Bonilla v. Averill
- Phyllis Hamilton
- 4:22-cv-05389
- U.S. District Court · Northern District of California
- 3
In Bonilla v. Judge Steven M. Katz, Judge Hamilton dismissed multiple civil-rights cases with prejudice because Bonilla could not receive a filing-fee waiver and his claims faced legal bars.
Steven Wayne Bonilla's multiple related civil-rights cases were dismissed with prejudice. The order also directed the clerk to close those cases and reject future filings in them without filing them.
What happened
In Bonilla v. Judge Steven M. Katz, Steven Wayne Bonilla, a state prisoner, filed multiple similar civil-rights cases without a lawyer. He named state and federal judges and county clerks as defendants and sought relief concerning his conviction and the handling of his other cases.
The court said Bonilla had previously been barred from proceeding without paying filing fees unless he showed an immediate risk of serious physical injury. The complaints did not show that kind of danger. The court also said that, even if Bonilla received a fee waiver, legal rules would bar the lawsuits.
Judge Phyllis Hamilton dismissed the cases with prejudice, meaning the dismissals ended these cases and barred refiling them. The clerk was ordered to terminate pending motions, close the cases, and return future documents without filing them.
The detailed version
- Bonilla v. Averill · No. 4:22-cv-05389
- Phyllis Hamilton
- Sept. 28, 2022
Background
The order covers multiple related cases listed under separate case numbers. Steven Wayne Bonilla, identified as a state prisoner, filed similar civil-rights complaints without a lawyer under 42 U.S.C. § 1983. The complaints named numerous state and federal judges and county clerks. Bonilla sought relief concerning his underlying conviction and the way his other state and federal cases had been handled.
The opinion states that Bonilla had a pending federal petition challenging his custody in the same court, with appointed counsel, and was also represented by counsel in state-court proceedings. The court cited those proceedings but did not decide them in this order.
Filing-fee waiver
The court addressed Bonilla's possible request to proceed without paying the filing fee. Under 28 U.S.C. § 1915(g), a prisoner who has accumulated qualifying prior dismissals generally cannot proceed without paying the fee unless the complaint shows that the prisoner faced an immediate danger of serious physical injury when it was filed. The court said Bonilla had already been disqualified from using that fee-waiver procedure and that these complaints did not show the required danger.
Other legal bars
The court further ruled that, even if a fee-waiver application were granted, the lawsuits would be barred under the legal doctrines and authorities cited in the order: Heck v. Humphrey, Younger v. Harris, Demos v. U.S. District Court, or Mullis v. U.S. Bankruptcy Court. The opinion did not separately analyze each complaint or identify which cited bar applied to which claim.
Disposition
The court dismissed the cases with prejudice. It also rejected the suggestion that the judge's impartiality could reasonably be questioned because of the repetitive and frivolous filings, citing the duty of a judge to sit absent legitimate grounds for recusal. The clerk was ordered to terminate all pending motions, close the cases, and return without filing any further documents Bonilla submitted in the closed cases.
Read the full 3-page opinion on CourtListener, the free public archive maintained by the Free Law Project.