to adhere to them. 

 

And to put a few more nails on the coffin of our constitutional rights, not only do we have the Rooker-Feldman doctrine, there is also the Domestic Relations Exception.  

 

Under this exception, federal courts are required to decline jurisdiction in domestic relations cases when the primary issue concerns such matters as alimony and child support.  The exception originates in the case Barber v. Barber, 62, U.S. (21 How.) 582, 584 (1859)--determined over a hundred years ago--where the Supreme Court ruled, "We disclaim altogether any jurisdiction in the courts of the United States upon the subject of divorce, or for the allowance of alimony..." 

 

Also, in subsequent cases the federal court disclaimed, in dictum, federal jurisdiction of "the whole subject of husband, wife, and child.  I believe there is also a similar probate exception.

 

According to Anthony B. Ullman of the "Columbia Law Review", federal courts have accepted these assertions as implied limitations on their jurisdiction, despite a statutory grant of diversity jurisdiction that nowhere mentions such an exception.  Naturally, under these circumstances the results have been contradictory and confusing. 

 

In 1992, in another case, Ankenbrandt v. Richards, the Federal Court further defined the domestic relations exception stating that it has to do with custody and alimony issues only and not to other issues such as torts. 

 

Still, the bottom line is that this exception gives the Federal Court a broad range of authority to simply dismiss cases emerging from family court particularly when they are brought by self represented parties. 

 

Thus, the Domestic Relations Exception provides an additional barrier to litigants attempting to obtain relief from the denial of their Constitutional and Human Rights.

 

With two such solid barriers in place, no wonder family courts everywhere have such a widespread reputation for negligent legal practice and the routine violation of litigants' rights.  No wonder they are laughing at you, and no wonder they don't care what you think and figure they will get away with all sorts of wrong doing and criminal behavior.

 

Not that I am advocating that you sit down and die in the face of these obstacles.  I would definitely do your research and find a basis in case law for arguing against them.  But don't be naïve and think it is going to be easy.