Lopes v. DeLeon

Background

Cornelius Lopes, proceeding without a lawyer, sued numerous defendants. He filed a 455-page first amended complaint. Defendant Acting Attorney General of California Matthew Rodriguez moved to dismiss that complaint, and the court granted the motion. The court said Lopes could seek permission to amend but warned that it would deny permission if another proposed complaint was so excessively lengthy and difficult that responding to it would require extraordinary effort.

Without formally moving for permission to amend, Lopes filed a 58-page document that he called his third amended complaint, along with a supplemental filing. Attorney General Rob Bonta moved to strike the complaint, arguing that Lopes had not requested permission to file it and that it failed to provide the short and plain statement required by Rule 8 of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure.

Court’s analysis

The court treated Lopes’s filing as including a request for permission to file the third amended complaint. It denied that request because the complaint was again too verbose, confused, and repetitive to reveal its true substance. The court relied on its earlier warning that it would not permit another amendment if the proposed complaint remained too difficult to understand.

The court also noted that Lopes had not timely opposed the motion. It stated, however, that the deficiencies in the proposed complaint were such that no opposition could have persuaded the court to grant permission to amend.

Ruling

The court denied leave to amend and granted the Attorney General’s motion to strike the third amended complaint. Because the court had already dismissed Lopes’s first amended complaint and now denied permission to amend, it stated that it would enter judgment in favor of the defendants. The opinion does not specify whether that judgment was entered with or without prejudice.