The United States Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit (“Federal Appellate Court”) held in its March 12, 2024 published opinion: “Plaintiffs brought this action against the United States pursuant to the Federal Tor Claims Act (“FTCA”), asserting negligence, wrongful death, and survival claims arising from Eleusipa Van Emburgh’s death after she was treated at a Navy medical center. The district court dismissed their claims for lack of subject matter jurisdiction, and this appeal followed. Because we hold that regulations enacted pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 2672 do not impose distinct jurisdictional requirements in addition to those contained in 28 U.S.C. § 2675, we reverse as to six of the plaintiffs and remand for further proceedings. But because one plaintiff, Imelda Crovetto, failed to satisfy one of the jurisdictional requirements listed in § 2675, we affirm as to her claims.”
When filing suit under the FTCA, plaintiffs must satisfy certain jurisdictional prerequisites. One such jurisdictional prerequisite is the administrative exhaustion requirement. 28 U.S.C. § 2675. This administrative exhaustion requirement contains three elements. First, a plaintiff must “present[ their] claim to the appropriate Federal agency[.]” § 2675(a). Second, when a plaintiff presents their claim to the agency, the plaintiff must state the sum they are seeking for their claim. § 2675(b) (“A[n a]ction under this section shall not be instituted for any sum in excess of the amount of the claim presented to the federal agency[.]”). Third, the plaintiff must wait either for the claim to be “finally denied by the agency” or for the agency to fail “to make final disposition of [the] claim within six months after it is filed.” § 2675(a).
In the case the Federal Appellate Court decided, the Government argued that because certain provisions of the FTCA reference the “law of the place” where the act or omissions giving rise to the claim occurred, the exhaustion requirement in § 2675 also incorporates state law. The district court found that Navy regulations impose additional jurisdictional elements as part of the administrative exhaustion requirement: the Navy’s regulations provide that “[a] claim . . . shall be presented[,] . . . in the case of death, by the properly appointed legal representative of the deceased’s estate or survivor where authorized by State law.” 32 C.F.R. § 750.5(b). The Government argued that § 2675 incorporates these regulations and, therefore, that a claim is only properly “presented” for purposes of § 2675 if it complies with the requirements in the regulations. 28 U.S.C. § 2675(a). The Government argued that Plaintiffs did not comply with these additional requirements because Crovetto was not qualified under Virginia law as the representative of the Estate at the time Plaintiffs presented their claims to the Navy and therefore the federal courts lacked jurisdiction over this case.
The Federal Appellate Court responded: “We disagree. The provisions that the Government references explicitly incorporate state law for purposes of determining the scope of the government’s liability. Those statutes have nothing to do with the proper procedure for presentment of the claim to the federal agency, which is governed by § 2675. By contrast, references to the “law of the place” where the act or omission occurred are noticeably absent from § 2675. Thus, we conclude that the only statutory requirements for administrative exhaustion are the three contained in the plain text of § 2675.”
The Federal Appellate Court held: “The Estate and five of the six individual Plaintiffs satisfied the jurisdictional administrative exhaustion requirements laid out in 28 U.S.C. § 2675. Since § 2675 is the only source of the jurisdictional administrative exhaustion requirements, those Plaintiffs satisfied the bare minimum jurisdictional requirements when they submitted their claims to the agency, included a specific valuation of their claims, and waited until after their claims were denied before filing suit. We therefore reverse the dismissal for lack of subject matter jurisdiction of the claims brought by the Estate, James Michael Van Emburgh, James Alan Van Emburgh, Amy Rivera, Alexis Navarro, and Rafael Navarro, and remand for further proceedings consistent with this opinion. Because Imelda Crovetto filed her individual administrative claim without providing a valuation of the claim, however, we affirm the district court’s dismissal of her claim for lack of subject matter jurisdiction.”
Source Estate of Eleusipa v. United States of America, No. 23-1011.
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