Cataldo v. Mead
- Laura Swain
- 1:25-cv-03978
- U.S. District Court · Southern District of New York
- 3
In Cataldo v. Mead, Chief Judge Swain transferred Cataldo’s Section 1983 case from New York to Pennsylvania because venue was improper.
Jason Cataldo’s case was transferred from the Southern District of New York to the Western District of Pennsylvania; the Pennsylvania court will decide whether he may proceed without prepaying filing fees.
What happened
In Cataldo v. Mead, Jason Cataldo, representing himself, sued Judge John J. Mead and other defendants under a civil-rights law about criminal proceedings in Erie and Warren Counties, Pennsylvania.
The court ruled that New York was not the proper venue because the defendants were not all New York residents and the events described in the complaint occurred in Pennsylvania. It concluded that the case belonged in the Western District of Pennsylvania.
Chief Judge Swain ordered the case transferred there in the interest of justice. The New York court closed the case, did not issue a summons, and left any decision about waiving filing fees to the Pennsylvania court; it also denied fee-free status for an appeal.
The detailed version
- Cataldo v. Mead · No. 1:25-cv-03978
- Laura Swain
- May 22, 2025
Background
Jason Cataldo, who was representing himself and was homeless, brought an action under 42 U.S.C. § 1983 concerning criminal proceedings in Erie and Warren Counties, Pennsylvania. The defendants included Judge John J. Mead, police officers, a district attorney, probation officers, jail wardens, and Stairways, Inc., a private mental-health treatment program located in Pennsylvania.
Venue Analysis
The court applied 28 U.S.C. § 1391(b), the federal venue statute. It found that venue was not proper in the Southern District of New York because all defendants were not residents of New York and because the alleged events occurred in Erie and Warren Counties. Those counties are within the Western District of Pennsylvania.
Under 28 U.S.C. § 1406(a), when a case is filed in the wrong venue, the court may dismiss it or, when justice requires, transfer it to a district where it could have been filed. The court determined that the action could have been brought in the Western District of Pennsylvania and that transferring it was in the interest of justice.
Ruling
Chief Judge Laura Taylor Swain directed the Clerk of Court to transfer the action to the United States District Court for the Western District of Pennsylvania. The order closed the case in the Southern District of New York, and no summons was to issue from that court. The Pennsylvania court would decide whether Cataldo could proceed without prepaying filing fees. Because Cataldo had not paid the filing fee or requested a waiver, the court also certified that an appeal would not be taken in good faith and denied fee-free status for purposes of an appeal.
Read the full 3-page opinion on CourtListener, the free public archive maintained by the Free Law Project.