Scullark v. Commissioner of Social Security
- Laura Swain
- 1:24-cv-03721
- U.S. District Court · Southern District of New York
- 3
In Scullark v. Commissioner, Judge Swain denied Isaiah Scullark’s extension request as unnecessary and explained that the case could reopen only if he withdrew his pending appeal.
Isaiah Scullark and his district-court case: the extension motion was denied as unnecessary, and the case could be reopened only if he withdrew the pending appeal and notified the court within 45 days.
What happened
In Scullark v. Commissioner of Social Security, Isaiah Scullark asked for more time to appeal after the court dismissed his complaint because he had not submitted a required fee-waiver application or paid the filing fee. He also filed a notice of appeal and a fee-waiver application for the appeal.
The court ruled that no extension was needed because Scullark filed his notice of appeal within 30 days after judgment. Because the appeal was pending, the district court could not reopen the case, even though his application showed that he qualified to proceed without paying the district-court filing fee.
Judge Laura Taylor Swain denied the extension request as unnecessary. She said Scullark could withdraw the appeal and notify the court within 45 days; if he did so, the court would reopen the case, allow him to proceed without paying the filing fee, and assign the case to another district judge. The court also denied fee-waiver status for any appeal from this order.
The detailed version
- Scullark v. Commissioner of Social Security · No. 1:24-cv-03721
- Laura Swain
- Aug. 9, 2024
Background
Isaiah Scullark filed the complaint without a lawyer. On May 15, 2024, the court directed him either to submit an amended application to proceed without paying the filing fee, commonly called an IFP application, or to pay the $405 civil-action filing fee within 30 days. The order warned that failing to comply would result in dismissal.
Scullark did not submit the amended IFP application or pay the fee. The court therefore dismissed the complaint without prejudice under 28 U.S.C. §§ 1914 and 1915 on July 2, 2024, and judgment was entered on July 9, 2024. Scullark later stated that he had not received the May 15 order on time. The clerk’s office had mailed the order and an amended IFP application to his address of record; the envelope was not returned.
Extension request and appeal
Scullark filed a motion for an extension of time to file a notice of appeal and filed the notice of appeal itself on July 29, 2024. The federal appellate rules generally require a notice of appeal in a civil case to be filed within 30 days after judgment. Because Scullark filed his notice within 30 days of the July 9 judgment, the court held that an extension was unnecessary and denied the extension motion on that basis.
The notice of appeal transferred authority over the appealed aspects of the case to the Second Circuit. As a result, the district court held that it could not reopen the case while the appeal was pending, even though Scullark’s attached application showed that he qualified to proceed without paying the filing fee in the district court.
Disposition
The court denied the motion for an extension of time as unnecessary and directed the clerk to terminate that motion. The court stated that Scullark could proceed in the district court only if he withdrew the pending appeal and notified the district court within 45 days. If he did so, the court would reopen the case, grant him permission to proceed without paying the district-court filing fee, and reassign the case to a district judge.
The court also certified under 28 U.S.C. § 1915(a)(3) that an appeal from this order would not be taken in good faith and denied permission to proceed without paying fees for such an appeal. The order did not decide the merits of Scullark’s Social Security claim.
Read the full 3-page opinion on CourtListener, the free public archive maintained by the Free Law Project.