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S.D.N.Y.Procedural orderFiled Mar. 18, 2022

Whitehead v. Netflix Inc.

Judge
Laura Swain
Docket
1:22-cv-00883
Court
U.S. District Court · Southern District of New York
Pages
2
Civil Procedure
In one sentence

In Whitehead v. Netflix Inc., Judge Swain denied Whitehead’s amended recusal motion and denied appeal fee-waiver status.

Who this affects

David Louis Whitehead’s amended request for Judge Laura Taylor Swain’s recusal and his ability to appeal this order without paying the required filing costs.

What happened

In Whitehead v. Netflix Inc., David Louis Whitehead asked Judge Laura Taylor Swain to recuse herself from the case. The court had already denied his original recusal motion.

Whitehead filed an amended motion making the same arguments, while correcting his statement about which president appointed the judge. The court denied the amended motion for the same reasons given in its earlier order.

Judge Laura Taylor Swain also certified that an appeal would not be taken in good faith and denied Whitehead permission to appeal without paying the required filing costs. The clerk was directed to mail Whitehead a copy of the order.

The detailed version

For law students, journalists, and other readers who want the full reasoning

Case
Whitehead v. Netflix Inc. · No. 1:22-cv-00883
Judge
Laura Swain
Date
Mar. 18, 2022

Background

On February 28, 2022, Plaintiff David Louis Whitehead filed a motion asking Judge Laura Taylor Swain to recuse herself. The court denied that motion on March 8, 2022. Whitehead also submitted an amended recusal motion on February 28; it was entered on the docket on March 11, 2022.

The court stated that Whitehead appeared to have filed the amended motion to indicate that the judge had been appointed by former President Bill Clinton rather than President Barack Obama. The court also stated that the amended motion otherwise repeated the arguments in the original motion.

Ruling

Judge Laura Taylor Swain denied the amended recusal motion for the same reasons stated in the March 8, 2022, order. The opinion provided here does not repeat those reasons.

The court also certified under 28 U.S.C. § 1915(a)(3) that any appeal from the order would not be taken in good faith. It therefore denied Whitehead permission to appeal without paying the required filing costs.

Clerk’s Direction

The clerk was directed to mail Whitehead a copy of the order and record service on the docket.

The authoritative version

Read the full 2-page opinion on CourtListener, the free public archive maintained by the Free Law Project.

Open opinion PDF →
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