Hubbard v. Ramos
- Jon Tigar
- 4:19-cv-07508
- U.S. District Court · Northern District of California
- 3
In Hubbard v. Ramos, Judge Tigar ordered Hubbard to explain why he should receive filing-fee relief despite four prior qualifying dismissals.
Zane M. Hubbard, the incarcerated plaintiff seeking permission to proceed without paying the filing fee upfront; the order also affected the status of his civil-rights action against Gloria Ramos.
What happened
Hubbard v. Ramos concerns Zane M. Hubbard, an incarcerated person who filed a civil-rights lawsuit against Gloria Ramos and asked to proceed without paying the filing fee upfront. He alleged that Ramos ordered him to receive unwanted medication, causing side effects.
The court found that at least four of Hubbard’s earlier cases counted as dismissals under the prisoner “three strikes” rule. Because Hubbard had not alleged that he faced an immediate serious physical injury, the court ordered him to explain within 28 days why his request to proceed without paying the fee should not be denied.
The order did not itself deny the request or dismiss the lawsuit. It warned that failing to respond as ordered would lead to dismissal without further notice under Rule 41(b). Judge Jon S. Tigar signed the order on November 20, 2019.
The detailed version
- Hubbard v. Ramos · No. 4:19-cv-07508
- Jon Tigar
- Nov. 20, 2019
Background
Zane M. Hubbard, an incarcerated plaintiff proceeding without a lawyer, filed a civil-rights action under 42 U.S.C. § 1983 against Gloria Ramos. Hubbard requested permission to proceed in forma pauperis, meaning to proceed without paying the filing fee upfront. The complaint alleged that Hubbard was being involuntarily medicated on Ramos’s orders and was suffering side effects.
Three-strikes issue
The Prison Litigation Reform Act generally bars a prisoner from proceeding without paying the filing fee if the prisoner has had three or more earlier federal actions dismissed as frivolous, malicious, or for failure to state a claim. An exception applies when the prisoner is under imminent danger of serious physical injury. The court stated that Hubbard had not alleged such imminent danger.
The court took judicial notice of at least four earlier Hubbard cases that it found qualified as strikes because they had been dismissed for failure to state a claim. The court described those earlier dismissals as involving insufficient allegations concerning constitutional and statutory claims, including claims involving safety, equal protection, conditions of confinement, due process, mental-health treatment, discrimination, excessive force, surveillance, and other theories. The opinion also notes an earlier ruling that Hubbard had at least three qualifying strikes.
Order
The court issued an order to show cause. It ordered Hubbard, within 28 days of the order’s date, to explain why his request to proceed without paying the filing fee should not be denied under 28 U.S.C. § 1915’s three-strikes provision. The court did not state that it was denying the request at this stage.
The order warned that failure to respond as required would result in dismissal of the action without further notice under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 41(b) for failure to comply with a court order. The opinion does not report a final ruling on the request to proceed without paying the fee or on the underlying civil-rights claims.
Read the full 3-page opinion on CourtListener, the free public archive maintained by the Free Law Project.