MEMORANDUM OPINION
BERYL
A. HOWELL, CHIEF JUDGE.
The
pro se plaintiff, Victor Ivy Brown, sues the
Secretary of Defense for money damages and declaratory
relief. This action is “spawned” from the
plaintiff's prior employment discrimination case in this
court, Compl. at 2, ECF No. 1 (citing Brown v. Dep't
of the Navy, No. 86-cv-1582 (closed Oct. 1, 1987)
(“Brown I”), where he prevailed against
the Department of Navy and was awarded injunctive relief and
“gross damages of $121, 706.64, ” Brown v.
United States, No. 14-1185T, 2015 WL 4450109, at *1
(Fed. Cl. July 17, 2015). In this case, the plaintiff
“seeks to recover the sum of $11, 849.24” that
the defendant allegedly “seized” from the award
“and then used . . . to pay taxes and penalties for
which the [p]laintiff was not obligated.” Compl. at 2.
The plaintiff “further seeks compensatory damages for
loss of the use of said monies retroactive to 7 April
1988.” Id.
Pending
is the Defendant's Motion to Dismiss pursuant to Federal
Rules of Civil Procedure 12(b)(1) and 12(b)(6), ECF No. 19,
and the Plaintiff's Opposition and Motion to Compel an
Answer from the defendant, ECF Nos. 29, 30, respectively. For
the reasons explained below, the defendant's motion is
granted, the plaintiff's motion is denied, and this case
is dismissed for lack of subject matter jurisdiction.
I.
BACKGROUND
A.
Procedural Posture
Since
2002, the plaintiff has filed a number of unsuccessful
actions in this Court and in the U.S. Court of Federal Claims
to recover $2, 727 that he claimed was “erroneously
deducted from his back pay award.” Brown, 2015
WL 4450109, at *1; see id. at 2 (noting that
“[t]his suit is the latest iteration of plaintiff's
quest for the return of the $2, 727.00”); Brown v.
Dalton, 312 F.R.D. 239, 244 (D.D.C. 2015)
(“Plaintiff has been litigating his claims regarding
the 1987 tax withholding since at least 2002.”) (citing
Brown v. Dep't of the Navy, No. 86-1582 (D.D.C.
Aug. II, 2003)). On September 21, 2012, this Court dismissed
the plaintiff's complaint on res
judicata grounds, finding:
Without question, the plaintiff's claim to $2, 727.00
arises from the judgment entered in his favor in the prior
Title VII suit against the Department of the Navy. The
plaintiff's opportunity to litigate the amount owed to
him pursuant to that judgment-and the $2, 727.00 allegedly
withheld from him and erroneously paid in Social Security
taxes on his behalf in 1988-has come and gone.
Brown v. Mabus, 892 F.Supp.2d 115, 118 (D.D.C.
2012), aff'd, 548 Fed. App'x 623 (D.C. Cir.
2013) (per curiam) (on appeal from No. 11-cv-1922 (BAH)). The
United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia
Circuit affirmed the dismissal order, stating:
Even assuming, without deciding, that appellant's claim
did not accrue until the date of discovery, and even
assuming, without deciding, that equitable tolling applies,
appellant did not file his complaint within the period
specified by 28 U.S.C. 2401(a). We reject appellant's
argument that his claim did not accrue until March 9, 2010,
because he was on notice of his claims by 2001, or by 2004 at
the latest. Moreover, because appellant's complaint did
not seek relief under Title VII, this case does not implicate
the interaction between the limitations period set out in
§ 2401(a) and the period set out in 42 U.S.C. §
2000e-16(c). In any event, the complaint was not timely filed
even under the latter provision.
Brown, 548 Fed. App'x at 624.
Almost
three years later, on March 9, 2016, the plaintiff lodged
with the Clerk of Court the instant 40-page complaint
asserting, in Counts I through XI, myriad claims regarding
the defendant's alleged “illegal seizure of all of
the monies at issue” that were used “to pay taxes
and penalties on behalf of the Plaintiff” back in 1988,
Compl. at 38, and expressly conceding that, for some claims
at least, he “hereby repeats the argument which he
sought to pursue in the previous courts to which he has
brought this matter, ” id.; see also
id. at 39 (stating that he “merely repeats the
argument which he uttered before this Court in CA
86-cv-1582”). On May 31, 2016, the Court dismissed the
case sua sponte on the grounds that the complaint
was barred by res judicata and by time. See
Mem. Op. at 2, ECF No. 4. The plaintiff appealed to the D.C.
Circuit. On appeal, the defendant “argue[d] that a 2003
district court decision denying a contempt motion serve[d] as
the res judicata bar.” Brown v.
Mattis, 701 Fed. App'x 3 (D.C. Cir. Oct. 12, 2017)
(per curiam). The D.C. Circuit rejected that argument, and it
could not discern “which claims the [district] court
[had] deemed untimely.” Id. Therefore, it
remanded the case for this Court “to consider in the
first instance the timeliness and other arguments” of
the parties. Id. The case was then reassigned to the
undersigned Judge on January 26, 2018.
B.
Factual Posture
The
plaintiff alleges the following relevant facts, which also
formed the basis of Civil Action No. 11-1922. See
Brown, 892 F.Supp.2d at 115. By check dated April 7,
1988, in the amount of $80, 839.30, the defendant “paid
the bulk of the monies ordered to be paid” in Brown
I. Compl. at 10, ¶ 5. At that time, the defendant
provided the plaintiff “with detailed computations
indicating that the gross amount of the damages . . . was
$121, 706.64.” Id. ¶ 6. The “damage
award . . . covered the period” between December 27,
1982 and January 31, 1988, for back pay. Compl. at 3.
In
1997, the plaintiff “was first notified by the Social
Security Administration that [the Department of Navy] had
deducted $2, 727.00 from the back-pay award in 1988.”
Id. at 5. According to the plaintiff, the defendant
“had no authority to levy Social Security taxes against
[him]” for that period; he “was not liable”
for said taxes; and the Internal Revenue Service Commissioner
confirmed in a letter dated February 19, 2002, that he
“was not obligated to pay Social Security taxes for the
tax year 1988.” Compl. at 10, ¶¶ 8-10. In
August 2001, upon examining “all of [his] pay
statements” dating from April 9, 1988, the plaintiff
“observed that the [Department of Navy] had deducted
$9, 122.24 from the . . . back pay award, purportedly for the
[p]laintiff having been indebted to the Government”
before April 1988. Compl. at 4, 5. Allegedly, in a document
dated December 10, 2015, which the plaintiff ...