Brooks v. Annucci
- Cathy Seibel
- 7:23-cv-06902
- U.S. District Court · Southern District of New York
- 2
In Brooks v. Annucci, Judge Swain ordered the prisoner to pay filing fees or submit forms to proceed without prepayment.
Shantee Brooks, who must pay the required fees or submit the specified forms for the action to proceed; the case will be dismissed if he does not comply within 30 days.
What happened
Brooks v. Annucci concerns Shantee Brooks’s civil action against Anthony Annucci and other defendants. Brooks filed the complaint without paying the required fees or submitting the documents needed to request permission to proceed without paying them upfront. The opinion says Brooks is incarcerated and is representing himself.
The court ordered Brooks, within 30 days, either to pay $402 in filing and administrative fees or to submit a completed application to proceed without prepaying fees and a signed authorization allowing installment payments from his prison account. The court said no summons would be issued yet and warned that the case would be dismissed if Brooks did not comply.
Judge Laura Taylor Swain also denied permission to appeal without prepaying fees, finding that an appeal from the order would not be taken in good faith. The order did not decide the underlying claims against the defendants.
The detailed version
- Brooks v. Annucci · No. 7:23-cv-06902
- Cathy Seibel
- Aug. 14, 2023
Background
Shantee Brooks filed a civil action against Anthony Annucci, Joseph Sergeant, and two defendants identified as John Doe officers. Brooks is incarcerated at Sing Sing Correctional Facility and is proceeding without a lawyer. The complaint was submitted without the required filing fees and without a completed application to proceed without prepaying fees or a signed prisoner authorization.
Payment and filing requirements
The court explained that a prisoner must either pay $402 to begin a civil action—$350 for the filing fee and $52 for the administrative fee—or request permission to proceed without prepaying fees. That request requires a signed application and a prisoner authorization. If permission is granted, the $350 filing fee must be collected in installments from the prisoner’s account. The authorization also directs the correctional facility to deduct those payments and provide certified account statements for the previous six months. The $52 administrative fee does not apply to a person granted this status.
Order
Within 30 days of the order, Brooks must either pay the $402 in fees or submit the required application and prisoner authorization, labeled with docket number 23-CV-6902 (LTS). The court directed that no summons be issued at that time. It stated that, if Brooks complies, the case will be processed under the Clerk’s Office procedures; if Brooks does not comply within the permitted time, the action will be dismissed.
The court also certified under 28 U.S.C. § 1915(a)(3) that an appeal from the order would not be taken in good faith and denied permission to appeal without prepaying fees. The order cautioned that certain future dismissals of federal actions or appeals could count as strikes under the prisoner litigation statute, potentially limiting a prisoner’s ability to proceed without prepaying fees after three strikes, unless an exception for imminent serious physical danger applies. The order did not reach the merits of Brooks’s claims.
Read the full 2-page opinion on CourtListener, the free public archive maintained by the Free Law Project.