Network v. iHeartRadio
- Laura Swain
- 1:25-cv-06155
- U.S. District Court · Southern District of New York
- 2
In Global Media Network v. iHeartRadio, Judge Swain dismissed the action without prejudice because William Scales did not follow a filing restriction.
William Scales and Global Media Network; the action was dismissed without prejudice, and Scales was denied permission to proceed without paying fees for an appeal.
What happened
Global Media Network; William Scales sued iHeartRadio. The court had previously barred Scales from filing future civil actions without paying fees or first obtaining permission to proceed without paying them. Scales filed this case for himself and Global Media Network, did not pay the fees, and did not request permission.
Because no fees were paid, the court treated the case as one seeking permission to proceed without paying. It dismissed the action without prejudice because Scales had not complied with the earlier order. The court also denied permission to proceed without paying fees for an appeal and directed the clerk to enter judgment.
Judge Laura Taylor Swain issued the dismissal order on September 18, 2025. She certified that any appeal would not be taken in good faith.
The detailed version
- Network v. iHeartRadio · No. 1:25-cv-06155
- Laura Swain
- Sept. 18, 2025
Background
On September 11, 2025, William Scales was barred under 28 U.S.C. § 1651 from filing future civil actions in this court without paying the required fees or first obtaining the court’s permission to proceed without paying them. The restriction applied to actions filed in Scales’s own name or in the names of his companies, and the order stated that the injunction took effect on July 23, 2025.
Scales then filed this action in his own name and in the name of Global Media Network (GMN). The opinion states that he proceeded without a lawyer, did not request permission to proceed without paying fees, and did not pay the filing fees. Because the fees were unpaid, the court assumed for purposes of this order that Scales was seeking permission to proceed without paying them.
The court also noted that GMN could not proceed without a lawyer or seek permission to proceed without paying fees. It referenced earlier warnings that Scales’s continued filing of lawsuits for GMN and other artificial entities without counsel could be considered vexatious and could lead to additional filing restrictions.
Ruling
The court dismissed the action without prejudice because Scales failed to comply with the earlier filing restriction. “Without prejudice” means the dismissal did not itself bar a later filing, although the earlier filing requirements remained relevant.
The court certified under 28 U.S.C. § 1915(a)(3) that an appeal would not be taken in good faith and denied permission to proceed without paying fees for purposes of an appeal. It directed the clerk to enter judgment in the action.
Classification and effect
This is a procedural order because the court dismissed the action for failure to comply with a filing restriction and did not decide the underlying dispute with iHeartRadio. The order affected Scales and GMN’s ability to proceed in this action without satisfying the court’s filing requirements.
Read the full 2-page opinion on CourtListener, the free public archive maintained by the Free Law Project.