Jones v. Fahey
- John Tunheim
- 0:19-cv-03057
- U.S. District Court · District of Minnesota
- 4
In Jones v. Lafayhe, Judge Leung clarified that no initial fee was due but denied the request for Marshal forms as moot.
Shafia M. Jones is not required to pay an initial partial filing fee, but she remains responsible for the $350 filing fee through installments from her account. Her request for Marshal Service forms and more time was denied as moot.
What happened
Shafia M. Jones, who is incarcerated and representing herself, asked the court to clarify an earlier order about her permission to proceed without paying the filing fee upfront and about forms for serving the defendants. The case is Jones v. Lafayhe, involving Joshua Lafayhe, Sgt. Jones, and Christine Zuraff.
The court explained that Jones does not have to pay an initial partial filing fee because she has no assets or means to pay it. However, she still must pay the full $350 filing fee over time through deductions from her prison account. The court also said that the Marshal Service forms had already been sent and completed, so her request for the forms and more time was no longer necessary.
The court granted in part and denied in part Jones’s motion to clarify. It clarified that no initial partial fee is due, while the remaining filing-fee balance must be paid in installments, and it denied the request for Marshal Service forms and additional time as moot. The order was signed by Magistrate Judge Tony N. Leung.
The detailed version
- Jones v. Fahey · No. 0:19-cv-03057
- John Tunheim
- Jan. 17, 2020
Background
Shafia M. Jones, proceeding without a lawyer, asked the court to clarify its earlier order concerning her permission to proceed without paying the filing fee in advance and the required Marshal Service forms. Jones had not paid the filing fee when she filed her complaint. The court had previously granted her application to proceed without prepaying the fee, found that she had no assets or means to pay an initial partial filing fee, and stated that the unpaid balance of the $350 statutory filing fee would be collected in installments.
Filing fee
The court explained that under 28 U.S.C. § 1915(b), prisoners who receive permission to proceed without prepaying the fee generally remain responsible for paying the entire filing fee. The statute ordinarily calls for an initial partial payment and later monthly payments of 20 percent of the preceding month’s income credited to the prisoner’s account, forwarded when the account exceeds $10, until the fee is paid.
Because the court had determined that Jones had no assets and no means to pay an initial partial filing fee, it ruled that no initial partial filing fee was due. The court emphasized, however, that Jones remained responsible for paying the balance of the $350 filing fee over time through deductions from her account under § 1915(b)(2). The institution holding her account had received the earlier order for that reason.
Marshal Service forms
The earlier order directed Jones to complete Marshal Service forms for each defendant. The court stated that the forms apparently were not included with the order when it was first mailed, but that they were sent shortly afterward and that completed forms were later received from Jones. The court therefore denied as moot Jones’s request for the forms and additional time to submit them.
Ruling
The court ordered that Jones’s Motion to Clarify Order was GRANTED IN PART and DENIED IN PART. The court left all prior consistent orders in effect. The order was signed by United States Magistrate Judge Tony N. Leung.
Read the full 4-page opinion on CourtListener, the free public archive maintained by the Free Law Project.