Smalls v. Cooper
- Laura Swain
- 1:22-cv-04509
- U.S. District Court · Southern District of New York
- 2
In Smalls v. Cooper, Judge Swain dismissed Aaron D. Smalls’s duplicate civil-rights complaint without prejudice and ordered that no filing fee be charged.
Aaron D. Smalls’s duplicate lawsuit was dismissed without prejudice, while his pending related case under docket number 22-CV-4115 was not dismissed by this order. The court ordered that he not be charged the filing fee for this action and denied payment-free status for an appeal.
What happened
In Smalls v. Cooper, Aaron D. Smalls, who was detained at the North Infirmary Command on Rikers Island, sued several defendants under a federal civil-rights law. He alleged that they violated his rights during his ongoing state criminal proceedings.
The court found that Smalls had already filed a substantially similar case against some of the same defendants, under docket number 22-CV-4115. Because this lawsuit raised the same claims, the court said there was no useful reason to continue this duplicate case.
Judge Swain dismissed the complaint without prejudice to the pending related case, meaning the dismissal did not bar the claims from proceeding there. She also ordered that Smalls not be charged the filing fee for this case and denied payment-free status for any appeal because the appeal would not be taken in good faith.
The detailed version
- Smalls v. Cooper · No. 1:22-cv-04509
- Laura Swain
- June 13, 2022
Background
Aaron D. Smalls brought this action without a lawyer under 42 U.S.C. § 1983, a federal law that allows claims against people acting under state authority for violating constitutional rights. The opinion states that Smalls was detained at the North Infirmary Command on Rikers Island and alleged that the defendants violated his rights during his ongoing state-court criminal proceedings.
The defendants named were MD Amy Cooper, MD Daniel Mundy, J. Svetkey, and ADA Charlotte Amour. The court described Doctors Cooper and Mundy as forensic psychiatrists and described Charlotte Amour as an assistant district attorney. The opinion also notes that Smalls named the judge presiding over his criminal case as “J. Svetkey.”
Reason for dismissal
The court stated that Smalls had previously submitted a substantially similar complaint against Doctors Cooper and Mundy and Assistant District Attorney Amour. That earlier case remained pending under docket number 22-CV-4115. Because the present complaint raised the same claims, the court concluded that no useful purpose would be served by filing and litigating this duplicate lawsuit.
The court stated that if Smalls wanted to add new or different claims or parties arising from the same facts, he had to do so in the case under docket number 22-CV-4115. The court also noted that judges are absolutely immune from damages claims for actions taken within the scope of their judicial responsibilities.
Ruling and effect
The court dismissed Smalls’s complaint without prejudice as duplicative of the case under docket number 22-CV-4115. The dismissal therefore did not bar the claims from proceeding in that pending case. The court directed the Clerk of Court not to charge Smalls the $350 filing fee for this action and directed that funds not be deducted or held from his prison trust account for this lawsuit.
Judge Swain also certified that any appeal from the order would not be taken in good faith and denied payment-free status for purposes of an appeal. The opinion does not decide the merits of Smalls’s underlying claims.
Read the full 2-page opinion on CourtListener, the free public archive maintained by the Free Law Project.