Cioce v. County of Westchester

128 F. App'x 181
Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit·Decided April 15, 2005·No. No. 04-4445·Published·Cited by 25 cases

Opinion

SUMMARY ORDER

Appellant, Michael W. Cioce, pro se, appeals from: '(1) the August 1, 2003, judgment of the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York, granting Appellees’ motion to dismiss his claims under the Americans with Disabilities Act and Title VII of the Civil Rights [183] Act of 1964, pursuant to Rules 4(m) and 12(b) of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, for the reasons set forth in the court’s opinion and order entered on July 30, 2003; and (2) the district court’s July 13, 2004, order denying his motion for a new trial under Rule 59(d) of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure. Cioce has also moved for this Court to docket the district court’s July 30, 2003, order.

As a preliminary matter, we note that, although Cioce’s Notice of Appeal states only that Cioce appeals from the July 13, 2004, order, it later refers to and discusses the July 30, 2003, opinion; thus, because “we construe notices of appeal liberally, taking the parties’ intentions into account,” Shrader v. CSX Transp., Inc., 70 F.3d 255, 256 (2d Cir.1995), we understand Cioce’s appeal to be both from the July 13, 2004, order and the August 1, 2003, judgment based on the July 30, 2003, opinion. Such an appeal was timely because Cioce filed his Rule 59 motion within ten days of the entry of the district court’s August 2003 judgment — thus tolling the time to file an appeal until the entry of the district court’s July 2004 order denying that motion — and filed a notice of appeal within thirty days from the entry of that decision. See Fed. R.Civ.P. 59(d); Fed. R.App. P. 4(a)(4)(A)(iv); see also Smith v. Woosley, 399 F.3d 428, 431 (2d Cir.2005). Thus, we review both judgments of the district court. We also grant Cioce’s motions to docket the July 30, 2003, order.

This Court reviews for abuse of discretion a district court’s dismissal of a complaint for failure to comply with the service requirements of Fed.R.Civ.P. 4. See Thompson v. Maldonado, 309 F.3d 107, 110 (2d Cir.2002) (per curiam). A district court’s dismissal of a complaint for failure to state a claim pursuant to Fed.R.Civ.P. 12(b)(6) is reviewed de novo, “taking all factual allegations as true and construing all reasonable inferences in the plaintiffs favor.” Lee v. Bankers Trust Co., 166 F.3d 540, 543 (2d Cir.1999). “Dismissal is proper only ‘if it appears beyond doubt that the plaintiff can prove no set of facts in support of his claim which would entitle him to relief.’ ” Id. (quoting Valmonte v. Bane, 18 F.3d 992, 998 (2d Cir.1994); further internal quotation marks and citation omitted)).

In this case, the district court properly dismissed Cioce’s complaint. Rule 4(m) provides that the district court shall, upon motion or on its own initiative after notice to the plaintiff, dismiss without prejudice any action in which service of the summons and complaint has not been made upon a defendant within 120 days after the filing of the complaint. See Fed. R.Civ.P. 4(m). Cioce contends that the district court abused its discretion in dismissing his complaint without first giving him notice, as required by the rule. However, although Rule 4(m) indicates that “notice to the plaintiff must be given prior to a sua sponte dismissal,” Thompson, 309 F.3d at 110, it does not appear that the court must provide such notice if the defendant moves to dismiss on that basis, see id. at 109. Indeed, such notice would be unnecessary because the plaintiff is, in such a situation, apprised by the defendant’s motion of the possible dismissal. Here, the defendants moved to dismiss Cioce’s amended complaint because they were not served with the complaint within 120 days of the initiation of the suit. Therefore, the court did not need to provide notice to Cioce as to this issue— indeed, as evidenced by Cioce’s response to the motion to dismiss, it is obvious that Cioce was aware of the possibility of dismissal on this basis.

In any event, the district court also considered the merits of Cioce’s claims and concluded that the amended complaint [184] should be dismissed pursuant to Fed. R.Civ.P. 12(b)(6). We agree. First, Cioce does not appear to dispute the district court’s finding that he failed to state a claim under Title VII, because he did not allege discrimination on the basis of race, color, religion, sex, or national origin. Nor does he seem to contest the district court’s finding that his claims under the Americans with Disabilities Act (“ADA”) cannot lie against Spencer or Pozzi as individual defendants. See Tomka v. Seiler Corp., 66 F.3d 1295, 1321 (2d Cir.1995), abrogated on other grounds by Burlington Indus., Inc. v. Ellerth, 524 U.S. 742, 118 S.Ct. 2257, 141 L.Ed.2d 633 (1998); Cerrato v. Durham, 941 F.Supp. 388, 395 (S.D.N.Y. 1996).

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Cioce v. County of Westchester, 128 F. App'x 181 (2d Cir. 2005).

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