Peace Love Lightning v. Officer 1

Background

Self-represented plaintiff Peace Love Lightning sued the City of Bartlett, Tennessee, Patrol Officer Worthy, SWAT Officer Giannini, and an unnamed Bartlett patrol officer. Lightning alleged that the officers approached his car in a Wal-Mart parking lot in Bartlett, Tennessee, searched the car, and detained him after finding what he described as “CBD cannabis.” He alleged violations of the Fourth, Eighth, and Fourteenth Amendments under 42 U.S.C. § 1983, a statute that allows certain constitutional claims against state or local officials.

Lightning filed the case in the Northern District of California. The court previously directed him to explain why the case belonged there or why it should be transferred. Lightning acknowledged that the defendants’ district or the location where most of the events occurred was the proper venue, but asked the court to let the case continue in California or transfer it to the Western District of Tennessee. The defendants then moved to transfer the case. Lightning’s separate motion for default judgment was still pending and was not considered in this order.

Venue Analysis

Venue means the federal district where a case may properly be heard. Under 28 U.S.C. § 1391(b), venue generally is proper where a defendant resides, where a substantial part of the events occurred, or, in limited circumstances, where a defendant is subject to the court’s personal jurisdiction. The court stated that Lightning had the burden of showing that venue was proper in the Northern District of California.

The court found that venue was improper because none of the defendants resided in that district and none of the events underlying the claims occurred there. Under 28 U.S.C. § 1406(a), when venue is improper, a court may dismiss the case or, in the interest of justice, transfer it to a district where it could have been brought.

Ruling

The court found that transferring the case, rather than dismissing it, was in the interest of justice. It therefore granted the defendants’ motion to transfer venue and directed the Clerk of Court to transfer the case to the United States District Court for the Western District of Tennessee, Western Division. Judge Thomas S. Hixson’s order addressed venue only and did not decide the merits of Lightning’s constitutional claims.