Lora v. JFK International Airport U.S. Customs and Border Protections
- Colleen McMahon
- 1:20-cv-02799
- U.S. District Court · Southern District of New York
- 3
In Lora v. JFK International Airport U.S. Customs and Border Protections, Judge McMahon transferred Lora’s records case to Pennsylvania because venue was improper in New York.
Rafael Lora’s FOIA case was transferred from the Southern District of New York to the Middle District of Pennsylvania. The transferee court, not Judge McMahon’s court, must decide the fee-prepayment issue and Lora’s motion to compel a response.
What happened
Lora v. JFK International Airport U.S. Customs and Border Protections concerns Rafael Lora’s request under the Freedom of Information Act for records about a package that Customs and Border Protection allegedly seized at John F. Kennedy International Airport.
Lora filed the case in the Southern District of New York. The court explained that the law allows this type of case where the requester resides, where the records are located, or in the District of Columbia. Lora said he lived in Luzerne County, Pennsylvania, and the airport was in a different federal district.
Judge Colleen McMahon transferred the case to the U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Pennsylvania. That court must decide whether Lora may proceed without paying filing fees and whether to grant his request to compel a response; the New York court did not decide those issues.
The detailed version
- Lora v. JFK International Airport U.S. Customs and Border Protections · No. 1:20-cv-02799
- Colleen McMahon
- Apr. 8, 2020
Background
Rafael Lora, who was representing himself and was described as a federal pretrial detainee held at Lackawanna County Prison, brought an action under the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA). He sought records from U.S. Customs and Border Protection concerning a package mailed from the Dominican Republic to his residence in Pennsylvania. He alleged that the package was seized at John F. Kennedy International Airport in Queens County, New York.
Venue analysis
The court applied 5 U.S.C. § 552(a)(4)(B), which permits a FOIA case to be filed in the federal district where the requester resides, where the requester has a principal place of business, where the agency records are located, or in the District of Columbia. Lora alleged that he resided in Luzerne County, Pennsylvania, but did not state where his principal place of business was. The court also noted that John F. Kennedy International Airport was not in the Southern District of New York; it was in the Eastern District of New York. The court therefore found that there did not appear to be a basis for venue in the Southern District of New York.
Luzerne County is in the Middle District of Pennsylvania. The court concluded that venue lay there and transferred the action under 28 U.S.C. § 1406(a).
Ruling and effect
The court directed the Clerk to transfer the action to the U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Pennsylvania and to mail Lora a copy of the order. It stated that the transferee court would decide whether Lora could proceed without prepaying fees and whether to grant his motion to compel a response to his FOIA request. The Southern District of New York court directed that a summons not issue from it and stated that the order closed the case.
The court also certified under 28 U.S.C. § 1915(a)(3) that an appeal would not be taken in good faith and denied fee-free status for purposes of an appeal. The opinion does not decide the merits of Lora’s FOIA request or his motion to compel.
Read the full 3-page opinion on CourtListener, the free public archive maintained by the Free Law Project.