Warren v. Hip-Hop Hall of Fame-NY
- Laura Swain
- 1:22-cv-07874
- U.S. District Court · Southern District of New York
- 2
In Warren v. Hip Hop Hall of Fame NY, Judge Swain ordered Warren to pay filing fees or submit corrected forms within 30 days.
Brian Andr’e Warren, who must satisfy the fee or corrected-form requirements for this action to proceed; the case will be dismissed if he does not comply within 30 days.
What happened
Brian Andr’e Warren v. Hip Hop Hall of Fame NY concerns Warren’s attempt to bring a civil action while incarcerated and without a lawyer. He submitted an application to proceed without paying fees upfront, but the application lacked required financial information, and his prisoner authorization was for a different court.
The court gave Warren 30 days from the order’s date to either pay $402 in fees or submit the attached application and authorization forms labeled with this case’s docket number. The court said the action would be dismissed if he did not comply, and no summons would issue at that time.
Judge Laura Taylor Swain also ruled that an appeal from this order would not be taken in good faith and denied permission to appeal without prepaying fees. The order did not decide the claims against Hip Hop Hall of Fame NY.
The detailed version
- Warren v. Hip-Hop Hall of Fame-NY · No. 1:22-cv-07874
- Laura Swain
- Sept. 14, 2022
Background
Brian Andr’e Warren, who the opinion says was incarcerated at Brooks Correctional Center in Muskegon Heights, Michigan, filed this action without a lawyer. The order addresses only the filing-fee requirements and does not reach the underlying claims against Hip Hop Hall of Fame NY.
Fee and IFP requirements
A prisoner filing a civil action must either pay the required fees or request permission to proceed without prepaying them. The total fees here were $402: a $350 filing fee and a $52 administrative fee. If the court grants permission to proceed without prepayment, the $350 filing fee is collected in installments from the prisoner’s account.
Warren submitted an application to proceed without prepaying fees, but the application did not include the required financial information. His prisoner authorization—the form allowing deductions from his account and requiring certified account statements—was also captioned for a different court.
Order
The court ordered Warren, within 30 days of the order, to either pay the $402 in fees or submit the attached application and prisoner authorization forms. The forms were to be labeled with docket number 22-CV-7874 (LTS). The Clerk of Court was directed to mail Warren a copy of the order and record service on the docket. No summons was to issue at that time.
The order states that the case would be processed under the Clerk’s Office procedures if Warren complied and would be dismissed if he failed to comply within the allowed time. The court also certified that any appeal from the order would not be taken in good faith and denied permission to appeal without prepaying fees.
Classification
This is a procedural order concerning filing fees and permission to proceed without prepayment. It does not decide the merits of Warren’s claims. The order also warns that a later dismissal for frivolousness or failure to state a claim could count as a statutory “strike,” but it does not make such a dismissal here.
Read the full 2-page opinion on CourtListener, the free public archive maintained by the Free Law Project.