McCoy v. City of Las Vegas

• Court: District Court, D. Nevada
• Decided: August 1, 2025
• Docket: 2:25-cv-00361
• Status: Unknown

Opinion

1 UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT 2 DISTRICT OF NEVADA 3 Timothy McCoy, et al., 2:25-cv-00361-GMN-MDC

4 Plaintiff(s), ORDER GRANTING IN PART AND DENYING IN PART MOTION TO SERVE 5 vs. BY PUBLICATION AND EXTEND TIME 6 FOR SERVICE (ECF No. 24) City of Las Vegas, et al., 7 Defendant(s). 8 Plaintiffs filed a Motion to Serve by Publication and Extend Time for Service. (“Motion”). ECF 9 No. 24. The Court GRANTS the Motion IN PART. The Court will allow plaintiff until September 1, 10 2025 to serve the defendants but denies the request to serve by publication without prejudice since 11 service by publication is a last resort. 12 I. LEGAL STANDARD 13 The Federal Rules of Civil Procedure provide for service within the United States pursuant to 14 the law of the state in which the district court is located, or in which service is made. See, e.g., FRCP 15 4(e)(1). Rule 4 states that “the plaintiff is responsible for having the summons and complaint served 16 within the time allowed by Rule 4(m)[.] 17 There are several factors courts consider in evaluating a party's due diligence, including the 18 number of attempts made to serve the defendant at his residence and other methods of locating 19 defendants, such as consulting public directories and family members. See Price v. Dunn, 106 Nev. 20 100, 102-104, 787 P.2d 785, 786-787 (Nev. 1990). Other courts have recognized that considering 21 “due process concerns, service by publication must be allowed ‘only as a last resort.’” Hernandez v. 22 Russell, No. 320CV00114MMDCSD, 2022 WL 347552, at *2 (D. Nev. Feb. 4, 2022), citing to Price 23 v. Thomas, No. 21-cv-06370-DMR, 2021 WL 5564795, at *1 (N.D. Cal. Nov. 29, 2021) (emphasis 24 added; citation and quotation marks omitted). This is because “it is generally recognized that service 25 1 by publication rarely results in actual notice.” Id. (citation and quotation marks omitted). District 2 courts retain broad discretion to permit service-of-process extensions under Rule 4(m). See Mann v. 3 Am. Airlines, 324 F.3d 1088, 1090 (9th Cir. 2003). Regarding extensions, “a district court may 4 consider factors ‘like statute of limitations bar, prejudice to the defendant, actual notice of a lawsuit, 5 and eventual service.’” Efaw v. Williams, 473 F.3d 1038, 1041 (9th Cir. 2007) (quoting Troxell v. 6 Fedders of N. Am. Inc., 160 F.3d 381, 383 (7th Cir. 1998)). 7 II. ANALYSIS 8 Plaintiffs argue in their Motion that they have been unable to serve two individual defendant 9 Officers Jonathan Gallegos and Sergio Guzman. ECF No. 24. Plaintiffs argue that they have attempted 10 to search for the addresses of the officers, but they have been unsuccessful. Plaintiffs ask the Court to 11 be allowed to serve these two officers by publication. Plaintiffs submit an affidavit from a process 12 server that states that he has been unable to identify any addresses for the officers. ECF No. 24-1. 13 Plaintiffs’ counsel’s declaration states that, “[a]s of May 8th, and May 13th through May 20, 2025, 14 Plaintiffs have, on multiple occasions, attempted to locate JG & SG and were not able to do so.” ECF 15 No. 24 at 6. 16 Plaintiffs’ asserted efforts, however, require more detail and development. Counsel does not 17 articulate or describe how they attempted service on the officers on those dates. The process server 18 researched different public and online records but had no leads on addresses. The process server states 19 that some search options require more qualifiers, presumably to conduct a better search, but does not 20 identify what such qualifiers may be and why they are not available. See e.g., ECF No. 24-1 at ¶4. 21 Plaintiffs state that they believe that the defendant officers “cannot be found within the State of Nevada” 22 but ask to serve the officers by publication in Nevada Legal News. ECF No. 24-1. The Court finds that 23 plaintiffs have not shown sufficient diligence in attempting to serve the defendant officers to support 24 that service by publication, the last resort, is appropriate. Plaintiff’s counsel has not shown that they 25 1 || took discovery, for example, from the other defendants regarding locating the individual officers, who 2 || are or were employed by defendant the City of Las Vegas Department of Public Safety. Counsel has not 3 ||investigated other likely sources of information to locate and serve the defendants prior to seeking the 4 || last resort of service by publication. The Court has broad discretion to permit an extension under Rule 5 The defendants will not be prejudiced by a reasonable extension. 6 ACCORDINGLY, IT IS ORDERED that:

9 1. Plaintiff’s Motion to Serve by Publication Or Alternative Means And Extend Time for 10 Service (ECF No. 24) is GRANTED AND DENIED IN PART. 11 2. Plaintiff’s request to serve the defendant by publication is DENIED WITHOUT 12 PREJUDICE. 13 3. Plaintiff’s request for an extension of time to serve the defendants is GRANTED: plaintiff M4 has until September 1, 2025, to serve the defendants or seek a further extension consistent 15 . . with this order. 16 4 DATED: August 1, 2025. 4 _ 12 IT IS SO ORDERED. □□ Af ae App Xe 19 ie \ 20 Aion. Maximiliang D. Couyillier | i L United States Mi istrate Judg 21 22 23 24 25