Vazquez-Diaz v. United States

Background

Luis A. Vazquez-Diaz, who was confined at the Medical Center for Federal Prisoners in Springfield, Missouri, filed this action without a lawyer. On January 10, 2024, the court treated his submission as a petition asking for release or other relief from confinement under 28 U.S.C. § 2241 and transferred the petition to the United States District Court for the Western District of Missouri. The Missouri court received the case on January 17, 2024. According to the opinion, that court later denied the petition without prejudice.

On January 30, 2024, the New York court received a letter, a motion to show cause, and an affidavit from Vazquez-Diaz. The court treated those submissions as a motion for reconsideration under Local Civil Rule 6.3 and a motion for relief from an order under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 60(b). It did not treat the submissions as a request to alter or amend a judgment under Rule 59(e), because no judgment had been entered in the New York action.

Jurisdiction over the motion

A court that transfers a case normally loses authority to act on it once the case is transferred. The transferring court can retain authority, however, if the party seeking review acts to stop the transfer before the receiving court’s clerk receives the case papers.

The court applied the prison mailbox rule, which generally treats a filing by a confined person as filed when that person delivers it to facility officials for mailing. The court assumed, for purposes of this order, that the rule also applied to a person confined in a facility such as Vazquez-Diaz. Because his letter and affidavit were signed on January 15, before the case was transmitted to Missouri on January 17, the court concluded that it had authority to consider them. Vazquez-Diaz signed the motion to show cause on January 22, after transmission, but the court treated it as a supplement to his timely motion because he was representing himself.

Reconsideration under Local Civil Rule 6.3

A motion under Local Civil Rule 6.3 requires a party to show that the court overlooked controlling law or factual matters already presented to it. The court found that Vazquez-Diaz had not made that showing regarding the January 10 transfer order. His submissions did not allege facts or cite legal authority supporting reconsideration. Instead, he asked the court to direct the Missouri federal court to explain why it had dismissed his earlier case and asked to be transferred to a new facility. The court denied the motion under Local Civil Rule 6.3.

Relief under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 60(b)

Rule 60(b) permits a party to seek relief from an order or judgment for specified reasons, including mistake, newly discovered evidence, fraud or misconduct, a void judgment, satisfaction or reversal of a judgment, or another reason justifying relief. The court found that Vazquez-Diaz had not shown that any of the first five grounds applied and denied relief under those provisions.

The court also considered the rule’s sixth provision, which covers other extraordinary circumstances. It found that Vazquez-Diaz had not demonstrated extraordinary circumstances warranting relief and denied the motion under Rule 60(b)(6) as well.

Disposition

The court denied Vazquez-Diaz’s motion for reconsideration. It directed the clerk to terminate all pending matters and closed the action. The court stated that the clerk would accept only documents directed to the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit. It also certified under 28 U.S.C. § 1915(a)(3) that any appeal would not be taken in good faith and denied permission to appeal without paying filing fees.