Miguel Angel Galvan Arias v. Warner Bros. Entertainment, et al.

Opinion

UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT SOUTHERN DISTRICT OF FLORIDA

CASE NO. 24-cv-25021-ALTMAN

MIGUEL ANGEL GALVAN ARIAS,

Plaintiff,

v.

WARNER BROS. ENTERTAINMENT, et al.,

Defendants. __________________________________/ ORDER Our Plaintiff—proceeding pro se—moves for the “recusal of The Honorable Judge Roy K. Altman pursuant to 28 U.S.C. §§ 144 and 155[.]” Motion to Recuse (the “Motion”) [ECF No. 111] at 1 (emphasis altered). The Plaintiff contends that “[t]he presiding judge has engaged in an unconscionable pattern of selective procedural manipulation and intentional administrative delay that directly favors the corporate interest of [the] Defendants. Id. at 2. In support, the Plaintiff notes that we denied his motion for summary judgment, granted the Defendants’ Motion to Dismiss [ECF No. 31] (with leave to amend), and somehow “weaponize[ed] deadlines to benefit corporate mergers[.]” Mot. at 2; see also id. at 3 (“For a federal judge to arbitrarily manufacture a personal ruling characterizing [the] Plaintiff’s protected screenplay structure as a mere ‘cliché’ (scènes à faire), while willfully suppressing [the] Plaintiff’s timely expert report pursuant to the scheduling order, and consciously freezing the adjudication of Plaintiff’s successful Motion for Summary Judgment, constitutes a manifest abuse of discretion, a denial of equal protection under the Law, and a weaponization of procedural timelines.”); Order Staying Case [ECF No. 107] (denying as moot all motions “until we have adjudicated” the Motion to Dismiss); Order Dismissing Case [ECF NO. 109] (granting the Motion to Dismiss and dismissing Count I with leave to amend). After careful review, we deny the Motion. The Plaintiff moves for recusal under 28 U.S.C. §§ 144 and 455. Section 144 mandates that a district judge “shall proceed no further” when “a party . . . makes and files a timely and sufficient affidavit that the judge . . . has a personal bias or prejudice” for or against any party. Ibid. “To warrant recusal under § 144, “the moving party must allege facts that would convince a reasonable person that

bias actually exists.” Christo v. Padgett, 223 F.3d 1324, 1333 (11th Cir. 2000). Section 455, by contrast, requires recusal when a district judge’s “impartiality might reasonably be questioned” or when the district judge “has a personal bias or prejudice concerning a party.” 28 U.S.C. § 455(a), (b)(1). “Under § 455, the standard is whether an objective, fully informed lay observer would entertain significant doubt about the judge’s impartiality.” Padgett, 223 F.3d at 1333. The essence of the Plaintiff’s objection is that our rulings show a “personal bias or prejudice” against the Plaintiff. §§ 144, 455. But the Plaintiff’s argument fails because “bias sufficient to disqualify a judge must stem from an extrajudicial source,” Jones v. Luis, 372 F. App’x 967, 968–69 (11th Cir. 2010), and “judicial rulings alone almost never constitute a valid basis for a bias or partiality motion,” Draper v. Reynolds, 369 F.3d 1270, 1279 (11th Cir. 2004) (quoting Liteky v. United States, 510 U.S. 540, 555 (1994)). In other words, “[t]he bias must be personal, rather than judicial in nature.” Jones, 372 F. App’x at 969.

Since we don’t know the Plaintiff at all and frankly know absolutely nothing about him—other than what he has filed in this case—we DENY his Motion. DONE AND ORDERED in the Southern District of Florida on June 3, 2026.

ROY K. ALTMAN UNITED STATES DISTRICT JUDGE CC: counsel of record Miguel Angel Galvan Arias, pro se