Innovative Sports Management Inc v. Ruiz Arias

• Court: District Court, N.D. California
• Decided: January 21, 2025
• Docket: 5:24-cv-06353
• Status: Unknown

Opinion

1 2 3 4 UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT 5 NORTHERN DISTRICT OF CALIFORNIA 6 7 INNOVATIVE SPORTS MANAGEMENT Case No. 5:24-cv-06353-PCP INC, 8 Plaintiff, 9 ORDER DENYING MOTION TO v. EXTEND TIME FOR SERVICE AND 10 DISMISSING CASE JEANETTE COSTANZA RUIZ ARIAS, et 11 al., Re: Dkt. No. 14 12 Defendants. 13 Plaintiff Innovative Sports Management served defendants Jeannette Costanza Ruiz Arias 14 and 818 Sports Bar & Grill, Inc. after the deadline for doing so had passed. Innovative Sports 15 Management now moves for an extension of time. For the following reasons, the motion is denied 16 and the case is dismissed without prejudice. 17 After an action is commenced, a plaintiff must serve the complaint on the defendant within 18 90 days. Fed. R. Civ. P. 4(m). “If a defendant is not served within 90 days after the complaint is 19 filed, the court … must dismiss the action without prejudice against that defendant or order that 20 service be made within a specified time.” Id. The deadline for service is intended to force parties 21 and their attorneys to be diligent in prosecuting their case. Fimbres v. United States, 833 F.2d 138, 22 139 (9th Cir. 1987). 23 Rule 4(m) also provides that “if the plaintiff shows good cause for the failure, the court 24 must extend the time for service for an appropriate period.” Fed. R. Civ. P. 4(m). “At a minimum, 25 ‘good cause’ means excusable neglect.” In re Sheehan, 253 F.3d 507, 512 (9th Cir. 2013). 26 Excusable neglect is an equitable determination based on at least four factors: “(1) the danger of 27 prejudice to the opposing party; (2) the length of delay and its potential impact on the proceedings; 1 Postal Serv., 231 F.3d 1220, 1223-24 (9th Cir. 2000). In addition to excusable neglect, a plaintiff 2 || may be required to show the following factors to bring the excuse to the level of good cause: “(a) 3 the party to be served personally received actual notice of the lawsuit; (b) the defendant would 4 suffer no prejudice; and (c) plaintiff would be severely prejudiced if his complaint were 5 dismissed.” Lemoge v. United States, 587 F.3d 1188, 1198 n.3 (9th Cir. 2009) (quoting Boudette v. 6 || Barnette, 923 F.2d 754, 756 (9th Cir. 1991)). 7 The complaint in this case was filed September 10, 2024. 818 Sports Bar & Grill and Ruiz 8 Arias were served January 6, 2025 and January 8, 2025, respectively. Accordingly, the defendants 9 were not served within 90 days of filing the complaint, as required by Rule 4(m). Innovative 10 Sports Management offers no explanation whatsoever for the delay. It has thus failed to show 11 good cause or excusable neglect. 12 Accordingly, the Court denies Innovative Sports Management’s motion to extend the time 13 for service and dismisses this case without prejudice.! 14 IT IS SO ORDERED. a 16 Dated: January 21, 2025 Kg Z 18 P. Casey Pit 19 United States District Judge 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 ' Although this remedy may appear harsh, the Court generally will not permit represented parties 28 to depart from the requirements of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure without some explanation of the justification for doing so.