Wells v. United States
- Valerie Caproni
- 1:22-cv-00233
- U.S. District Court · Southern District of New York
- 2
In Wells v. United States, Judge Valerie Caproni dismissed Wells’s habeas petition for failing to pay the filing fee or request permission to proceed without prepaying fees.
Perry Wells’s habeas petition was dismissed because he did not pay the required filing fee or submit a signed application to proceed without prepaying fees. Permission to proceed without prepaying fees on appeal was also denied.
What happened
In Wells v. United States, Perry Wells asked the court to recalculate his sentence. The court treated his request as a petition challenging his custody under a federal law allowing such challenges.
The court told Wells to pay a $5 filing fee or submit a signed request to proceed without prepaying fees. After more than 50 days, he had done neither, so the court dismissed the petition.
Judge Valerie Caproni also ruled that an appeal would not be taken in good faith and denied permission to proceed without prepaying fees on appeal. The clerk was directed to mail Wells the order and close the case.
The detailed version
- Wells v. United States · No. 1:22-cv-00233
- Valerie Caproni
- Mar. 14, 2022
Background
Perry Wells, who was representing himself, filed a letter asking that his sentence be recalculated. The court treated the letter as a habeas petition—a request for relief from allegedly unlawful custody—under 28 U.S.C. § 2241 and opened this parallel civil case.
Filing-fee requirement
The court informed Wells that he had to pay the $5 filing fee or submit a signed application to proceed without prepaying fees. The court gave him 30 days to comply and warned that the case would be dismissed if he did not.
More than 50 days passed after that order, and Wells had neither paid the fee nor submitted the required application.
Ruling
The court dismissed Wells’s habeas petition for failure to pay the filing fee or submit a signed application requesting permission to proceed without prepaying fees. The order did not state whether the dismissal was with or without prejudice.
The court 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 prepaying fees for an appeal. The clerk was directed to mail Wells a copy of the order, record the mailing on the docket, and close the civil case.
Read the full 2-page opinion on CourtListener, the free public archive maintained by the Free Law Project.