Jean-Louis v. Board of Education
- Laura Swain
- 1:24-cv-02226
- U.S. District Court · Southern District of New York
- 3
In Jean-Louis v. Board of Education, Judge Swain denied permission to proceed without fees and dismissed the complaint without prejudice under the three-strikes rule.
The plaintiff’s ability to proceed without paying the filing fee was affected: he remains barred from proceeding without fees in future federal civil actions while he is a prisoner, unless he shows imminent danger of serious physical injury. The complaint was dismissed without prejudice, and the court did not decide whether the allegations against the defendants were legally valid.
What happened
In Jean-Louis v. Board of Education, the plaintiff, who was representing himself while being treated at a psychiatric center, alleged that New York City and its Department of Education negligently failed to build underground nuclear shelters in elementary schools. He asked to bring the case without paying the filing fee.
The court found that the plaintiff was considered a prisoner under the Prison Litigation Reform Act when he filed the complaint and had already accumulated three qualifying dismissals. Because the complaint did not show that he faced an immediate threat of serious physical injury, the law barred him from proceeding without paying the fee.
Judge Swain denied the request to proceed without paying the fee and dismissed the complaint without prejudice. The court also denied permission to appeal without paying the fee and directed the clerk to enter judgment dismissing the action.
The detailed version
- Jean-Louis v. Board of Education · No. 1:24-cv-02226
- Laura Swain
- Mar. 26, 2024
Background
The plaintiff brought the action without a lawyer and requested permission to proceed without prepaying the filing fee. The complaint alleged that the City of New York and its Department of Education were negligent because they failed to build underground nuclear fallout shelters in the City’s elementary schools. The complaint was not accompanied by the $405 filing fee, so the court treated the plaintiff as seeking permission to proceed without paying that fee.
The plaintiff was being treated at Kirby Forensic Psychiatric Center. The court relied on the pending criminal case against him and a state-court order for temporary treatment and/or assessment in a mental hospital to determine that he was a “prisoner” under the Prison Litigation Reform Act when he filed this civil action.
Three-strikes filing bar
The Prison Litigation Reform Act generally bars a prisoner from proceeding without paying filing fees if the prisoner previously brought three or more federal actions or appeals that were dismissed as frivolous, malicious, or for failure to state a claim. An exception applies if the prisoner was under an imminent danger of serious physical injury when the complaint was filed.
The court stated that prior related proceedings had established that the plaintiff was subject to this three-strikes bar. It also found that the complaint did not show that he faced an imminent danger of serious physical injury when he filed it. The alleged failure to build nuclear fallout shelters did not establish that exception.
Ruling
The court denied the plaintiff’s request to proceed without paying the filing fee and dismissed the complaint without prejudice under 28 U.S.C. § 1915(g). The order states that the plaintiff may begin a new federal civil action by paying the required fees, although any new prisoner civil-rights complaint would be subject to statutory screening.
Judge Laura Taylor Swain also certified that an appeal from the order would not be taken in good faith and denied permission to appeal without paying the filing fee. The court directed the clerk to enter judgment dismissing the action.
Read the full 3-page opinion on CourtListener, the free public archive maintained by the Free Law Project.