Opinion
No 00 Civ. 4163 (GEL).
October 26, 2000.
OPINION AND ORDER
This case tests the limits of the well-known principle that pro se complaints should be read generously, and interpreted "to raise the strongest arguments that they suggest." Soto v. Walker, 44 F.3d 169, 173 (2d Cir. 1995) (internal quotation marks and citation omitted). Plaintiff Dennis Lee, acting pro se has filed a series of lengthy and hard to understand complaints, setting forth a number of apparently distinct grievances against a number of named defendants, including governmental agencies of various kinds and several private companies. Judge Scheindlin of this Court dismissed with prejudice a prior lawsuit asserting similar grievances, holding that plaintiff's pleadings were "unintelligible" and "incomprehensible." Lee v. United States, No. 98 Civ. 7883 (SAS), 1999 WL 335830 (S.D.N.Y. May 25, 2000). A second series of complaints, filed under the instant docket number, was found by Judge Stein of this Court also to be "largely unintelligible." Lee v. United States, No. 00 Civ. 4168 (SHS), (S.D.N.Y. Aug. 15, 2000). Judge Stein ordered plaintiff to file another amended complaint, and to show cause as to why the complaint should not be dismissed, both for failure to comply with Fed.R.Civ.P. 8(a) (requiring a short and plain statement of the claim and the grounds of jurisdiction), and as barred by res judicata pursuant to Judge Scheindlin's dismissal of the earlier case. Plaintiff has duly filed a second, shorter complaint. Defendant New York City Housing Authority ("NYHA") moves to dismiss the action with prejudice.
Determining what, if any, actions of NYHA plaintiff complains of is difficult. Plaintiff states that his "first amendment right to redress his grievances [was] denied at the hands of the official at the Bellevue Men's Shelter." (¶ 13). It can be inferred from the complaint that plaintiff at some point resided in the Bellevue Men's Shelter, though this is not actually stated anywhere in the complaint. Nor does the complaint specifically state that this facility is maintained by NYHA, though perhaps that can be inferred from a paragraph that attributes actions of "personnel and management at the Bellevue Men's Shelter" to "NYHA." (¶ 57). One can construe the complaint as alleging that unnamed officials "encouraged their subordinates['] harassment" of plaintiff (¶ 27), "arbitrarily and capriciously" destroyed his property (¶ 29), attempted to "transfer" plaintiff "out of this jurisdiction" (¶¶ 23, 32) — or perhaps to make a "transfer decision affecting residency" (¶ 33) — pursuant to a plot to retaliate against him for bringing a lawsuit alleging civil rights violations and discrimination (¶ 26) and thus to "silenc[e] homeless persons who complain about their misuses of power." (¶ 32). These latter actions, however, are not clearly attributed to NYHA: ¶¶ 23-38 refer to an unspecified "official" or "officials" (¶¶ 24 23, 26, 27), the "DSS" (¶¶ 33, 35), the "DHS (Dept. of Homeless Services)" (¶ 35), and, on one occasion, "Bellevue Men's Shelter," which is alleged to have "discriminated" and "harassed, attempted to banish and produced community ridicule aimed at [plaintiff]." (¶ 36).
The complaint does state that subordinate officials at the shelter "were creating an atmosphere within this shelter where Mr. Lee was being harassed by the other clients." (¶ 28).
Due to an error in the paragraph numbering, there are two ¶ 23's in the complaint. This and subsequent references, unless otherwise noted, are to the second ¶ 23.
Reference is made to the first ¶ 24.
From this portion of the complaint, one could infer that Mr. Lee is complaining that the staff of the Bellevue Men's Shelter, apparently employees of defendant, mistreated him, destroyed his property, and "transferred" him (presumably to less desirable accommodations) in retaliation for his complaints and lawsuits, in violation of his rights under the First and Fourteenth Amendments. This could conceivably state a claim under federal law.
If this were all, the Court could perhaps conclude that the complaint, albeit barely, stated a federal claim. But it is not all. The above account lifts from the 12-page complaint one small and difficult-to-construe section of a document that includes apparent claims that an entity called "Underhill Wiping Cloth" "defrauded [plaintiff] from 1987 through 1994 out of employment taxes" and placed him on a "blacklist" enforced by the New York City Police Department (¶ 45); that the Buffalo Police Department searched plaintiff's hotel room pursuant to an "irregular" search warrant in 1995 (¶¶ 50, 51); that he was discriminated against in a class he took at CCNY (¶¶ 39-45); that he was maliciously prosecuted by "Rural Metro Ambulance Services" (¶ 53) and "RJD Security" (¶ 55); and that the Dime Savings Bank, "act[ing] as a bailee," deprived plaintiff of property by acting in a "grossly negligent manner as a particip[ant] of a[n] on going civil rights conspiracy." (¶ 60). While certain pieces of this assortment of claims could be seen as alleging violations of constitutional rights, others state (at most) claims under state law. Moreover, several allegations in the amended complaint, as well as passages in an accompanying memorandum of law, make it fairly clear that plaintiff conceives of this entire cluster of grievances as constituting a single conspiracy to violate his rights. And the allegations taken as a whole state no coherent claim at all, but merely reassert the same generalized conspiracy claim that was dismissed with prejudice by Judge Scheindlin.
To the extent that the memorandum of law focuses attention on any of plaintiff's grievances in particular, it primarily addresses his alleged exclusion from certain educational programs at CCNY.
Plaintiff is clearly deeply troubled, and one can infer he has a difficult life and has had difficulties with a variety of private and governmental institutions. But his complaint, of a virtually universal conspiracy by those institutions, is not one that can be addressed by a court under normal processes. Plaintiff is not, however, an abusive litigant; ordered to produce a shorter and clearer claim, and to address the question of jurisdiction, he has attempted to do so. While the Court is sympathetic to the difficulties of busy lawyers for NYHA who must attempt to respond to such documents, it is also sympathetic to plaintiff's circumstances, and it must be alert to the possibility that lurking within the complaint are potential causes of action that plaintiff is entitled to have addressed by a federal court on their merits.
Nevertheless, the claim that plaintiff appears to be pursuing in this document is the same one that was already dismissed with prejudice by Judge Scheindlin, and is ultimately as diffuse and incoherent as the earlier complaint, despite plaintiff's evident efforts to focus his energy. This action is therefore dismissed, without leave to replead. I emphasize, however, that the action that I am dismissing, like the one earlier dismissed by Judge Scheindlin, is a claim of broad and diffuse conspiracy. If plaintiff can articulate a specific challenge toparticular actions or policies of NYHA, or CCNY, or any other defendant, that would be a different matter. But that would also be a different lawsuit.
In this regard, plaintiff is reminded that the key to shaping any of his various claims into a viable complaint against any of the defendants named in the present complaint is to state, as simply and specifically as possible, exactly what he believes that defendant did.
The complaint is dismissed.
SO ORDERED