Williams v. Schoeder

Filing 11

ORDER denying re 9 Original Document - Motion for Reconsideration; signed by Judge William C Griesbach on 7/06/2011. (cc: all counsel, via US mail to Clyde Williams)(Griesbach, William)

UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT
EASTERN DISTRICT OF WISCONSIN
CLYDE B. WILLIAMS,
Plaintiff,
v.

Case No. 11-C-0572

HON. BRUCE SCHOEDER,
Defendant.

ORDER DENYING MOTION FOR RECONSIDERATION

On June 27, 2001 this Court dismissed Clyde Williams’s case for lack of jurisdiction.
(Dkt. 6.) Three days later Plaintiff filed a document entitled a “common traverse file” which this
Court will treat as a motion for reconsideration.
A motion for reconsideration serves a very limited purpose in federal civil litigation; it
should be used only “to correct manifest errors of law or fact or to present newly discovered
evidence.” Rothwell Cotton Co. v. Rosenthal & Co., 827 F.2d 246, 251 (7th Cir. 1987) (quoting
Keene Corp. v. Int’l Fidelity Ins. Co., 561 F. Supp. 656, 665-66 (N.D. Ill. 1976), aff’d 736 F.2d 388
(7th Cir. 1984)). “A ‘manifest error’ is not demonstrated by the disappointment of the losing party.
It is the ‘wholesale disregard, misapplication, or failure to recognize controlling precedent.’” Oto
v. Metro. Life Ins. Co., 224 F.3d 601, 606 (7th Cir. 2000) (quoting Sedrak v. Callahan, 987 F. Supp.
1063, 1069 (N.D. Ill. 1997)). Such motions are disfavored and should be “rare.” Bank of Waunakee
v. Rochester Cheese Sales, Inc., 906 F.2d 1185, 1191 (7th Cir. 1990).
Plaintiff has presented no new facts and no new law warranting reconsideration. As noted
previously, Williams has exhausted his ability to attack his conviction under the Antiterrorism and

Effective Death Penalty Act (“AEDPA”), which generally affords prisoners just one round of
collateral review. See Rodriguez v. United States, 286 F.3d 972, 980 (7th Cir. 2002). Williams was
convicted in Wisconsin state court of three counts of first-degree sexual assault of a child. After
unsuccessfully pursuing his state court direct appeal, he filed a petition for habeas corpus in this
Court which denied relief. Williams v. Bartow, 2005 WL 3435038, No. 05-C-89 (E.D. Wis. Dec
13, 2005). On March 20, 2007, the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals affirmed. See Williams v.
Bartow, 481 F.3d 492 (7th Cir. 2007). Any subsequent motion attacking the prisoner's conviction
must be dismissed, absent permission from the court of appeals to commence a second or successive
collateral attack. Melton v. United States, 359 F.3d 855, 857 (7th Cir. 2004). Accordingly
Plaintiff’s self-styled “common traverse file” is dismissed as it seeks reconsideration of this Court’s
prior order dismissing his case for lack of jurisdiction.
SO ORDERED this

6th

day of July, 2011.

s/ William C. Griesbach
William C. Griesbach
United States District Judge

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