Jeffrey Hout v. United States

N OTE : This disposition is nonprecedential.
United States Court of Appeals
for the Federal Circuit
______________________
JEFFREY HOUT,
Plaintiff-Appellant
RALPH HERNANDEZ,
Plaintiff
v.
UNITED STATES,
Defendant-Appellee
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2025-1247
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Appeal from the United States Court of Federal Claims
in No. 1:24-cv-01032-RTH, Judge Ryan T. Holte.
______________________
Decided: August 11, 2025
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J EFFREY HOUT, Wasilla, AK, pro se.
A NNE DELMARE , Commercial Litigation Branch, Civil
Division, United States Department of Justice, Washing-
ton, DC, for defendant-appellee. Also represented by E RIC
P. BRUSKIN, PATRICIA M. MCCARTHY, Y AAKOV R OTH .
______________________
Case: 25-1247 Document: 20 Page: 1 Filed: 08/11/2025

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HOUT v. US 2
P ER C URIAM .
Jeffrey Hout appeals the dismissal of his action in the
U.S. Court of Federal Claims (“Claims Court”) for failure
to prosecute.1 We have jurisdiction under 28 U.S.C.
§ 1295(a)(3).
Pursuant to Rule 41(b) of the Rules of the Court of Fed-
eral Claims (“RCFC”), the Claims Court may dismiss a case
on its own motion “[i]f the plaintiff fails to prosecute or to
comply with these rules or a court order.” We review a dis-
missal pursuant to RCFC 41(b) for abuse of discretion. Ka-
din Corp. v. United States, 782 F.2d 175, 176 (Fed. Cir.
1986). We also review a trial court’s timeliness determina-
tion for abuse of discretion. See NAACP v. New York, 413
U.S. 345, 365–66 (1973).
We see no abuse of discretion by the Claims Court in
this case. Incarcerated pro se plaintiff Mr. Hout filed his
Complaint in the Claims Court alleging “fraud and obstruc-
tion of justice” “against Alaska’s Governor.” S.A. 1, 4–5.2
On July 12, 2024, the Claims Court, “suspect[ing] it
lack[ed] jurisdiction over [Mr. Hout]’s claims,” ordered
Mr. Hout to show cause as to why his case should not be
dismissed for lack of subject-matter jurisdiction pursuant
to RCFC 12(h)(3). S.A. 17–18. Specifically, the Claims
Court required Mr. Hout to, by August 12, 2024, “identify
which source or sources of money-mandating law he is in-
voking, identify how his claims are against the United
States, and explain why [the Claims Court] has jurisdiction
over this case.” S.A. 18. As of September 23, 2024,
Mr. Hout had “still not filed a show cause as to why the
1 Today, we also issue an opinion in a companion ap-
peal, Hernandez v. United States, No. 25-1248 (Fed. Cir.),
where essentially the same allegations are made.
2 “S.A.” refers to the supplemental appendix in-
cluded with the government’s informal brief.
Case: 25-1247 Document: 20 Page: 2 Filed: 08/11/2025

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HOUT v. US 3
[Claims] Court has jurisdiction over his claims.” S.A. 21–
22.
Although Mr. Hout is proceeding pro se, the show cause
order was unambiguous and clearly directed him to file a
response explaining the jurisdictional basis for his case by
the stated deadline. S.A. 18. When Mr. Hout failed to re-
spond by the initial deadline, the Claims Court afforded
Mr. Hout an additional opportunity to respond, extending
the deadline to October 7, 2024, and warned Mr. Hout that
if he still failed to file a response, the court “will have no
choice but to dismiss [his] Complaint for failure to prose-
cute pursuant to RCFC 41(b).” S.A. 21–22. There is no
dispute that Mr. Hout’s next filing was not received by the
Claims Court until October 25, 2024—eighteen days after
the deadline, and a day after the Claims Court dismissed
the action and directed that judgment be entered. Appel-
lee’s Informal Br. 3–4; Informal Reply Br. 7.3
We hold that the Claims Court did not abuse its discre-
tion in determining that Mr. Hout failed to timely file a re-
sponse to the show cause order. Because that failure is
dispositive, we affirm.
AFFIRMED
C OSTS
No costs.
3 We cite to the ECF page numbers.
Case: 25-1247 Document: 20 Page: 3 Filed: 08/11/2025

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