Sivak v. Perea
- Martinez-Olguin
- 3:24-cv-01487
- U.S. District Court · Northern District of California
- 3
In Sivak v. Perea, Judge Martinez-Olguin dismissed the cases without prejudice after Sivak failed to pay filing fees and denied pending appellate fee requests.
Lacey Sivak's listed actions were dismissed without prejudice after he failed to pay the required filing fees. Any pending requests to proceed without paying fees on appeal were also denied, while the Ninth Circuit retained authority to decide appellate fee status.
What happened
In Sivak v. Perea, Lacey Sivak, who represented himself, filed the listed actions while incarcerated. The court had denied his requests to proceed without paying filing fees because he had at least three prior qualifying dismissals and did not show an immediate risk of serious physical injury.
The court gave Sivak 14 days to pay the full filing fee in each case. He did not pay by the deadline and instead appealed some of the orders. The court said it still had authority to act because the appeals had not yet been authorized by the Ninth Circuit.
Judge Araceli Martinez-Olguin dismissed each action without prejudice. The court also denied any pending requests to proceed without paying fees on appeal, terminated the other pending motions as moot, and closed the cases.
The detailed version
- Sivak v. Perea · No. 3:24-cv-01487
- Martinez-Olguin
- July 11, 2024
Background
Lacey Sivak, described as an Idaho state prisoner and frequent litigant, filed the listed actions without a lawyer. In each case, the court denied his request to proceed without paying the filing fee under 28 U.S.C. § 1915(g). That provision, part of the Prison Litigation Reform Act, generally prevents a prisoner from proceeding without paying fees after three or more qualifying prior dismissals, unless the prisoner shows an imminent danger of serious physical injury.
The court found that Sivak had three or more prior dismissals, had not alleged a specific imminent danger of serious physical injury when he filed the actions, and did not meet the standard for proceeding without payment as a prisoner with many prior dismissed lawsuits. The court ordered him to pay the full filing fee within 14 days or risk dismissal without prejudice.
Appeals and jurisdiction
Sivak did not pay the filing fees by the deadline. Instead, he appealed some of the orders. The court explained that an interlocutory appeal—an appeal taken before the case is finished—does not take effect until the court of appeals permits it. Because the Ninth Circuit had not granted permission for these appeals, the district court concluded that it retained authority over the actions.
Ruling
The court DISMISSED WITHOUT PREJUDICE each listed action. This means the dismissals did not bar Sivak from seeking to reopen the cases after paying the full filing fee. The court stated that a separate full filing fee would be required for each case he wished to reopen and pursue.
The court also DENIED, under 28 U.S.C. § 1915(g), any pending motion for leave to proceed without paying the filing fee on appeal, for the same reasons it had denied that status in the district court. It explained that the Ninth Circuit would independently review the record and decide whether Sivak could proceed without paying the appellate fee. The Clerk was directed to terminate all other pending motions as moot and close the cases.
Classification
This is a procedural order because the court dismissed the actions for failure to pay filing fees after denying fee-waiver status; it did not decide the underlying claims.
Read the full 3-page opinion on CourtListener, the free public archive maintained by the Free Law Project.