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S.D.N.Y.Procedural orderFiled Jan. 15, 2020

Williams v. New York

Judge
Colleen McMahon
Docket
1:18-cv-08353
Court
U.S. District Court · Southern District of New York
Pages
1
Civil ProcedureMotion to Dismiss
In one sentence

In Williams v. New York, Judge McMahon dismissed Curtis Williams’s action after he failed to file the required amended complaint.

Who this affects

Curtis Williams’s action against New York was dismissed. The court also denied permission to proceed without paying court fees for an appeal.

What happened

In Williams v. New York, the court had reopened Curtis Williams’s action and allowed him 30 days to file an amended complaint. The earlier order warned that failing to do so could lead to dismissal.

Williams did not file an amended complaint. The court therefore dismissed the action as frivolous, for failing to state a claim for relief, and for seeking money from a defendant protected from that type of lawsuit.

Chief Judge Colleen McMahon ordered the Clerk to mail Williams the decision and stated that an appeal would not be considered to have been brought in good faith. The court therefore denied permission to proceed without paying court fees on appeal.

The detailed version

For law students, journalists, and other readers who want the full reasoning

Case
Williams v. New York · No. 1:18-cv-08353
Judge
Colleen McMahon
Date
Jan. 15, 2020

Background

On November 15, 2019, the court reopened Curtis Williams’s action and gave him 30 days to file an amended complaint. The court’s earlier order warned that failure to comply could result in dismissal as frivolous, for failure to state a claim on which relief could be granted, and for seeking monetary relief from a defendant immune from that relief.

Williams did not file an amended complaint.

Ruling

The court dismissed the action on all three stated grounds: as frivolous, for failure to state a claim on which relief could be granted, and for seeking monetary relief from an immune defendant. The opinion cites 28 U.S.C. § 1915(e)(2)(B), the statute governing dismissal of certain claims filed without prepayment of court fees.

The court directed the Clerk to mail Williams a copy of the order and record service on the docket. It also certified under 28 U.S.C. § 1915(a)(3) that an appeal would not be taken in good faith and denied permission to proceed without paying court fees for an appeal.

The authoritative version

Read the full 1-page opinion on CourtListener, the free public archive maintained by the Free Law Project.

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