Alston v. Lantz

Filing 42

ORDER (see attached) - For the reasoning articulated in its January 16, 2014 Order, the Court does not and will not consider Lieutenants Ramos, Saylor, or Bellerose to be defendants under Plaintiff's September 24, 2012 Amended Complaint, i.e., t he operative complaint in this action. However, the Court GRANTS 40 Plaintiff motion to receive additional time in which to file a proposed Second Amended Complaint which includes these three individuals as defendants in its case caption, and whic h thereby makes them parties within this matter. Plaintiff shall file any such proposed Second Amended Complaint on or before Friday, March 21, 2014. The Court sees no reason why Defendants would require an additional extension of time in which to respond to Plaintiff's Amended Complaint, particularly as Defendants' counsel has represented that he had substantially completed a motion to dismiss concerning claims contained within the applicable Amended Complaint. Such claims will not change or be altered as to current Defendants should any proposed Second Amended Complaint, if filed, become the operative complaint in this matter; therefore the Court can discern no prejudice from requiring those Defendants currently in this actio n to file a response to Plaintiff's Amended Complaint. Doing so would enable the case to proceed with respect to the currently existing claims. Accordingly, 41 Defendants' motion for extension of time is DENIED. Defendants are directed to file their response to Plaintiff's Amended Complaint on or before Friday, February 28, 2014. Signed by Judge Charles S. Haight, Jr on 2/21/14. (Hornstein, A)

UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT
DISTRICT OF CONNECTICUT

IRA ALSTON,
Plaintiff,
v.

PRISONER
3:12-CV-00147 (CSH)

THERESA LANTZ, et al.,
Defendants.

RULING
On September 24, 2012, Plaintiff Ira Alston (hereafter "Plaintiff"), currently incarcerated
at the Northern Correctional Institution in Somers, Connecticut, filed an Amended Complaint1
pro se under 42 U.S.C. § 1983 seeking damages and injunctive relief. [Doc. 12]. This Amended
Complaint is the operative complaint in this action. On January 29, 2014, Plaintiff filed a motion
moving that the Court construe his Amended Complaint to contain three additional defendants –
Lieutenants Ramos, Saylor, and Bellerose – who were not named in the case caption as parties to
this action or, in the alternative, that the Court allow Plaintiff additional time in which to file a
proposed Second Amended Complaint which adds the three aforementioned individuals as
defendants to the action. [Doc. 40]. Approximately two weeks later, on February 11, 2014,
Defendants filed a motion seeking an extension of time in which to respond to respond to
Plaintiff's Amended Complaint, asking that the Court extend such deadline "until the later of
thirty days after the [C]ourt rules on ... [P]laintiff's motion for permission to amend the complaint

1

Plaintiff was ordered to amend his complaint to conform to the rule that all Defendants
be named in the caption of the Complaint. [Doc. 5]. He did so on September 24, 2012, filing an
Amended Complaint on that date. See [Doc. 12].

... or thirty days after the [C]ourt conducts an initial review order of ... [P]laintiff's amended
complaint and service is effectuated on any new party." [Doc. 41] at 1. For the reasoning
articulated below, the Court GRANTS Plaintiff's motion, [Doc. 40], and DENIES Defendants'
motion, [Doc. 41].
Plaintiff seeks leave to add Lieutenants Ramos, Saylor and Bellerose as defendants in this
action although their names were not included in the caption of either Plaintiff's original or
amended complaints. As the Court noted in its January 16, 2014 Order – issued in response to
Defendant's January 15, 2014 motion for articulation, which posed the question of whether these
three individuals were parties in this case – "while the actions of Ramos, Saylor, and Bellerose
[were] discussed in Plaintiff's Amended Complaint, and, further, [while] the text of the Amended
Complaint [did] at turns refer to these three individuals as 'defendants,' none of these three
individuals [were] named as defendants in the caption of the Amended Complaint, and therefore
pursuant to Fed. R. Civ. P. 10(a), they [were] not Defendants in this matter." [Doc. 39] (citations
omitted). Thus, "[b]ecause [Plainitff] has not included [these individuals] in the caption of his
Complaint, they are not defendants in this action at this time and the Court will not consider any
claims against them." Gilhooly v. Armstrong, No. 3:03-CV-01798, 2006 WL 322473 at *2
(D.Conn. Feb. 9, 2006).
The Court further noted in its January 16, 2014 Order that while it is true that "[w]hen a
plaintiff omits the name of a defendant from the caption, but accurately identifies the defendant
and includes allegations against [the defendant] in the body of the complaint," courts may under
some circumstances permit the plaintiff "to proceed as to [such] a defendant[,] who has not been
named in the caption, but who has been sufficiently identified and put on notice of the claims
2

against it based on the allegations in the body of the complaint." See, e.g., Dolphin v. Waterbury
Police Dep't, No. 3:05-CV-00426, 2008 WL 2568667 at *4 (D.Conn. June 24, 2008) (citations
omitted); see also, e.g., Arnold v. Doe, No. 3:11-CV-01342, 2013 WL 3716519 at *5 n.2
(D.Conn. July 12, 2013). In the case at bar, however, as "Plaintiff was specifically instructed by
the Court in a June 4, 2013 Order," i.e., [Doc. 5], "to file an Amended Complaint 'identify[ing]
all defendants in the case caption and clearly list[ing] the claims against each defendant,'" and,
despite this, "Plaintiff ha[d] made no additional effort to pursue claims against [Ramos], Saylor,
or Bellerose," the Court concluded in its January 16, 2014 Order that these individuals were not
defendants. [Doc. 39] (citations omitted).
Plaintiff avers in the motion he now brings before the Court, [Doc. 40], that when he
"drafted his Amended Complaint ... he inadvertently omitted Lieutenants ... Saylor, Ramos[,] and
Bellerose['s] name[s] from the case caption," and, moreover, that "[i]t should not be ignored that
it is clear from a careful reading of [Plaintiff's] Amended Complaint [that] Plaintiff clearly
intended to conclude Lieutenants ... Saylor, Ramos and Bellerose as defendants to this action."
[Doc. 40]. Plaintiff further states that while he "is cognizant of the fact th[at] this Court's" June
4, 2012 "Order directed or instructed Plaintiff to file an Amended Complaint identifying all
defendants in the case caption[, ...] it was only a lack of oversight that resulted in the omission of
... Lieutenant[s] Ramos, Saylor[,] and Bellerose from the case caption" of the Amended
Complaint Plaintiff filed on September 24, 2012, i.e., [Doc. 12]. See [Doc. 40] at 2. Plaintiff
therefore prays either that this Court consider such Amended Complaint to contain claims against
Lieutenants Ramos, Saylor, and Bellerose, or, in the alternative, that the Court permit Plaintiff
additional time in which to file a Second Amended Complaint to include these three individuals
3

as defendants. Id. at 2-3.
For the reasoning articulated in its January 16, 2014 Order, the Court does not and will
not consider Lieutenants Ramos, Saylor, or Bellerose to be defendants under Plaintiff's
September 24, 2012 Amended Complaint, i.e., the operative complaint in this action. However,
the Court GRANTS Plaintiff motion to receive additional time in which to file a Second
Amended Complaint which includes these three individuals as defendants in its case caption, and
which thereby makes them parties within this matter. Accordingly, such Second Amended
Complaint shall include Plaintiff's claims against Lieutenants Ramos, Saylor, and Bellerose along
with the pending claims and allegations contained within Plaintiff's First Amended Complaint; it
shall comply with the Court's previous instructions in such regard. Plaintiff shall not alter the
pending claims or include any new claims in his proposed Second Amended Complaint. To that
end, should Plaintiff so wish, Plaintiff may merely add the names of Lieutenants Ramos, Saylor,
and Bellerose to the case caption of the current Amended Complaint and file such document as a
proposed Second Amended Complaint. Plaintiff shall file any proposed Second Amended
Complaint on or before Friday, March 21, 2014.
In response to Plaintiff motion, Defendants "respectfully move[d] [the Court] for an
enlargement of time until the later of thirty days after the [C]ourt rules on ... [P]laintiff's motion
for permission to amend [the] complaint ... or thirty days ... after the [C]ourt concludes an initial
review order of ... [P]laintiff's amended complaint and service is effectuated on any new party."
[Doc. 41] at 1. In support of this request, counsel for Defendants avers that he "has been
preparing a motion to dismiss, which is substantially complete," and which "is in respond to the
current complaint," and that, should any prospective additional parties under a second amended
4

complaint "choose to be represented by the Office of the Attorney General, [Defendants'] counsel
[would] have to obtain and review addition documents relevant to the complaint, meet with the
new clients, examine issues of service and representation, and file an appropriate response." Id.
at 2 (emphasis in original).
As an initial matter, the Court notes that it has set two prior final deadlines for
Defendants' response to Plaintiff's Complaint, the second of which was exactly a week after
Defendants filed the motion at bar. The first such deadline, which was issued in a December 11,
2013 Order granting a motion for extension by defendants nunc pro tunc, was February 3, 2014.
[Doc. 37]. In that Order, the Court explicitly cautioned counsel Order "that this extension [was]
peremptory" and that "no further motions for enlargement of time [would] be entertained." Id.
However, despite this language, the Court did grant Defendants a second deadline by which to
respond to Plaintiff's complaint after Defendants filed a Motion for Articulation with the Court.
[Doc. 38]. Despite the Court having responded to Defendants' Motion for Articulation within a
day of its filing, see [Doc. 39], the Court granted Defendants' motion for an additional extension
of time in which to respond to Plaintiff's Amended Complaint, as Defendants had requested in
their Motion for Articulation, thus allowing Defendants to receive thirty days "after the Court
issue[d] its clarification to file an answer or response to the [c]omplaint" and setting a new
deadline of February 18, 2014. See [Doc. 38] at 1, [Doc. 39].
Pursuant to the Court's ruling allowing Plaintiff to file a proposed Second Amended
Complaint, supra, Plaintiff is precluded from amending his claims against existing defendants in
this action. Given that, the Court sees no reason why Defendants would require an additional
extension of time in which to respond to Plaintiff's Amended Complaint, particularly as
5

Defendants' counsel has represented that he had substantially completed a motion to dismiss
concerning claims contained within the applicable Amended Complaint. Such claims will not
change or be altered as to current Defendants should any proposed Second Amended Complaint,
if filed, become the operative complaint in this matter; therefore the Court can discern no
prejudice from requiring those Defendants currently in this action to file a response to Plaintiff's
Amended Complaint. Doing so would enable the case to proceed with respect to the currently
existing claims. Accordingly, Defendants' motion for extension of time is DENIED. Defendants
are directed to file their response to Plaintiff's Amended Complaint on or before Friday,
February 28, 2014.
The foregoing is SO ORDERED.

Dated: New Haven, Connecticut
February 21, 2014

/s/Charles S. Haight, Jr.
Charles S. Haight, Jr.
Senior United States District Judge

6