United States Court of Appeals,
Fifth Circuit.
No. 95-40310.
Robert Lee WESTFALL, Plaintiff-Appellant,
v.
Wayne MILLER, Chief, National Firearms Act Branch, Department of
the Treasury, and the United States of America, Defendants-
Appellees.
March 18, 1996.
Appeal from the United States District Court for the Eastern
District of Texas.
Before KING, STEWART and PARKER, Circuit Judges.
STEWART, Circuit Judge:
Robert Lee Westfall appeals the district court's judgment,
which held that Westfall lacked standing to challenge the law
enforcement certification requirement, that even if Westfall had
standing mandamus was an improper remedy and the Administrative
Procedure Act did not provide jurisdiction over the action, and
further that Westfall failed to state a claim upon which relief
could be granted because the law enforcement requirement does not
violate the Tenth, Fifth, or Fourteenth Amendments of the
Constitution. Finding that Westfall lacks standing, we affirm.
FACTS
On March 16, 1993, Robert Lee Westfall contracted to purchase
an AWC Systems Technology machinegun. Federal regulations require
a transferee of a machinegun to submit to the National Firearms Act
Branch of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms ("ATF") an
ATF Form 4, which is an application for Tax Paid Transfer and
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Registration of Firearm. ATF Form 4 requires the transferee to
obtain a certification from a local law enforcement official that,
inter alia, the official has no knowledge that the transferee will
use the firearm for an unlawful purpose.
Westfall, who resides in the City of Plano, Collin County,
Texas, requested the required certification from the officials
located within five miles of his home: the City of Plano Chief of
Police, the Sheriff of Collin County, and the Collin County
District Attorney. Each of these officials declined or refused to
complete the certification. Nevertheless, on July 7, 1993,
Westfall submitted his Form 4 and other prescribed documents to the
ATF. He attached a letter challenging the legal basis for the law
enforcement certification. Additionally, Westfall attached an
affidavit explaining that he had unsuccessfully attempted to obtain
certification from the chief of police, the sheriff, and the
district attorney in his area.
On August 27, 1993, Wayne Miller, the chief of the National
Firearms Branch of the ATF, sent Westfall a letter refusing to
process Westfall's application because it was incomplete without
the required law enforcement certification. Miller also informed
Westfall that the transferee has the burden of obtaining the law
enforcement certification and advised Westfall of other officials
who could give the certification. The proposed certifying
officials included the head of the state police and certain judges.
Westfall filed suit on October 20, 1993 against Miller in his
official capacity and the United States, seeking a declaration that
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the law enforcement provision of 27 C.F.R. § 179.85 violated the
Tenth and Fourteenth Amendments of the Constitution, as well as a
writ of mandamus directing the ATF to approve his application.
Westfall amended his complaint to add that § 179.85 also violated
his Fifth Amendment right to due process. The ATF moved to dismiss
Westfall's complaints, and soon thereafter Westfall sought summary
judgment.
On March 28, 1995, the district court granted the ATF's motion
to dismiss with prejudice. First, the district court held that
Westfall did not have standing to challenge the certification
requirement because he had not exhausted his certification options
prior to filing suit. Second, the district court held that even if
Westfall had standing, mandamus was not the appropriate remedy.
Third, the district court concluded that the Administrative
Procedure Act did not provide jurisdiction. Finally, the district
court held that the complaint failed to state a claim upon which
relief could be granted because the law enforcement certification
requirement did not violate the Constitution. The Tenth Amendment
was not violated because state officials do not have a duty to make
the certification. Westfall could not establish a Fifth Amendment
due process violation because he did not have a property right in
possession of a machinegun. Further, Fourteenth Amendment due
process was not implicated because there was no state action.
Westfall timely appealed.
DISCUSSION
A. STANDARD OF REVIEW.
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We review de novo the granting of a motion to dismiss,
accepting as true all well pleaded assertions in the light most
favorable to the plaintiff. See American Waste & Pollution Control
Co. v. Browning-Ferris, 949 F.2d 1384, 1386 (5th Cir.1991).
Dismissal is appropriate only if the district court could not
afford relief to the plaintiff under any set of facts consistent
with the allegations in the complaint. Id. Accordingly, we will
uphold the dismissal only if it "appears beyond doubt that the
plaintiff can prove no set of facts in support of his claim which
would entitle him to relief." Conley v. Gibson, 355 U.S. 41, 45-
46, 78 S.Ct. 99, 102, 2 L.Ed.2d 80 (1957). In viewing the facts in
favor of the plaintiff, we need not strain to find inferences
favorable to the plaintiff. Therefore, we will view the facts in
Westfall's favor, and Westfall is entitled to all inferences that
surface from a fair and reasonable reading of the pleadings.
B. STANDING.
Before we can address the merits of Westfall's arguments we
must determine whether Westfall is the appropriate party to raise
these complaints. Just because Westfall does not like the firearms
regulation does not give him standing to complain about its
legality. The courts are designed to address only grievances of
people who have suffered real injuries causally linked to the
defendant's alleged unlawful conduct and likely to be redressed by
the requested relief. See U.S. Const. art. III; see also
Northeastern Florida Chapter of the Associated General Contractors
of America v. City of Jacksonville, 508 U.S. 656, ----, 113 S.Ct.
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2297, 2301-02, 124 L.Ed.2d 586, 595-96 (1993). The Supreme Court
explained the three elements of standing as follows:
It has been established by a long line of cases that a party
seeking to invoke a federal court's jurisdiction must
demonstrate three things: (1) "injury in fact," by which we
mean an invasion of a legally protected interest that is (a)
concrete and particularized, and (b) actual or imminent, not
conjectural or hypothetical, ...; (2) a causal relationship
between the injury and the challenged conduct, by which we
mean that the injury fairly can be traced to the challenged
action of the defendant, and has not resulted from the
independent action of some third party not before the court,
...; and (3) a likelihood that the injury will be redressed
by a favorable decision, by which we mean that the prospect of
obtaining relief from the injury as a result of the favorable
ruling in not too speculative.
Id. (citations and quotations omitted). Accordingly, we must first
examine the substance of Westfall's injuries before diving into the
constitutional complaints alleged.
The district court found that Westfall lacked standing
because he failed to exhaust his certification options before
filing suit. Therefore, the court concluded that Westfall failed
to demonstrate a causal link between the certification requirement
and his injury.
Westfall argues that he fully complied with all constitutional
and lawful requirements of 27 C.F.R. § 179.85. He claims that the
ATF's contention that he must seek certification from the head of
the Texas State Police (a position which he contends does not
exist) or other officials is an attempt to unreasonably expand the
list of qualified individuals who may certify his application.
Finally, Westfall asserts that the Eleventh Circuit in Steele v.
National Firearms Act Branch, 755 F.2d 1410 (11th Cir.1985),
impliedly held that a firearm purchaser would have standing to
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challenge the regulations by holding that a seller lacked standing
to challenge them.
On the other hand, the ATF argues that Westfall has failed to
establish the necessary causal link between his injury and the
regulation because he has not shown that he is not the cause in
fact of his injury. The ATF further alleges that Westfall has not
pursued certification from all specified persons, such as the head
of the Texas State Police (which the ATF contends is the Texas
Department of Public Safety). Finally, the ATF maintains that
Westfall misinterprets the Steele decision.
We agree with the district court and with the ATF that
Westfall lacks standing to bring the instant action. Westfall
correctly directs our attention to Steele, which persuasively
addresses the issue in a different context; however, we find that
Westfall grossly misinterprets Steele. In Steele, the Eleventh
Circuit analyzed whether Steele, a seller of firearms, had standing
to challenge the law enforcement certification requirement. 755
F.2d at 1413-15. Steele submitted requests to State Attorney Janet
Reno, United States Attorney Atlee Wampler, and United States
Marshall Carlos Cruz, who all refused to sign the certificate. Id.
at 1413. The National Firearms Act Branch (NFAB) informed Steele,
that although he was an attorney, the NFAB probably would not
accept the certificate with his signature in the certification
section. The NFAB also notified Steele that there were other local
officials, besides Reno, whose signature the NFAB would accept.
Steele filed suit without seeking attestations from any other local
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officials. The Eleventh Circuit found that Steele could not
satisfy the causation element of the standing inquiry. Id. at
1414. The court explained as follows:
The allegedly illegal conduct challenged by the appellant is
the NFAB's refusal to approve firearms transfers without a
properly supported Form 4539. The line of causation from that
conduct to plaintiff's injury is not established from the
allegations of the complaint or other materials in the record.
The challenged regulation indicates that local law enforcement
officials are eligible to sign the form, and the exhibits
attached to the complaint indicate that appellant was directed
to such officials. Appellant's inability to sell his
inventory would be fairly traceable to the purportedly
unlawful conduct only if all of the eligible signers listed in
the regulation would not sign the form.... Without such an
allegation [that local officials other than Reno refused to
sign the form] ..., this court cannot be sure whether the
injury was caused by the defendant's actions or by appellant's
failure to pursue all possible avenues listed in the
regulation to obtain the required signatures.
Id. The Eleventh Circuit clarified that the causation element is
satisfied only if the petitioner exhausts the remedies available in
the regulation. Steele had not requested signatures from all
acceptable officials listed in the statute. Accordingly, the court
could not determine whether the injury Steele alleged was
self-inflicted by his own inaction.
We are persuaded by the reasoning of the Eleventh Circuit and
adapt its analysis to fit the specific issue presented here.
Westfall requested signatures of some local officials who refused
to make the required certification. Although the ATF informed
Westfall of other acceptable local officials, Westfall made no
effort to obtain certifications from these officials. We can only
conclude that his inaction has caused any injury he has suffered.
We fully understand that, as the regulation is written, Westfall
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may possibly have to face more rejection or even go outside of the
five mile radius of his home in order to exhaust the regulation's
list of certifying officials. We also acknowledge that this
process may prove to be cumbersome, frustrating, and inconvenient
for Westfall. Nonetheless, we find the completion of the statutory
procedure necessary to establish Westfall's injury. Moreover, we
cannot ignore the fact that Westfall will not have an injury of
which to complain if the chief of the Texas Department of Public
Safety or a judge in his area provides the requested certification.
Under the facts of this case we also must reject Westfall's
arguments that the ATF is attempting to unreasonably expand the
list of qualified individuals who may certify his application. The
ATF's suggestion is consistent with the directives of the statute.
Section 179.85 specifically lists the head of the state police,
whose functional equivalent in this case is the head of the Texas
Department of Public Safety,1 as a certification option. Enforcing
1
The head of the Department of Public Safety, the highest
law enforcement official in the state of Texas, is the official
whom Texas law enforcement bodies recognize as the head of the
state police. The ATF, citing Texas Gov't Code § 411.002,
indicates in its brief that the Texas Department of Public Safety
is the State Police of Texas "since it is an agency of the State
which enforces the laws protecting the public safety and
providing for the prevention and detention of crime." The letter
from the City of Plano police department, which declined to
provide the certification, specifically advised Westfall to seek
certification from the head of the Department of Public Safety.
The ATF's post-argument submission to this court demonstrates
that the Director of the Department of Public Safety has
completed the law enforcement certification for some of the
recently approved Form 4 transfer application. Therefore, it is
more than mere supposition that Westfall could get the necessary
certification from the head of the Texas State Police by
soliciting the Director of the Department of Public Safety.
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the statute as written certainly cannot be interpreted as an
unreasonable expansion. Further, requiring Westfall to seek
certification from local judges is consistent with case law
interpreting § 179.85. Compare Steele, 755 F.2d at 1415 n. 3
(where the appellate court impliedly noted that it was reasonable
to require the transferee to seek certification from the other
local officials in his area before the transferee was eligible to
challenge the legality of the law enforcement requirement).2 We
find, therefore, that the ATF was completely within its authority
to require Westfall to exhaust these certification options.
Westfall has failed to establish that he has suffered an
injury in fact which is fairly traceable to actions taken by the
ATF. Thus, the district court correctly dismissed Westfall's
complaint.
CONCLUSION
For the foregoing reasons, we AFFIRM the district court's
2
The ATF's list of qualified officials from whom Westfall
could seek certification appears even more reasonable in light of
the number of transfer applications approved using the Form 4
process with signatures from the very officials from whom
Westfall refused to seek certification. The ATF approved a total
of 1,275 Form 4 transfer applications for Texas transferees
between March 16, 1993 (the date Westfall contracted to purchase
the machinegun) and November 25, 1995. Of the 1,275
applications, 829 transfers involved Texas transferees receiving
machineguns. Certifying officials included chiefs of police,
sheriffs, the director of the Texas Department of Public Safety,
local district attorneys, Texas state court judges, county
attorneys, Texas marshals, Texas constables, and United States
provost marshals. The ATF has not asked Westfall to seek
certification from any official that has not already certified a
Form 4 application. Accordingly, the ATF has not expanded its
list of qualifying officials, and its instruction to Westfall to
exhaust the already established list was not unreasonable.
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judgment dismissing Westfall's complaint with prejudice.
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