Thompson v. City of New York
- Barbara Moses
- 1:21-cv-10371
- U.S. District Court · Southern District of New York
- 6
In Thompson v. City of New York, Judge Moses denied requests to add claims, obtain discovery, and appoint counsel while a dismissal motion remained pending.
Kwaine Thompson’s efforts to add claims and defendants, obtain discovery, secure default judgment, and obtain appointed counsel were denied or limited; the defendants’ deadline to answer remained suspended while their motion to dismiss was pending.
What happened
In Thompson v. City of New York, Kwaine Thompson, who was representing himself and was detained at Rikers Island, had already filed an amended complaint about recreation, medical care, and practicing Islam. While the defendants’ motion to dismiss that complaint was pending, Thompson submitted several more documents seeking to add allegations, obtain evidence, receive judgment, and obtain a lawyer.
The court denied the requests to further amend or supplement the complaint, except that it would consider some added facts about religious services and take notice of a state-court phone restriction order. It denied discovery as premature and stayed discovery while the dismissal motion was pending. It also found that the defendants were not in default because they had timely filed the dismissal motion, and denied the request for appointed counsel without prejudice to renewing it after the dismissal motion was resolved.
Judge Barbara Moses also directed the Clerk to remove proposed new defendants and the Department of Corrections from the case. The court did not decide the pending motion to dismiss or the underlying claims in this order.
The detailed version
- Thompson v. City of New York · No. 1:21-cv-10371
- Barbara Moses
- July 28, 2022
Background
Kwaine Thompson, a self-represented plaintiff, filed a complaint and then an amended complaint. The amended complaint principally alleged that, while he was a pretrial detainee at Rikers Island, he was denied adequate recreation, medical care, and freedom to practice the Muslim religion. The defendants had withdrawn an earlier motion to dismiss the original complaint and filed a new motion to dismiss the amended complaint under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 12(b)(6). Thompson’s response to that motion was still due on August 25, 2022.
After filing the amended complaint, Thompson submitted several letters and documents. He sought to add claims concerning a terminated video visit, sexual harassment, retaliation, a fight in which he said he broke his ankle, restrictions on phone calls and visits, denial of medical attention and law-library access, and other alleged conduct. Some filings proposed new defendants. He also sought discovery, summary judgment or default judgment, and appointment of pro bono counsel.
Motions to Amend or Supplement
The court treated filings at Dockets 36, 37, 45, 46, 49, and part of 48 as motions for leave to amend or supplement the amended complaint. Because Thompson had already amended once and the defendants had challenged the amended complaint, further amendment required the court’s permission.
The court denied those motions except to the extent noted in the opinion. It concluded that the proposed new allegations generally involved later events, different facts, and distinct legal theories that were not related to the claims already pending. The court stated that those claims should be brought, if at all, in a different lawsuit under a different docket number. It also noted that Dockets 46 and 49 were unsigned, contrary to Rule 11(a).
The court did not add the new claims to this case. It stated that it would take judicial notice—meaning it would recognize the existence and contents—of the state-court order restricting Thompson’s outgoing phone calls, to the extent that order was relevant to his existing claims. It also stated that it would consider factual allegations in Docket 37 about denial of religious services as supplementing the amended complaint for purposes of the pending motion to dismiss.
Discovery
The court treated Docket 39 as a motion to compel discovery and denied it as premature. No discovery conference had occurred, no discovery schedule had been issued, and the defendants’ motion to dismiss was pending. The court ordered that discovery was stayed until the motion to dismiss was decided.
Summary Judgment and Default Judgment
Although Thompson described filings at Dockets 37 and 47 as requests for summary judgment, the court construed them as requests for default judgment because he argued that the defendants had not answered the amended complaint. The court stated that the defendants were not in default because they had timely filed a motion to dismiss. Under the applicable rule, that motion suspended their deadline to file an answer until 14 days after the court decided the motion. The court therefore stated that the defendants did not need to respond to the request at Docket 47.
Appointment of Counsel
The court denied Thompson’s request for appointed pro bono counsel without prejudice to renewal after the pending motion to dismiss was resolved. The court relied on its earlier conclusion that the case was still too early for it to assess the merits.
Conclusion and Effect
The court denied Thompson’s motions to amend or supplement the amended complaint, to compel discovery, and for appointment of pro bono counsel. It reminded him that his response to the defendants’ motion to dismiss was due by August 25, 2022.
The Clerk was directed to remove Santiago, Washington, and Bernier as proposed new defendants listed in Docket 45. The Clerk was also directed to remove the Department of Corrections as a defendant because the court had previously dismissed the claims against that agency on the ground that an agency of the City of New York could not be sued. Judge Barbara Moses did not decide the pending motion to dismiss or the merits of Thompson’s underlying claims in this order.
Read the full 6-page opinion on CourtListener, the free public archive maintained by the Free Law Project.