Miller v. Superintendent of the Shawangunk Correctional Facility
- Ronnie Abrams
- 1:18-cv-01762
- U.S. District Court · Southern District of New York
- 2
In Miller v. Superintendent, Judge Abrams dismissed Miller’s reconsideration motion for lack of jurisdiction because he filed it after appealing.
Devon Miller’s motion for reconsideration was dismissed; the opinion does not state what further action occurred in the appeal.
What happened
In Miller v. Superintendent of the Shawangunk Correctional Facility, Devon Miller appealed the court’s denial of his habeas petition on August 27, 2020. Four days later, he filed a motion asking the district court to reconsider that denial.
The court explained that filing an appeal gives control over the appealed issues to the appeals court and removes that control from the district court. An exception can apply when a reconsideration motion is filed before the appeal, but that did not happen here.
Judge Ronnie Abrams dismissed Miller’s reconsideration motion for lack of jurisdiction and directed the clerk to terminate the motion. The order did not revisit the earlier denial of Miller’s habeas petition.
The detailed version
- Miller v. Superintendent of the Shawangunk Correctional Facility · No. 1:18-cv-01762
- Ronnie Abrams
- Oct. 26, 2020
Background
On July 31, 2020, the court denied Devon Miller’s petition for a writ of habeas corpus. The court had concluded that the state court’s decision was not contrary to, or an unreasonable application of, clearly established federal law and was not based on an unreasonable determination of the facts under 28 U.S.C. § 2254(d).
Miller filed a notice of appeal on August 27, 2020, seeking review by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit. On September 1, 2020—four days after filing the notice of appeal—Miller filed a motion for reconsideration under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 59(e) in the district court.
Court’s Analysis
The court relied on the rule that filing a notice of appeal gives the appeals court jurisdiction over the parts of the case involved in the appeal and removes the district court’s control over those matters. The court noted that a district court may retain jurisdiction over a reconsideration motion filed before a notice of appeal. Because Miller filed his motion after the notice of appeal, the court determined that this exception did not apply.
Ruling
Judge Ronnie Abrams dismissed Miller’s motion for reconsideration for lack of jurisdiction. The clerk was directed to terminate the motion at Docket 41 and mail Miller a copy of the memorandum opinion and order. The opinion did not reconsider or change the court’s earlier denial of the habeas petition.
Read the full 2-page opinion on CourtListener, the free public archive maintained by the Free Law Project.