JOHN DOE v. WALK

CourtDistrict Court, E.D. Pennsylvania
DecidedJune 29, 2023
Docket2:23-cv-02187
StatusUnknown

This text of JOHN DOE v. WALK (JOHN DOE v. WALK) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering District Court, E.D. Pennsylvania primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
JOHN DOE v. WALK, (E.D. Pa. 2023).

Opinion

IN THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT FOR THE EASTERN DISTRICT OF PENNSYLVANIA ARTIS C. CARROLL, JR. : CIVIL ACTION v. NO. 23-2187 MARY WALK

MEMORANDUM KEARNEY, J. June 29, 2022 Serial litigant Artis C. Carroll, Jr. disguises himself as a John Doe in his latest challenge to a state actor’s treatment of him upon his most recent return to custody in a Pennsylvania prison. He again proceeds without paying the filing fees. He today sues a state court staff member for not giving him forms to move for habeas relief in state court while the public defender represented him. He claims the court employee did not give him the forms because Pennsylvania law prohibits him from seeking habeas relief in state court separate and apart from his counsel’s efforts. Mr. Carroll claims this state actor in the Office of Judicial Support is depriving him of his due process rights, violating his First, Fifth and Fourteenth Amendment rights, and violating the “privilege” of habeas corpus. He asks we release him from custody and declare his rights in state court. But Mr. Carroll admits the court staff member acts within the scope of her role in the Office of Judicial Support. She is thus immune from civil rights damages claims. We also cannot release him from custody, nor can we stop the state court evaluating his habeas petitions. We also cannot make a declaratory judgment as to the legitimacy of his state court filings. Mr. Carroll files yet another frivolous case without paying the filing fees which we must dismiss under our Congressionally mandated screening obligations. Congress requires we today enter a prefiling injunction barring Mr. Carroll from filing further civil cases in federal court as an incarcerated person without paying the filing fees or showing imminent danger of serious physical injury.

I. Alleged pro se facts An unnamed Upper Darby Township Police Officer arrested Artis C. Carroll, Jr. in Delaware County on November 4, 2021.! The officer filed a “Police Criminal Complaint” shortly after the arrest stating Mr. Carroll “committed a crime(s) on said date at said location[.]”” An unnamed Delaware County Court of Common Pleas judge revoked Mr. Carroll’s bail in the unnamed “criminal case” on January 31, 2022.7 The judge issued a bench warrant for Mr. Carroll’s arrest the same day after Mr. Carroll failed to appear at a pretrial conference without good cause.’ Officers arrested Mr. Carroll “solely for said bench warrant” on February 1, 2022.° Mr. Carroll has “remained in pretrial incarceration ever since” his February 1, 2022 arrest.° Mr. Carroll objects to an involuntary incompetency exam. Delaware County Assistant Public Defender Thomas Martinicchio began “Incompetency Involuntary Civil Commitment proceedings” against Mr. Carroll in the unnamed criminal case on February 3, 2022.’ Public Defender Martinicchio requested the trial judge hold Mr. Carroll in pretrial custody unless or until Mr. Carroll submitted to an involuntary incompetency exam.® Mr. Carroll immediately objected to Public Defender Martinicchio’s request.” Mr. Carroll requested a Step One hearing to see if “reasonable cause” or a “prima facie” question existed to show his incompetence.!° The trial judge “ignored” Mr. Carroll’s objection and granted Public Defender Martinicchio’s request.'! The trial judge ordered Mr. Carroll be held in pretrial incarceration until he submitted to an involuntary incompetency exam.!* Mr. Carroll tries to petition for habeas relief in state court. Mr. Carroll “upon information and belief’ became eligible to petition for habeas relief to challenge his confinement in his unnamed criminal case due “solely” to his “purported mental illness and/or purported mental impairment” after the trial judge ordered his pretrial confinement.!?

Mr. Carroll wrote to the Director of the Office of Judicial Support of the Delaware County Court of Common Pleas Mary Walk to explain his situation, petition, and to ask for an in forma pauperis form on April 25, 2022.'4 Director Walk is the “chief decision maker” at the Office of Judicial Support and controls its policies, practices, and customs including the training, supervision, and discipline of the employees.!° Director Walk’s responsibilities include the “ministerial act” of accepting, filing, and docketing petitions for writs of habeas corpus and notifying parties of defects preventing the filing of petitions.'® But neither Director Walk nor the Office of Judicial Support responded to Mr. Carroll’s April 25, 2022 letter.!7 Mr. Carroll again objects to an involuntary incompetency exam. Delaware County Assistant Public Defender Timothy Walsh renewed Public Defender Martinicchio’s request for Mr. Carroll’s incompetency exam in a document “fraudulently” and “misleading[ly]’” titled “Petition for a Writ of Habeas Corpus” on May 15, 2022.'§ Delaware County Assistant Public Defender Kevin Horan renewed this request again on June 3, 2022.!° Mr. Carroll objected immediately when he learned of each of these requests.”? But the trial judge “ignored” Mr. Carroll’s objections and granted Public Defenders Walsh and Horan’s requests on June 3, 2022.7! The trial judge ordered Mr. Carroll remain in custody until he submitted to the involuntary incompetency exam.” Mr. Carroll tries again to petition for habeas relief in state court. Mr. Carroll again wrote again to Director Walk to petition for habeas relief and ask for an in forma pauperis form on May 1, 2023 but she did not respond.”? II. Analysis Mr. Carroll, disguising himself as a John Doe, pro se sues only Director Walk for violating his civil rights.24 He cannot proceed as a John Doe based on his sworn facts.”°

Mr. Carroll claims Director Walk and the Office of Judicial Support have a practice of arbitrarily refusing to file pro se petitions based on the ban against hybrid representation.” Mr. Carroll neither specifies his meaning of hybrid representation nor why his filing should not qualify as hybrid representation given the public defenders representing him.”’ Mr. Carroll’s Complaint, construed in the most liberal fashion without speculation, seemingly tries to plead claims against Director Walk for: e depriving him of his due process rights under 42 U.S.C. § 1983; e violating his First, Fifth, and Fourteenth Amendments rights; and e violating the privilege of the writ of habeas corpus.”® Mr. Carroll demands we declare “it[’]s not [h]ybrid representation” (we liberally construe “it”? as meaning Mr. Carroll petitioning for habeas relief), enjoin the rejection of Mr. Carroll’s habeas petition, and order Mr. Carroll’s release from custody.”? Congress requires we screen the incarcerated Mr. Carroll’s Complaint.?? Congress requires we must “review, before docketing, if feasible or, in any event, as soon as practicable after docketing, a complaint in a civil action in which a prisoner seeks redress from a governmental entity or officer or employee of a governmental entity.”?! On review, we must “identify cognizable claims or dismiss the complaint, or any portion of the complaint, if the complaint . . . is frivolous, malicious, or fails to state a claim upon which relief may be granted; or . . . seeks monetary relief from a defendant who is immune from such relief.”3? We apply the same standard under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 12(b)(6) when considering whether to dismiss a complaint for failure to state a claim under section 1915A(b)(1).2?> A complaint containing “sufficient factual matter, accepted as true, to ‘state a claim to relief that is plausible on its face’” meets the Rule 12(b)(6) standard.**

We accept all facts in Mr.

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JOHN DOE v. WALK, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/john-doe-v-walk-paed-2023.