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S.D.N.Y.Procedural orderFiled Jan. 23, 2024

Torres v. City of New York

Judge
Edgardo Ramos
Docket
1:19-cv-06332
Court
U.S. District Court · Southern District of New York
Pages
2
Civil ProcedureDiscovery
In one sentence

In Torres v. City of New York, Judge Ramos denied Torres’s request to appeal without paying filing fees and denied his renewed motion concerning Lieutenant Veras and adding the Justice Department.

Who this affects

Wilfredo Torres, the City of New York and the other defendants, Lieutenant Nell Veras, and the United States Department of Justice as to the requested amendment.

What happened

In Torres v. City of New York, Wilfredo Torres asked the court to correct alleged errors in the transcript of a September 20, 2023 hearing. The court directed the defendants to respond by January 31, 2024.

The court had extended the fact-discovery deadline to March 8, 2024. After Torres appealed that extension, he asked to appeal without paying the required fees. The court found that he had not identified the relief he was seeking or the issues he planned to raise and certified that the appeal would not be taken in good faith, so it denied that request.

The court also denied Torres’s renewed motion asking the defendants to identify Lieutenant Nell Veras as a “CIA terrorist” and/or federal employee and to add the U.S. Department of Justice as a defendant. Judge Edgardo Ramos said Torres had provided no basis to change the result of an earlier denial. The clerk was directed to terminate both motions.

The detailed version

For law students, journalists, and other readers who want the full reasoning

Case
Torres v. City of New York · No. 1:19-cv-06332
Judge
Edgardo Ramos
Date
Jan. 23, 2024

Background

Wilfredo Torres filed a motion seeking to correct alleged errors in the transcript of a September 20, 2023 hearing. The court directed the defendants to respond, and ordered that their response be filed by January 31, 2024.

The court had also granted the defendants’ request to extend the fact-discovery deadline to March 8, 2024. Torres appealed that order and asked to proceed on appeal without paying filing fees. The opinion states that his request did not claim an entitlement to relief or identify the issues he intended to present on appeal.

Rulings

The court certified that an appeal from the discovery-extension order would not be taken in good faith. It therefore denied Torres’s request to proceed without paying filing fees for the appeal. This ruling concerned the fee-waiver request, not the merits of the underlying discovery-deadline order.

Torres also moved to compel the defendants to identify New York Police Department Lieutenant Nell Veras as a “CIA terrorist” and/or federal employee and to amend the complaint to add the United States Department of Justice as a defendant. The court noted that Torres had previously filed a nearly identical motion, which had been denied. Finding no basis to reconsider or otherwise change that result, the court denied the renewed motion.

The clerk was directed to terminate the motions concerning proceeding without filing fees on appeal and the renewed motion involving Lieutenant Veras and the Department of Justice.

The authoritative version

Read the full 2-page opinion on CourtListener, the free public archive maintained by the Free Law Project.

Open opinion PDF →
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