Lopez v. Deacon
- Kenneth Karas
- 7:23-cv-07327
- U.S. District Court · Southern District of New York
- 4
In Lopez v. Deacon, Chief Judge Swain ordered Anthony Lopez to pay filing fees or submit an application to proceed without prepaying them.
Anthony Lopez, an incarcerated plaintiff representing himself, was required to pay the filing fees or submit the required application within 30 days; the case would be dismissed if he did not comply.
What happened
Anthony Lopez, who is incarcerated and representing himself, sued J.T. Deacon and others. He submitted a complaint and a prisoner authorization but did not submit the required application to proceed without prepaying fees.
The court gave Lopez 30 days to either pay $402 in filing and administrative fees or submit a completed application. The court said no summons would issue yet and warned that the action would be dismissed if Lopez did not comply.
Chief Judge Laura Taylor Swain issued the order on August 31, 2023. She also ruled that any appeal would not be taken in good faith and denied permission to appeal without prepaying fees.
The detailed version
- Lopez v. Deacon · No. 7:23-cv-07327
- Kenneth Karas
- Aug. 31, 2023
Background
Anthony Lopez filed this civil action while incarcerated at Elmira Correctional Facility and without a lawyer. He submitted a complaint and a prisoner authorization, but he did not submit a completed application to proceed without prepaying fees.
Fees and required filing
The court explained that a prisoner filing a civil action must either pay $402 or request permission to proceed without prepaying fees. The $402 consists of a $350 filing fee and a $52 administrative fee. If the court grants the fee-waiver application, the $52 administrative fee does not apply, but the $350 filing fee must be collected in installments from the prisoner's account. The prisoner authorization permits those deductions and requires certified account statements for the preceding six months.
Order
The court ordered Lopez, within 30 days of the order's date, to either pay the $402 in fees or submit the attached completed application to proceed without prepaying fees, labeled with docket number 23-CV-7327. No summons would issue at that time. The court stated that, if Lopez complied, the case would be processed under the Clerk's Office procedures; if he did not comply within the allowed time, the action would be dismissed.
Appeal and filing warning
Chief Judge Laura Taylor Swain 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 also warned that certain dismissals of prisoner cases can count as strikes under 28 U.S.C. § 1915(g), potentially affecting a prisoner's ability to file future federal civil actions without prepaying fees.
Read the full 4-page opinion on CourtListener, the free public archive maintained by the Free Law Project.