Davis v. The Department of Corrections
- Colleen McMahon
- 7:19-cv-10588
- U.S. District Court · Southern District of New York
- 2
Judge McMahon granted Davis one final 30-day extension to amend his complaint and denied him permission to appeal without prepaying fees.
James Davis III received one final 30-day extension to amend his complaint. The defendants were not required to provide information for that amendment under this order.
What happened
Davis v. Department of Corrections concerned James Davis III’s request for more time to file an amended complaint. The court had previously given him 60 days and then granted one 30-day extension.
Davis requested another extension because he said he was having trouble getting information from the defendants. The court said he did not need information from the defendants to amend his complaint and instead needed to describe what happened to him.
Judge McMahon granted one additional 30-day extension because Davis was representing himself, but stated that no further extensions would be granted. The order did not dismiss the complaint, but warned that failure to amend would lead to dismissal for failure to state a claim; it also denied permission to appeal without prepaying fees.
The detailed version
- Davis v. The Department of Corrections · No. 7:19-cv-10588
- Colleen McMahon
- Feb. 27, 2020
Background
The court had previously granted James Davis III 60 days to file an amended complaint. On January 24, 2020, it granted his request for an additional 30 days. Davis then made a second request for more time, stating that he was having trouble obtaining information from the defendants.
Court’s reasoning
The court stated that Davis did not need information from the defendants to file an amended complaint. Instead, he needed to submit a complaint explaining what happened to him. Although the court was inclined to deny the second request, it considered Davis’s status as a self-represented litigant and granted one final extension.
Ruling
The court granted Davis an additional 30 days from the date of the order to file an amended complaint and stated that no further extensions would be granted. It warned that if he failed to file the amended complaint, the court would dismiss the complaint for failure to state a claim. The court also certified that an appeal from the order would not be taken in good faith and denied permission to appeal without prepaying fees. This order did not itself dismiss the complaint or decide the underlying claims.
Classification
This is a procedural order because it addressed the deadline for amending the complaint and appeal-related filing status, rather than deciding the merits of Davis’s claims.
Read the full 2-page opinion on CourtListener, the free public archive maintained by the Free Law Project.