Antolini v. Nieves
- Vernon Broderick
- 1:19-cv-07645
- U.S. District Court · Southern District of New York
- 3
In Antolini v. Nieves, Judge Broderick granted Antolini’s extension in part and declined both sides’ procedural requests.
The plaintiff and defendants in the case, particularly their lawyers handling the summary-judgment briefing, were affected by the revised filing deadlines and the court’s instructions.
What happened
In Antolini v. Nieves, the court addressed filing problems during briefing on the defendants’ motion for summary judgment, which asks the court to decide whether a case can be resolved without a trial.
An electronic filing problem prevented the defendants from filing their required statement of facts on time, although their counsel emailed it to the court and opposing counsel. The defendants later filed the statement, and the plaintiff’s lawyer said he had not seen the email and asked for more time. The defendants asked the court to treat an earlier plaintiff letter as the plaintiff’s opposition and to grant their motion; the plaintiff asked the court to reject the defendants’ motion outright because of the late filing.
Judge Vernon S. Broderick declined to reject the defendants’ motion outright and declined to treat the plaintiff’s earlier letter as a formal opposition. He granted the plaintiff’s extension request in part, setting April 19, 2021, for the opposition and May 10, 2021, for any reply, and stated that he would not decide the summary-judgment motion until briefing was complete.
The detailed version
- Antolini v. Nieves · No. 1:19-cv-07645
- Vernon Broderick
- Mar. 29, 2021
Background
On January 22, 2021, the court set deadlines for briefing on the defendants’ motion for summary judgment: March 1 for the motion, April 2 for the response, and April 23 for any reply. On March 1, an electronic filing problem hindered filings in the district. At 11:53 p.m., defense counsel explained the problem and emailed the motion materials, including the required statement under Local Rule 56.1, to the judge’s chambers and to the plaintiff’s counsel.
When the defendants electronically filed their materials on March 2, they accidentally omitted the Rule 56.1 statement. The defendants filed that statement on March 19 and said they had emailed it to the plaintiff’s counsel on March 1. On March 18, the plaintiff asked the court to deny the defendants’ summary-judgment motion outright because the statement had not been filed. The plaintiff later asked the court not to treat that March 18 letter as a formal opposition and requested additional time to respond because counsel said he had not seen the emailed statement.
Rulings
The court ordered that it would not deny the defendants’ summary-judgment motion outright. It also ordered that the plaintiff’s March 18 letter would not be treated as a formal opposition memorandum. The court granted in part the plaintiff’s request for an extension. It set April 19, 2021, as the new deadline for the opposition memorandum and May 10, 2021, as the new deadline for any defense reply. The opinion states that the court would not decide the defendants’ motion until the briefing was complete.
Judge Vernon S. Broderick also directed the parties to avoid personal attacks and stated that further extension requests were unlikely to be granted without extraordinary circumstances supported by a declaration or affidavit. This order resolved scheduling and filing issues; it did not decide the merits of the summary-judgment motion.
Read the full 3-page opinion on CourtListener, the free public archive maintained by the Free Law Project.