Bonilla v. Blum
- Phyllis Hamilton
- 4:23-cv-06056
- U.S. District Court · Northern District of California
- 2
Bonilla v. Monterey County Superior Court: Judge Hamilton dismissed multiple civil-rights cases with prejudice after finding no imminent danger and applying procedural bars.
Steven Wayne Bonilla’s multiple civil-rights cases were dismissed with prejudice, and his request to proceed without paying filing fees and his recusal request were rejected. The named state-court and judicial defendants were not required to litigate these cases further.
What happened
Steven Wayne Bonilla v. Monterey County Superior Court et al. involved multiple civil-rights complaints filed by Bonilla, a state prisoner, without a lawyer. He sued various state courts and judges and sought relief related to his conviction or how other courts handled his cases.
The court found that Bonilla could not use the filing-fee waiver because his allegations did not show imminent danger of serious physical injury. The court also said that, even if he could proceed without paying fees, legal rules barred the lawsuits. It dismissed the cases with prejudice.
Judge Phyllis J. Hamilton denied Bonilla’s request for her recusal in one case, directed the clerk to end all pending motions, and ordered the cases closed. The clerk was also told to return future documents Bonilla submitted in the closed cases without filing them.
The detailed version
- Bonilla v. Blum · No. 4:23-cv-06056
- Phyllis Hamilton
- Nov. 27, 2023
Background
Steven Wayne Bonilla filed multiple nearly identical civil-rights complaints under 42 U.S.C. § 1983, a federal law allowing certain claims against state actors. The cases named various state courts and judges as defendants. Bonilla sought relief concerning his underlying conviction or the way state and federal courts had handled his other cases.
The order states that Bonilla is a condemned state prisoner with a pending federal petition challenging his custody in the same district, where he has appointed counsel. It also states that he is represented by counsel in state-court proceedings.
Filing-fee status and dismissal
The court ruled that, to the extent Bonilla sought to proceed without paying the filing fee, 28 U.S.C. § 1915(g) disqualified him from doing so unless he showed that he faced imminent danger of serious physical injury when he filed the complaints. The court found that the allegations did not show such danger.
The court further ruled that, even if a filing-fee waiver were granted, the lawsuits would be barred under the legal rules identified in the order: Heck v. Humphrey, Younger v. Harris, Demos v. U.S. District Court, or Mullis v. U.S. Bankruptcy Court. The order therefore dismissed the cases with prejudice.
Recusal and case administration
Bonilla named Judge Hamilton as a defendant in one of the cases, No. 23-cv-5965-PJH, and requested that she step aside. Judge Hamilton denied the request, stating that the arguments were meritless and that the repetitive filings did not provide a basis to question her impartiality.
The clerk was ordered to terminate all pending motions and close the cases. The clerk was also ordered to return, without filing, any further documents Bonilla submitted in the closed cases.
Disposition
The court dismissed the multiple cases with prejudice, denied the recusal request identified in the order, terminated the pending motions, and closed the cases.
Read the full 2-page opinion on CourtListener, the free public archive maintained by the Free Law Project.