Bonilla v. Freeman
- Phyllis Hamilton
- 4:20-cv-02996
- U.S. District Court · Northern District of California
- 2
In Bonilla v. Freeman, Judge Hamilton dismissed multiple civil-rights cases with prejudice after finding no imminent danger and denying pauper status.
Steven Wayne Bonilla's multiple civil-rights cases were dismissed with prejudice, and he could not proceed without paying filing fees; the named federal, state, municipal, and county defendants were not required to litigate these cases further.
What happened
In Bonilla v. Freeman, Steven Wayne Bonilla, a state prisoner proceeding without a lawyer, filed multiple civil-rights lawsuits against federal judges, state judges, municipalities, and other state and county officials. He also asked to proceed without paying filing fees.
The complaints raised similar issues involving his conviction and the handling of his state and federal petitions challenging his conviction. The court said Bonilla had already been barred from proceeding without paying fees under a federal law for repeat prisoner litigants, and that the complaints did not show he faced imminent danger when he filed them.
Judge Hamilton dismissed the cases with prejudice. She also directed the clerk to terminate pending motions, close the cases, and return any further documents Bonilla submitted without filing them.
The detailed version
- Bonilla v. Freeman · No. 4:20-cv-02996
- Phyllis Hamilton
- June 11, 2020
Background
Steven Wayne Bonilla, identified as a state prisoner, filed multiple civil-rights complaints under 42 U.S.C. § 1983. He represented himself in these civil cases and sought permission to proceed without paying the filing fees. The order covers the related cases numbered 20-cv-02986-PJH, 20-cv-02987-PJH, 20-cv-02993-PJH, 20-cv-02996-PJH, 20-cv-03009-PJH, 20-cv-03011-PJH, 20-cv-03012-PJH, 20-cv-03561-PJH, 20-cv-03655-PJH, 20-cv-03657-PJH, and 20-cv-03658-PJH.
Bonilla named various federal judges, state judges, municipalities, and other state and county officials as defendants. The court said the complaints presented very similar claims concerning Bonilla's underlying conviction and the handling of his self-filed petitions challenging his conviction in state and federal court. The order also noted that Bonilla had appointed counsel in a separate federal petition challenging his conviction and was represented by counsel in state proceedings.
Reasoning
The court stated that Bonilla had already been disqualified from proceeding without paying filing fees under 28 U.S.C. § 1915(g), which restricts such fee waivers for certain repeat prisoner litigants. The court further found that the allegations did not show Bonilla was in imminent danger when he filed the complaints. As a result, he could not proceed without paying the filing fees.
The court added that, even if permission to proceed without paying fees had been granted, the lawsuits would be barred under the authorities it cited, including Heck v. Humphrey, Younger v. Harris, Demos v. U.S. District Court, and Mullis v. U.S. Bankruptcy Court.
Disposition
The court dismissed the cases with prejudice. It ordered the clerk to terminate all pending motions and close the cases. It also ordered the clerk to return, without filing, any additional documents Bonilla submitted after the cases were closed.
Classification
This is a procedural order because the court disposed of the cases based on filing-fee eligibility and legal barriers to the lawsuits rather than deciding the underlying civil-rights claims.
Read the full 2-page opinion on CourtListener, the free public archive maintained by the Free Law Project.