Shakespeare v. Wilson

40 F.R.D. 500
CourtDistrict Court, S.D. California
DecidedJuly 18, 1966
DocketNo. 65-637-IH
StatusPublished
Cited by36 cases

This text of 40 F.R.D. 500 (Shakespeare v. Wilson) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering District Court, S.D. California primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Shakespeare v. Wilson, 40 F.R.D. 500 (S.D. Cal. 1966).

Opinion

MEMORANDUM OPINION

IRVING HILL, District Judge.

By separate Order and judgment entered this day, I have dismissed the above-entitled action with prejudice. The dismissal is based on the following two grounds:

1. Plaintiff’s Second Amended Complaint is not a short, plain statement, nor is each averment in that pleading simple, concise and direct as required by Rules 8(a) (2), (e) (1) of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure. (See discussion at 1(A) which follows.) In further support of dismissal for violation of Rule 8, I find that Plaintiff makes no statement showing that she is entitled to relief under the terms of the Civil Rights Act, 42 U.S.C. § 1981 et seq., to the extent required by Rule 8(a) (2). (See discussion at 1(B) which follows.)

2. Plaintiff has twice failed to comply with Orders of the Court that an amended complaint be filed meeting the requirements of Rule 8, and was on notice that a second failure to comply would result in the dismissal of the action with prejudice. The dismissal with prejudice is therefore authorized under Rule 41(b). (See discussion at II which follows.)

BACKGROUND

This action, filed in pro. per., is a typical example of the kind of action being filed with increasing frequency under the provisions of the Civil Rights Act of 1871, 42 U.S.C. §§ 1981-1986. Having been defeated in state court proceedings and being unhappy and somewhat humiliated and frustrated by the results of such proceedings, these persons lash out at judges, attorneys, witnesses, court functionaries, newspapers and anyone else in convenient range, terming all of them corruptly evil and charging them with perjury and conspiracy in a last desperate effort to re-litigate the issues on which they have once lost and hoping to secure sizeable damages to boot.

As best I can determine, after careful scrutiny of the voluminous papers she has filed in this Court, this Plaintiff’s grievance stems from her involvement in ten separate state court proceedings as follows:

1. A suit by Plaintiff’s foster son for specific performance of an alleged contract to purchase a piece of real estate in Pasadena. The trial court apparently held that there never was a legally binding obligation.
2. Appeal of the adverse judgment in the specific performance action by Plaintiff claiming to be an assignee of the alleged contract.
3. Suit by Plaintiff for breach of the same alleged contract after the specific performance action failed.
4. Request for, and issuance of, an injunction restraining Plaintiff from going on certain property in Pasadena.
5. Suits by Plaintiff against the State-Court Commissioner who issued, and' the attorney who requested, the injunction.
6. Trial and acquittal of Plaintiff for trespass in a criminal case following a citizen’s arrest by the owner of the Pasadena property.
7. Suit by Plaintiff against the private person who arrested her.
8. Suit by Plaintiff against the City of Pasadena for damages arising from, the above citizen’s arrest, the consequent detention and trial, and from a. later 25-minute detention by Pasadena, police officers.
9. Cross-Complaint by Plaintiff for-abuse of process in an action against-her to have a Us pendens on the Pasadena property removed.
10. Divorce or support proceedings-involving Plaintiff’s foster son.

[503]*503Except for her acquittal on the trespass charge (#6 above), Plaintiff and her foster son appear to have lost every one «of these proceedings.1

1(A) The Need for a Short, Plain Statement and Simple, Concise and Direct Averments in a Pleading, Rules S(a) (2) and 8(e) (1).

Plaintiff alleges a broad conspiracy designed to deprive her of the Pasadena property and to defeat her in her attempts to seek legal redress in the state civil actions, and to injure her reputation, health, mental wellbeing and her business. She inserts into her pleading a separate “Complaint in Equity” asking that the Pasadena property be made hers and that the state court determination in the specific performance suit be set aside. She asks this Court to subject twenty-one Judges and Justices of the State Courts to damages for vague acts of misconduct, including intimidation, fraud, malice, misrepresentation and oppressive motion and trial settings. She asserts what appear to be claims based on defamation, infliction of emotional distress, perjury and perhaps other state law remedies. By inserting references in the Complaint to “equal protection” and “due process” Plaintiff seeks to give her difficulties and frustrations the character of Constitutional deprivations.

But Constitutional deprivations are not Plaintiff’s real grievance. A close reading of her papers indicates that her real complaint is encompassed in repeated protestations concerning her hurt feelings, humiliation, emotional upset and adverse publicity.2

After repeated chances to clarify her pleading, Plaintiff has still not shown what overt act or acts each defendant has committed either under color of law (42 U.S.C. § 1983) or in furtherance of the alleged conspiracy (42 U.S.C. § 1985(3)). Her whole pleading is a mixture of conclusions of law, evidentiary statements, irrelevant pejoratives, conjecture and random remarks which defy rational understanding and comprehension.

It appears evident that the adjectives used to describe complaints in other cases, as grounds for dismissal for violations of Rule 8, are equally apt here. Corcoran v. Yorty, 347 F.2d 222, 223 (9th Cir. 1965), cert. denied 382 U.S. 966, 86 S.Ct. 458, 15 L.Ed.2d 370 (1965) (verbose, confused and redundant); Collier v. First Michigan Cooperative Housing Ass’n, 274 F.2d 467, 469 (6th Cir. 1960) (prolix and muddled); Benner v. Philadelphia Musical Society, Local 77, A. F. of M., 32 F.R.D. 197, 198 (E.D.Pa.1963) (prolix, argumentative and eonelusionary) ; Martin v. Hunt, 28 F.R.D. 35-36 (D.Mass.1961) (argumentative, redundant and verbose); Mottaghi-Iravani v. International Commodities Corp., 20 F.R.D. 37 (S.D.N.Y.1956) (disparate and unrelated allegations); cf. also Carrigan v. California State Legislature, 263 F.2d 560 (9th Cir. 1959), cert. denied 359 U.S. 980, 79 S.Ct. 901, 3 L.Ed.2d 929 (1959).

Therefore, I hold that Plaintiff’s Second Amended Complaint should be dismissed for violation of the Rule 8 requirements of brevity, clarity, simplicity and succinctness in pleading.

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Bluebook (online)
40 F.R.D. 500, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/shakespeare-v-wilson-casd-1966.