Reyes v. City of New York
- Ho
- 1:23-cv-01145
- U.S. District Court · Southern District of New York
- 4
In Reyes v. City of New York, Judge Ho denied defendants’ motion to dismiss without prejudice and allowed a shorter amended complaint by July 26, 2024.
Dequan Reyes may file a proposed Third Amended Complaint by July 26, 2024; the defendants’ motion to dismiss was denied without prejudice to renewal, and the court stated that the case would be dismissed with prejudice if no proposed amended complaint was received by that deadline.
What happened
In Reyes v. City of New York, Dequan Reyes filed a 270-page second amended complaint about various incidents during at least three years of his incarceration at the George R. Vierno Center. Reyes represented himself, and the defendants moved to dismiss the complaint.
The court ruled that the complaint did not give a short and plain statement of Reyes’s claims, as required by the federal pleading rules. Although it described specific incidents, those allegations appeared among many unclear or unrelated statements, so the defendants did not receive fair notice of the claims.
Judge Dale E. Ho allowed Reyes to file a proposed third amended complaint by July 26, 2024, and directed him to provide a brief, chronological account identifying the defendants involved in each incident where possible. The defendants’ motion to dismiss was denied without prejudice to renewal. The court stated that it would dismiss the case with prejudice if Reyes did not submit the proposed amended complaint by the deadline.
The detailed version
- Reyes v. City of New York · No. 1:23-cv-01145
- Ho
- June 14, 2024
Background
Dequan Reyes initially filed this action on February 9, 2023, and later filed amended complaints. The court treated the First Amended Complaint and additional pages attached to a later filing as the operative Second Amended Complaint. The defendants moved to dismiss that pleading. Reyes responded with a letter that the court treated as a request for permission to amend again if the motion were granted.
Court’s reasoning
Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 8(a)(2) requires a complaint to provide a short and plain statement showing that the plaintiff is entitled to relief. The court explained that dismissal under this rule is generally reserved for complaints so confused, ambiguous, vague, or unintelligible that their substance is difficult to determine. The court also stated that filings by people representing themselves are read liberally, meaning the court tries to interpret them to raise the strongest arguments they reasonably suggest.
Even with that liberal reading, the court found that Reyes’s 270-page Second Amended Complaint did not satisfy Rule 8. The pleading included exhibits among factual allegations and described numerous incidents over at least three years relating to Reyes’s incarceration at the George R. Vierno Center. Although it contained allegations about specific incidents, those allegations appeared among many unclear or unrelated statements and did not give the defendants fair notice of the claims.
Ruling
Judge Dale E. Ho ordered that Reyes could file a proposed Third Amended Complaint by July 26, 2024. The court instructed him to provide a short and plain statement of his claims, present the underlying incidents chronologically where possible, and identify which defendants were involved in each incident where possible. The court stated that he did not need to submit documentary evidence at this stage. Defendants’ motion to dismiss was denied without prejudice to renewal. The court stated that if Reyes did not submit a proposed Third Amended Complaint by the deadline, it would dismiss the case with prejudice.
Read the full 4-page opinion on CourtListener, the free public archive maintained by the Free Law Project.