Wells v. Newsome
- Edward Chen
- 3:19-cv-07537
- U.S. District Court · Northern District of California
- 2
In Wells v. Newsome, Judge Chen denied Wells’s intervention motion without prejudice and dismissed the action because it was opened in error.
Andre Lavar Wells, a California prisoner seeking to raise concerns through the Coleman and Clark class actions, and the existing class-action process through which those concerns were to be presented.
What happened
Wells v. Newsome began when Andre Wells, a California prisoner, filed a request to intervene in existing class actions concerning prison mental-health rights. The court treated the filing as a new case, but Wells later clarified that he wanted relief through the Coleman and Clark class actions rather than a separate lawsuit.
The court explained that a prisoner cannot bring a separate case seeking to enforce those class actions’ orders or remedial plans. Instead, he must raise his concerns through the class representatives and their attorneys. The court said Wells should send his filing or concerns to plaintiffs’ counsel in those cases.
Judge Edward M. Chen denied Wells’s motion to intervene without prejudice to seeking relief in the Coleman and Clark cases, dismissed this action because it was opened in error, and directed the clerk to close the file. No filing fee was due.
The detailed version
- Wells v. Newsome · No. 3:19-cv-07537
- Edward Chen
- Jan. 27, 2020
Background
Andre Lavar Wells, a California prisoner, filed a pro se motion asking to intervene to enforce requirements in the Coleman and Clark class actions and protect the rights of mental-health patients. Because the filing appeared to seek to open a new case, the clerk filed it as a new action and told Wells to submit a civil-rights complaint form and either pay the filing fee or apply to proceed without paying it.
Wells then filed another document stating that the filing was a motion made as a class-action member, not a separate claim. He explained that he was seeking relief in the existing Coleman and Clark class actions rather than starting a new case.
Court’s reasoning
The court held that a prisoner may not bring a separate lawsuit seeking to compel prison officials to comply with orders or remedial plans in the existing Clark and Coleman class actions. A prisoner must instead pursue those concerns through the class representatives and attorneys, including by asking them to seek further action or contempt proceedings, or by intervening in the class action when permitted.
The court concluded that Wells intended to file his materials in Clark and/or Coleman, not to start a separate case. It stated that this was the correct course, but explained that an order in Coleman barred Wells from filing a pro se document directly in that case; he could raise specific mental-health-care concerns through plaintiffs’ counsel. The court directed him to send his filing or communicate his concerns to plaintiffs’ counsel, who also represented the class in Clark.
Disposition
The court denied without prejudice Wells’s motion to intervene, allowing him to seek relief in the Coleman and Clark cases as described in the order. It dismissed this action because it was opened in error. The court stated that no filing fee was due, so Wells did not need to submit an application to proceed without paying the fee, and it directed the clerk to close the file.
Effect of the ruling
The order did not decide the merits of Wells’s concerns about prison mental-health care. It ended this separately opened action and directed Wells to pursue those concerns through the existing class actions and their counsel.
Read the full 2-page opinion on CourtListener, the free public archive maintained by the Free Law Project.