Jordan v. TJX

Filing 3

Order re: 1 Complaint filed by Camille P. Jordan. The Complaint is STRICKEN as an impermissible shotgun pleading. Jordan is GRANTED LEAVE to file an amended complaint on or before 4/11/2025. The Clerk is DIRECTED to send a copy of the original complaint and exhibits to Jordan for reference, along with a copy of this Court's Pro Se Litigant Handbook. Copies mailed to Plaintiff. Signed by Magistrate Judge Sonja F. Bivins on 3/12/2025. (meh)

IN THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT
FOR THE SOUTHERN DISTRICT OF ALABAMA
SOUTHERN DIVISION
CAMILLE P. JORDAN,

*
*
*
*
* CIVIL ACTION NO. 25-00097-KD-B
*
*
*
*

Plaintiff,
vs.
TJX d/b/a T.J. Maxx,
Defendant.

ORDER
This action is before the Court on review.

Plaintiff Camille

P. Jordan (“Jordan”), who is proceeding without an attorney (pro
se), filed a complaint against Defendant TJX d/b/a T.J. Maxx (“T.J.
Maxx”)1 and paid the filing fee for a civil action.
After

conducting

Jordan’s

a

complaint

preliminary
is

an

review,

impermissible

the

Court

shotgun

(Doc. 1).
finds

that

pleading

that

violates the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure and fails to provide
adequate notice of her claims and the factual grounds on which

1

Jordan lists the Defendant’s name as “TJX dba T.J. Maxx” in the
caption of her complaint and as “T.J. Maxx” in the body of her
complaint.
(Doc. 1 at 1).
However, a search of the Alabama
Secretary of State’s Business Entity Records reveals no entity
registered to do business in Alabama under the name “TJX” or “T.J.
Maxx.” Rather, it appears that T.J. Maxx may be a fictitious name
for The TJX Companies, Inc. Jordan is hereby cautioned that she
will have to identify and name a proper legal entity in her amended
complaint in order to perfect service of process on the corporate
Defendant.

they rest.

It is therefore necessary for Jordan to replead her

claims in an amended complaint.
I.

COMPLAINT
In her complaint,2 Jordan indicates that she is bringing this

action

for

employment

discrimination

based

on

a

physical

disability in violation of the Americans with Disabilities Act
(“ADA”).

(Doc. 1 at 2-3).

Jordan indicates that she worked for

T.J. Maxx at its store in Daphne, Alabama from April 2018 to May
24,

2024.

(Id.

at

1-2).

Jordan

indicates

that

the

“acts

complained of in this suit concern” the “[t]ermination of [her]
employment” with T.J. Maxx on May 24, 2024.

(Id.).

Jordan states

that she filed charges with the Equal Employment Opportunity
Commission (“EEOC”) regarding T.J. Maxx’s alleged discriminatory
conduct on or about November 14, 2024, and she attaches copies of
her EEOC charge and a right-to-sue letter dated December 9, 2024.
(Doc. 1 at 3; Doc. 1-1 at 10, 27).3

When prompted on the complaint

form to describe how T.J. Maxx discriminated against her, Jordan
states only: “Violation of Rights Under the ADA Amendments Act of
2008. (ADAAA).”

(Doc. 1 at 3).

“[r]ecovery of back pay.”

2

For relief, Jordan requests

(Id.).

Jordan uses this Court’s form complaint for civil
alleging employment discrimination. (See Doc. 1).

3

actions

Jordan also attaches various other EEOC case documents relating
to her charge number 425-2025-00277. (See Doc. 1-1).
2

II.
A.

LEGAL STANDARDS
Federal Rules of Civil Procedure 8 and 10

A complaint filed in federal court must contain “a short and
plain statement of the claim showing that the pleader is entitled
to relief.”

Fed. R. Civ. P. 8(a)(2).

This means that “a complaint

must contain sufficient factual matter, accepted as true, to ‘state
a claim to relief that is plausible on its face.’”

Ashcroft v.

Iqbal, 556 U.S. 662, 678 (2009) (quoting Bell Atl. Corp. v. Twombly,
550 U.S. 544, 570 (2007)).

This necessarily requires that a

plaintiff include factual allegations that plausibly support each
essential element of his claim.
708 n.2 (11th Cir. 2010).
factual

allegations,

but

Randall v. Scott, 610 F.3d 701,

A complaint does not need detailed
it

“requires

more

than

labels

and

conclusions, and a formulaic recitation of the elements of a cause
of action will not do.”

Twombly, 550 U.S. at 555.

“Nor does a

complaint suffice if it tenders ‘naked assertion[s]’ devoid of
‘further factual enhancement.’”

Iqbal, 556 U.S. at 678 (quoting

Twombly, 550 U.S. at 557).
The purpose of Rule 8(a)(2) is to “give the defendant fair
notice of what the . . . claim is and the grounds upon which it
rests.”

Twombly, 550 U.S. at 555 (quotation omitted).

Although

no technical pleading form is required, each allegation in a
complaint “must be simple, concise, and direct.”
3

Fed. R. Civ. P.

8(d)(1).

Relatedly, Rule 10(b) mandates that a complaint “state

its claims . . . in numbered paragraphs, each limited as far as
practicable to a single set of circumstances,” and that “each claim
founded on a separate transaction or occurrence . . . be stated in
a separate count” to the extent doing so “would promote clarity.”
Fed. R. Civ. P. 10(b).
These rules “work together to require the pleader to present
[her] claims discretely and succinctly, so that [her] adversary
can discern what [she] is claiming and frame a responsive pleading,
[and so that a] court can determine which facts support which
claims and whether the plaintiff has stated any claims upon which
relief can be granted.”

Fikes v. City of Daphne, 79 F.3d 1079,

1082 (11th Cir. 1996) (quotation omitted). Complaints that violate
these rules are “disparagingly referred to as ‘shotgun pleadings.’”
Weiland v. Palm Beach Cty. Sheriff’s Office, 792 F.3d 1313, 1320
(11th Cir. 2015).

The Eleventh Circuit Court of Appeals has

identified four general types or categories of shotgun pleadings:
(1) those in which “each count adopts the allegations of all
preceding counts, causing each successive count to carry all that
came before and the last count to be a combination of the entire
complaint;” (2) those that are “replete with conclusory, vague,
and immaterial facts not obviously connected to any particular
cause of action;” (3) those that do not separate each cause of
4

action or claim for relief into a different count; and (4) those
that assert “multiple claims against multiple defendants without
specifying which of the defendants are responsible for which acts
or omissions, or which of the defendants the claim is brought
against.”

Id. at 1321-23.

The unifying characteristic of all

shotgun pleadings is that they “fail . . . to give the defendants
adequate notice of the claims against them and the grounds upon
which each claim rests.”
B.

Id. at 1323.

Pro Se Litigation

Although courts must liberally construe pro se pleadings and
hold them to less stringent standards than formal pleadings drafted
by lawyers, Erickson v. Pardus, 551 U.S. 89, 94 (2007) (per curiam),
this does not give a court license to act as counsel for a party
or rewrite an otherwise deficient pleading in order to sustain an
action. Campbell v. Air Jamaica Ltd., 760 F.3d 1165, 1168–69 (11th
Cir. 2014).

A pro se litigant is still “subject to the relevant

law and rules of court, including the Federal Rules of Civil
Procedure.”

Moon v. Newsome, 863 F.2d 835, 837 (11th Cir. 1989).

III. DISCUSSION
A.

Jordan’s Complaint is Deficient

Upon review, the Court finds that Jordan’s complaint violates
Rules 8 and 10 of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure and fails
to provide adequate notice of her claims and their underlying
5

factual

grounds.

Most

fundamentally,

Jordan’s

complaint

is

defective because it lacks any direct factual allegations against
T.J. Maxx and rests solely on a bare, unsupported assertion: that
T.J. Maxx discriminated against Jordan because of her physical
disability in violation of the ADA.

This conclusory assertion,

standing alone, is utterly insufficient to provide adequate notice
of the claim(s) Jordan is raising under the ADA and the factual
grounds on which her claim or claims rest.
To the extent Jordan relies on her EEOC charge or other
attachments

to

the

complaint

as

a

substitute

for

factual

allegations in the body of the complaint, this form of pleading is
improper.

First, it violates Rule 8, which requires that a

complaint contain “a short and plain statement of the claim showing
that the pleader is entitled to relief,” and that each allegation
in a complaint “must be simple, concise, and direct.”
Civ. P. 8(a)(2) & 8(d)(1) (emphasis added).

See Fed. R.

Second, it violates

Rule 10(b), because the EEOC charge on which Jordan arguably relies
is not broken up into numbered paragraphs each limited as far as
practicable to a single set of circumstances.
10(b).

See Fed. R. Civ. P.

This manner of pleading prevents the Court and T.J. Maxx

from accurately discerning which claim(s) for relief Jordan is
asserting, and which factual allegations are intended to support
each claim (to the extent more than one claim is being asserted).
6

It also hinders T.J. Maxx’s ability to admit or deny pertinent
allegations and frame a meaningful response to the complaint.
Although

it

is

not

clear

from

her

barebones

complaint,

Jordan’s EEOC charge suggests that she may be raising claims
against

T.J.

discrimination
disability.

Maxx
and

for

for

disparate

failure

to

treatment

reasonably

disability

accommodate

her

(See Doc. 1-1 at 10).

An ADA discrimination claim can be based on either a
conventional “disparate treatment” theory, or a theory
that
the
defendant
failed
to
make
“reasonable
accommodations,” or both. Disparate treatment involves
discriminatory intent and occurs when a disabled person
is singled out for disadvantage because of her
disability. By contrast, a failure to make reasonable
accommodations claim requires no animus and occurs when
a covered entity breaches its affirmative duty to
reasonably accommodate the known physical or mental
limitations of an otherwise qualified person. This is
because the ADA not only protects against disparate
treatment, “it also creates an affirmative duty in some
circumstances to provide special, preferred treatment,
or ‘reasonable accommodation.’”
Forbes v. St. Thomas Univ., Inc., 768 F. Supp. 2d 1222, 1227 (S.D.
Fla. 2010) (citations omitted); see also Parsons v. First Quality
Retail Servs., LLC, 2012 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 6823, at *13, 2012 WL
174829, at *5 (M.D. Ga. Jan. 20, 2012) (explaining that “the basis
for a failure to accommodate claim is that an employer, because of
a particular employee’s needs as a disabled individual, is required
to

treat

that

individual

differently

than

other

employees,”

whereas in a disparate treatment disability discrimination claim,
7

“the plaintiff is seeking relief because he has been treated
differently

based

on

his

status

as

a

disabled

individual”)

(emphasis in original).
Thus, “a disparate treatment disability discrimination claim
is conceptually different than a failure to accommodate claim, and
they are essentially inapposite.”

Id.; see also Hart v. Bear

Staffing Servs., Inc., 2021 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 81193, at *5 n.3,
2021 WL 1662766, at *2 n.3 (M.D. Fla. Apr. 28, 2021) (noting that
“a failure to accommodate claim under the ADA has separate and
distinct

elements

from

a

discriminatory

discharge

claim”).

Because they are based on different theories of liability, claims
under the ADA for disparate treatment disability discrimination4
and denial of reasonable accommodation5 must be raised in separate

4

“To state a discrimination claim under the ADA, a plaintiff must
allege sufficient facts to plausibly suggest ‘(1) that [she]
suffers from a disability, (2) that [she] is a qualified individual,
and (3) that a “covered entity” discriminated against [her] on
account of [her] disability.’” Surtain v. Hamlin Terrace Found.,
789 F.3d 1239, 1246 (11th Cir. 2015) (quoting Cramer v. Florida,
117 F.3d 1258, 1264 (11th Cir. 1997)). A disability is defined
under the ADA as “(A) a physical or mental impairment that
substantially limits one or more major life activities of such
individual; (B) a record of such an impairment; or (C) being
regarded as having such an impairment.”
42 U.S.C. § 12102(1).
“For purposes of the ADA, a qualified individual is one ‘who, with
or without reasonable accommodation, can perform the essential
functions’ of her employment.” Surtain, 789 F.3d at 1246 (quoting
42 U.S.C. § 12111(8)).

5

To state a claim for failure to accommodate under the ADA, a
plaintiff must allege sufficient facts to plausibly suggest “that:
8

counts.

See, e.g., Hausberg v. Wilkie, 2021 U.S. Dist. LEXIS

171918, at *5, 2021 WL 4133739, at *2 (M.D. Fla. Sept. 10, 2021)
(dismissing

count

that

asserted

“claims

for

both

disability

discrimination (or disparate treatment) and denial of reasonable
accommodation . . . with leave to amend for violating the shotgun
pleading rule”); Hart, 2021 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 81193, at *3-4, 2021
WL 1662766, at *2 (finding that complaint was “a shotgun pleading
in that it [did] not separate two distinct legal claims—failure to
accommodate and discriminatory discharge, both under the ADA”).
As noted above, Jordan’s EEOC charge appears to invoke more
than one theory of liability under the ADA.

However, Jordan’s

complaint fails to specify what type of claim or claims she is
raising under the ADA in this civil action, and it is not clear
from the complaint whether Jordan intends to assert a disparate
treatment

disability

discrimination

claim,

a

failure

to

accommodate claim, or both (or any other type of claim under the
ADA).

(See Doc. 1).

To the extent Jordan intends to assert more

than one type of claim under the ADA, she fails to plead her
discrete claims for relief in separate counts as required and fails

(1) [she] is disabled; (2) [she] is a qualified individual, meaning
able to perform the essential functions of the job; and (3) [she]
was discriminated against because of [her] disability by way of
the defendant’s failure to provide a reasonable accommodation.”
Russell v. City of Tampa, 652 F. App’x 765, 767 (11th Cir. 2016)
(per curiam).
9

to specify which factual allegations are intended to support which
claims for relief.

Thus, Jordan’s complaint falls into the third

shotgun pleading category identified by the Eleventh Circuit in
Weiland.
B.

Order to Amend

When presented with a deficient shotgun pleading such as
Jordan’s initial complaint in this case, a district court should
take the initiative to dismiss or strike the pleading and give the
party an opportunity to replead her case.
1321 n.10.

Weiland, 792 F.3d at

“In the repleading order, the district court should

explain how the offending pleading violates the shotgun pleading
rule so that the party may properly avoid future shotgun pleadings.”
Vibe Micro, Inc. v. Shabanets, 878 F.3d 1291, 1296 (11th Cir.
2018).

When a plaintiff fails to make meaningful modifications to

her shotgun complaint after being ordered to do so, the court may
dismiss the case under the authority of either Federal Rule of
Civil Procedure 41(b) or the court’s inherent power to manage its
docket.

Weiland, 792 F.3d at 1321 n.10.6

Accordingly, Jordan’s complaint (Doc. 1) is STRICKEN as an
impermissible shotgun pleading.

6

Jordan is GRANTED LEAVE to file

A pro se plaintiff must generally be given at least one chance
to remedy her complaint’s deficiencies before her action can be
dismissed sua sponte on shotgun pleading grounds.
Nezbeda v.
Liberty Mut. Ins. Corp., 789 F. App’x 180, 183 (11th Cir. 2019)
(per curiam).
10

an amended complaint on or before April 11, 2025. Jordan’s amended
complaint must plead her claims with sufficient specificity to
conform to Rules 8 and 10 of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure,
and it must address and correct the pleading deficiencies outlined
in this order.

This includes, but is not limited to, clearly and

separately identifying each cause of action or claim for relief
she

is

asserting

(e.g.,

disparate

treatment

disability

discrimination, failure to accommodate, etc.); specifying which
alleged acts of discrimination fall under each cause of action or
claim

for

relief

asserted;

and

making

clear

which

factual

allegations are intended to support which causes of action or
claims for relief (to the extent more than one cause of action or
claim for relief is asserted).7
The Court reiterates to Jordan that a complaint must contain
enough factual matter to state a facially plausible claim for
relief.

Iqbal, 556 U.S. at 678.

“A claim has facial plausibility

when the plaintiff pleads factual content that allows the court to
draw the reasonable inference that the defendant is liable for the
misconduct alleged.”

Id.

This necessarily requires that a

plaintiff include factual allegations that plausibly support each

7

Jordan may attach copies of her EEOC charge of discrimination
and right-to-sue letter as exhibits to her amended complaint, and
she may refer to these exhibits in her amended complaint, but she
may not rely on the contents of these documents to convey the
nature or factual basis of her claims in this civil action.
11

essential element of her claim.
708 n.2 (11th Cir. 2010).
factual

allegations,

but

Randall v. Scott, 610 F.3d 701,

A complaint does not need detailed
it

“requires

more

than

labels

and

conclusions, and a formulaic recitation of the elements of a cause
of action will not do.”

Twombly, 550 U.S. at 555.

“Nor does a

complaint suffice if it tenders ‘naked assertion[s]’ devoid of
‘further factual enhancement.’”

Iqbal, 556 U.S. at 678 (quoting

Twombly, 550 U.S. at 557).
Jordan is informed that her amended complaint will replace
her original complaint.

Therefore, the amended complaint shall

not reference or seek to incorporate by reference
complaint.

her prior

See Dresdner Bank AG v. M/V Olympia Voyager, 463 F.3d

1210, 1215 (11th Cir. 2006) (stating that the original complaint
is considered abandoned and is no longer a part of the pleader’s
allegations against her adversary when an amended complaint is
filed).
Jordan is hereby cautioned that if she does not file an
amended complaint within the ordered time, or if she files an
amended complaint that fails to fully address and correct the
deficiencies in the original complaint that are described in this
order, the undersigned will recommend that this action be dismissed.
The Clerk is DIRECTED to send a copy of the original complaint
and exhibits (Docs. 1, 1-1) to Jordan for her reference, along
12

with a copy of this Court’s Pro Se Litigant Handbook.

Jordan is

encouraged to review the handbook carefully and utilize it in
drafting an amended complaint, so as to avoid repetition of the
pleading deficiencies identified herein.
ORDERED this 12th day of March, 2025.
/s/ SONJA F. BIVINS
UNITED STATES MAGISTRATE JUDGE

13