Grant v. Venango County Sheriffs Office

Background

Elizabeth Mary Grant filed the action without a lawyer. The opinion states that she was incarcerated at the Rose M. Singer Center on Rikers Island. She asserted claims arising from events in January 2025 in Oil City, Venango County, Pennsylvania. The defendants were captioned as Venango County Sheriffs, Venango County Jail, Sergeant Williams, Ray Whittan, Ann Graff, and Ruth Thompson. The opinion says that some individual defendants appeared to have been Grant’s neighbors in Pennsylvania.

Venue analysis

Venue is the federal judicial district where a lawsuit may properly proceed. The court applied 28 U.S.C. § 1391 and explained that venue may generally be based on where defendants reside or where a substantial part of the events occurred. The court concluded that venue did not appear proper in the Southern District of New York based on defendants’ residence because not all defendants resided in New York. It also concluded that venue did not appear proper there based on the events because Grant alleged that her rights were violated in Oil City, which is in Venango County and within the Western District of Pennsylvania.

Ruling

The court transferred the action to the United States District Court for the Western District of Pennsylvania under 28 U.S.C. §§ 1404(a) and 1406. The Clerk was directed to make the transfer, no summons was to issue from the Southern District of New York, and the order closed the case in that district. The court stated that the transferee court would decide whether Grant could continue without prepaying fees. Judge Laura Taylor Swain also certified that an appeal would not be taken in good faith and denied fee-free status for purposes of an appeal.