Torres v. United States of America

Filing 21

ORDER denying 20 Motion to Alter Judgment. Signed by Judge Robert N. Scola, Jr on 5/10/2018. (pes) Modified document type on 5/11/2018 (pes).

United States District Court
for the
Southern District of Florida
Antistenes Torres, Movant,
v.
United States of America,
Respondent.

)
)
) Criminal Case No. 17-20623-civ-Scola
)
)

Order Denying Rule 59(e) Motion
Movant Antistenes Torres asks the Court to reconsider, under Federal
Rule of Civil Procedure 59(e), its order adopting United States Magistrate Judge
Patrick A. White’s report and recommendation. According to Torres, the Court
has not adequately established subject-matter jurisdiction and has not
properly evaluated Torres’s ineffective-assistance-of-counsel claims.
Rule 59(e) permits a motion to alter or amend a judgment. “The only
grounds for granting a Rule 59 motion are newly-discovered evidence or
manifest errors of law or fact. A Rule 59(e) motion cannot be used to relitigate
old matters, raise argument or present evidence that could have been raised
prior to the entry of judgment.” Arthur v. King, 500 F.3d 1335, 1343 (11th Cir.
2007) (internal quotations omitted).
It is an improper use of the motion to reconsider to ask the Court to
rethink what the Court already thought through—rightly or
wrongly. The motion to reconsider would be appropriate where, for
example, the Court has patently misunderstood a party, or has
made a decision outside the adversarial issues presented to the
Court by the parties, or has made an error not of reasoning but of
apprehension. A further basis for a motion to reconsider would be a
controlling or significant change in the law or facts since the
submission of the issue to the Court. Such problems rarely arise
and the motion to reconsider should be equally rare.
Z.K. Marine Inc. v. M/V Archigetis, 808 F. Supp. 1561, 1563 (S.D. Fla. 1992)
(Hoeveler, J.) (citation omitted).
After considering Torres’s motion, the record, and the relevant legal
authorities, the Court denies the motion (ECF No. 20). Torres does not present
newly discovered evidence or new law but merely urges the Court to rethink its
previous decision. Nor has Torres established any manifest errors of law or
fact. In other words, the motion does not meet the standards of Rule 59(e). The

Court does not issue a certificate of appealability.
Done and ordered, at Miami, Florida, on May 10, 2018.
_______________________________
Robert N. Scola, Jr.
United States District Judge