Saddozai v. Atchley
- Beth Freeman
- 5:21-cv-01169
- U.S. District Court · Northern District of California
- 3
In Saddozai v. Atchley, Judge Freeman denied recusal and extended the deadline to amend the complaint, warning dismissal with prejudice could follow.
Shikeb Saddozai, whose recusal request was denied and who received 28 days to file an amended complaint; the action remained subject to the earlier dismissal order.
What happened
In Saddozai v. Atchley, Shikeb Saddozai, a California state prisoner, sued prison officials under a federal civil-rights law. The court had dismissed his original complaint while allowing him to amend it, but he missed the deadline.
Saddozai asked to disqualify the judge, asserting a conflict of interest, prejudice, and personal bias. The court treated his filing as a recusal motion because some cited state-law provisions did not apply or could not be identified. It found his assertions unsupported by facts and insufficient to overcome the presumption that the judge was impartial.
Judge Beth Labson Freeman denied the recusal motion and granted Saddozai 28 days to file an amended complaint. The court stated that failing to respond within that period would result in dismissal of the action with prejudice for failure to state a claim, without further notice.
The detailed version
- Saddozai v. Atchley · No. 5:21-cv-01169
- Beth Freeman
- Sept. 7, 2021
Background
Shikeb Saddozai, a California state prisoner confined at Salinas Valley State Prison, filed a lawsuit without a lawyer under 42 U.S.C. § 1983 against prison officials. The court had dismissed his original complaint with permission to amend and set July 26, 2021, as the deadline for filing an amended complaint. Saddozai had not filed one by that deadline.
Recusal motion
Saddozai filed a document seeking to challenge and disqualify the judge under provisions of the California Code of Civil Procedure and federal recusal statutes, 28 U.S.C. §§ 144 and 455. The court explained that the cited California provision concerning disqualification applies to judges in state superior court and therefore does not apply in this federal case. The court also stated that it could not determine what law Saddozai intended to cite through two other references, so it treated the filing as a motion asking the judge to recuse herself.
Under the federal recusal statutes, the question is whether a reasonable, well-informed person would reasonably question the judge’s impartiality. A federal judge is presumed to be impartial, and the person seeking recusal has a substantial burden to show otherwise. Saddozai alleged a conflict of interest, prejudice, personal bias against him, and favoritism toward the opposing party. The court found these allegations conclusory and unsupported by factual allegations. It therefore concluded that they did not overcome the presumption of impartiality.
Ruling and deadline
The court denied the motion for recusal. It also granted, on its own initiative, an extension of time for Saddozai to respond to the earlier dismissal order and file an amended complaint. The new deadline was 28 days from the date of the order. The court stated that all other provisions of the earlier order remained in effect. It warned that failure to respond within the required time would result in dismissal of the action with prejudice for failure to state a claim, without further notice. The order terminated Docket No. 5. The court also stated that Saddozai could appeal the recusal decision to the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit.
Judge Beth Labson Freeman signed the order.
Read the full 3-page opinion on CourtListener, the free public archive maintained by the Free Law Project.