Bonilla v. Beatty
- Phyllis Hamilton
- 4:22-cv-05390
- U.S. District Court · Northern District of California
- 3
In Bonilla v. Katz et al., Judge Hamilton dismissed the prisoner’s multiple civil-rights cases with prejudice after finding no imminent danger and other legal barriers.
Steven Wayne Bonilla’s multiple civil-rights cases were dismissed with prejudice, preventing those cases from continuing; the clerk was directed to close them and return future submissions without filing them.
What happened
In Bonilla v. Judge Steven M. Katz et al., a state prisoner filed multiple nearly identical civil-rights lawsuits without a lawyer. He sued numerous state and federal judges and county clerks over his conviction and the handling of his other cases.
The court found that he could not proceed without paying filing fees because his allegations did not show imminent danger of serious physical injury when he filed. The court also said that, even if permission to proceed without paying fees were granted, the lawsuits were barred by other legal rules. It dismissed the cases with prejudice.
Judge Phyllis J. Hamilton also said the repetitive filings did not provide a reasonable basis to question her impartiality. She ordered the clerk to end all pending motions, close the cases, and return future documents without filing them.
The detailed version
- Bonilla v. Beatty · No. 4:22-cv-05390
- Phyllis Hamilton
- Sept. 28, 2022
Background
Steven Wayne Bonilla, identified as a state prisoner and a condemned prisoner, filed multiple civil-rights complaints under 42 U.S.C. § 1983 without a lawyer. The complaints presented nearly identical claims and named numerous state and federal judges and county clerks as defendants. The complaints sought relief concerning Bonilla’s underlying conviction and the handling of his other state and federal court cases.
The opinion also states that Bonilla had a pending federal petition challenging his custody in the same court with appointed counsel and was represented by counsel in state-court proceedings.
Filing-fee restriction
The court stated that Bonilla had previously been disqualified from proceeding in forma pauperis, meaning without paying the required filing fees, under 28 U.S.C. § 1915(g). That restriction permits such a prisoner to proceed without paying fees only if the complaint shows that he was in imminent danger of serious physical injury when he filed it.
The court found that the allegations did not show imminent danger at the time of filing. It therefore held that Bonilla could not proceed without paying the filing fees.
Other grounds for dismissal
The court further stated that, even if an application to proceed without paying fees were granted, the lawsuits would be barred under the legal rules and authorities cited in the opinion: Heck v. Humphrey, Younger v. Harris, Demos v. U.S. District Court, and Mullis v. U.S. Bankruptcy Court. The opinion did not separately analyze each cited authority.
Disposition
The court dismissed the cases with prejudice. The opinion also stated that the cases were not ones in which Judge Hamilton’s impartiality could reasonably be questioned because of the repetitive and allegedly frivolous nature of the filings. The clerk was ordered to terminate all pending motions, close the cases, and return without filing any further documents submitted in the closed cases.
Read the full 3-page opinion on CourtListener, the free public archive maintained by the Free Law Project.