Cheng v. Department of Justice
- Analisa Torres
- 1:23-cv-03983
- U.S. District Court · Southern District of New York
- 2
In Cheng v. Department of Justice, Judge Stein suspended the summary-judgment schedule while the plaintiff’s request to stay was considered.
The order affected pro se plaintiff Sheng-Wen Cheng and the Department of Justice and Federal Bureau of Investigation by suspending the defendants’ summary-judgment briefing schedule and setting deadlines for the next filings.
What happened
In Cheng v. Department of Justice, Sheng-Wen Cheng asked the court to pause his Freedom of Information Act case until a related criminal prosecution was resolved. The Department of Justice and Federal Bureau of Investigation opposed a stay but asked to pause the summary-judgment schedule while the stay request was addressed.
The court suspended the briefing schedule for the defendants’ proposed summary-judgment motion. It set October 9, 2023, for the defendants to file either a dismissal agreement or an opposition to the stay motion, and October 30, 2023, for Cheng to serve any reply.
Judge Gary Stein issued the order on September 28, 2023. The order did not decide whether the requested records had to be disclosed or whether the Freedom of Information Act exemption applied.
The detailed version
- Cheng v. Department of Justice · No. 1:23-cv-03983
- Analisa Torres
- Sept. 28, 2023
Background
Sheng-Wen Cheng, representing himself, brought this Freedom of Information Act case against the Department of Justice and the Federal Bureau of Investigation. He had requested all unclassified documents that former President Trump took from the White House to his residence at Mar-a-Lago. The FBI denied the request, citing Freedom of Information Act Exemption 7(A), which covers records whose disclosure could reasonably be expected to interfere with a pending law-enforcement proceeding.
The court had previously approved a schedule for the defendants to seek summary judgment based solely on Exemption 7(A), while reserving other possible exemptions. Cheng later moved to stay, or pause, the case until the criminal prosecution of Trump in the Southern District of Florida was resolved. The defendants asked the court to suspend the summary-judgment schedule while it considered Cheng’s stay motion.
Order
The court agreed with the defendants’ proposed approach and suspended the briefing schedule for their proposed summary-judgment motion. The defendants were ordered to file, by October 9, 2023, either a stipulation of dismissal or an opposition to Cheng’s motion to stay. Cheng was permitted to serve a reply by October 30, 2023. The clerk was directed to send the order to Cheng at the address stated in the order.
This order addressed scheduling and the pending stay request. It did not decide whether Exemption 7(A) applied, whether the records were exempt from disclosure, or whether the case should ultimately be dismissed.
Read the full 2-page opinion on CourtListener, the free public archive maintained by the Free Law Project.