DiDonna v. Harold L. Smith
- Kenneth Karas
- 7:22-cv-06107
- U.S. District Court · Southern District of New York
- 3
In Didonna v. Smith, Judge Karas ordered Prime Care to provide addresses for four nurses so they could be served.
Louis Andrew Didonna, Prime Care Medical, Inc., and the four defendants—Kim, Lynn Elkins, Christine Bermington, and Anderson—for whom service addresses were sought.
What happened
Louis Andrew Didonna v. Harold L. Smith, et al. concerns service of Didonna’s Third Amended Complaint, which named individual defendants, Sullivan County, Sullivan County Jail, and Prime Care Medical. Some defendants had been served, while Sullivan County Jail had been terminated from the case.
Earlier service attempts for several defendants were unsuccessful. The court ordered Prime Care Medical to provide accurate service addresses, including forwarding addresses for former employees, for Nurses Kim, Lynn Elkins, Christine Bermington, and Anderson within 30 days.
Judge Kenneth M. Karas also directed the Clerk of Court to mail Prime Care copies of the order and related filings. This order addressed identifying service information and did not decide the underlying claims.
The detailed version
- DiDonna v. Harold L. Smith · No. 7:22-cv-06107
- Kenneth Karas
- Oct. 17, 2025
Background
The court had previously directed Louis Andrew Didonna to file a Third Amended Complaint containing all factual allegations, defendants, and claims he wanted to assert. The court treated his filing at Docket No. 53 as that complaint.
The complaint named Harold Smith, Lieutenant Bini, Deputy Fancher, Deputy Lawrence, Head Nurse Wendy Moore, Nurse Santini, Sullivan County, New York, Sullivan County Jail, Prime Care Medical, Inc., Nurse Kim, Nurse Lynn Elkins, Nurse Christine Bermington, Nurse Anderson, Sgt. Robert W. Mass, Connor Stewart, Kyle Farrand, Deputy Skow, and Constable Ketchem as defendants. The opinion states that Harold Smith, Deputy Fancher, Sullivan County, Lieutenant Bini, and Prime Care had been served, although Prime Care had not appeared. Sullivan County Jail had already been terminated from the action.
Service Efforts
Didonna provided service addresses for the defendants, but many repeated addresses at which the United States Marshals Service had previously been unable to complete service. Relying on the rule that a self-represented plaintiff is entitled to court assistance in identifying defendants and obtaining proper service addresses, the court had ordered the Sullivan County Attorney and the New York Attorney General to provide address information for specified defendants.
The Sullivan County Attorney identified Kim, Elkins, Bermington, and Anderson as Prime Care employees and provided Prime Care’s address as their service address. The Marshals Service then attempted service at that address, but service was unsuccessful. Prime Care’s representative said she could not determine whether Anderson, Bermington, and Kim were Prime Care employees and declined to accept service for Elkins because Elkins no longer worked for Prime Care.
Ruling
The court determined that responsible entities needed to provide accurate service addresses. It ordered Prime Care to provide the court and Didonna, within 30 days, service addresses—including forwarding addresses for former employees—for Kim, Elkins, Bermington, and Anderson.
The court also directed the Clerk of Court to mail Prime Care a copy of the order, the Third Amended Complaint, the earlier order requesting address information, and the Sullivan County Attorney’s response. The mailing was directed to Prime Care at 3940 Locust Lane, Harrisburg, Pennsylvania 17109.
Judge Kenneth M. Karas’s order concerned service information and did not rule on the merits of Didonna’s claims.
Read the full 3-page opinion on CourtListener, the free public archive maintained by the Free Law Project.