Chambers v. The Office of Mental Health
- Colleen McMahon
- 1:19-cv-07633
- U.S. District Court · Southern District of New York
- 2
Judge McMahon denied Chambers’s request for more time after dismissing Chambers v. The Office of Mental Health without prejudice.
Sonny Lloyd Chambers’s action remained closed, although he could file a new complaint at any time if he submitted the required application and prisoner authorization or paid the applicable fees.
What happened
In Chambers v. The Office of Mental Health, the court had dismissed the complaint without prejudice because Chambers did not submit the required fee-waiver application and prisoner authorization or pay the filing fees.
Chambers later asked for more time to complete and file the necessary materials, explaining that he was backed up with work.
Judge McMahon denied the extension request and stated that the case was closed, while allowing Chambers to start a new case at any time by filing the required materials or paying the fees. The court also denied fee-waiver status for any appeal.
The detailed version
- Chambers v. The Office of Mental Health · No. 1:19-cv-07633
- Colleen McMahon
- Dec. 18, 2019
Background
The court had dismissed Sonny Lloyd Chambers’s complaint without prejudice on October 16, 2019. The dismissal occurred because Chambers had not filed an application to proceed without paying the filing fee and a prisoner authorization, and had not paid the fees required to bring a civil action in the court.
On December 5, 2019, the court received Chambers’s letter asking for an extension of time to complete the work of processing and filing his complaint. Chambers stated that he was “kind of backed up with work.”
Ruling
The court denied Chambers’s request for an extension of time. It stated that the action had been dismissed without prejudice and that the case was closed. The court said Chambers could file the action again at any time as a new complaint, but would need to submit the application to proceed without paying the filing fee and the prisoner authorization or pay the $400 in applicable fees.
The court directed the clerk to mail the order to Chambers and record service on the docket. It also certified that any appeal from the order would not be taken in good faith and denied fee-waiver status for purposes of an appeal.
Read the full 2-page opinion on CourtListener, the free public archive maintained by the Free Law Project.