Opinion
Case No. 16 C 11448
01-09-2017
ABS-CBN CORPORATION, a Philippines Corporation, et al., Plaintiffs, v. MARK ORVEN MERCADO, an Individual and PINOY GRILL, LLC, an Illinois Limited Liability Company, Defendants.
MEMORANDUM ORDER
This Court's invaluable judicial assistant has been away from chambers for a few weeks because of the government's use-or-lose-it policy, so that her regular effort to police violations of this District Court's LR 5.2(f) requirement as to newly-filed complaints in cases assigned to this Court's calendar has been left unattended. That said, there is simply no legitimate reason for that policing task to be borne by this Court's staff (let alone by this Court itself). After all, it is the direct responsibility of plaintiffs' counsel to comply with that LR as to judges (such as this Court) who have chosen the option of maintaining paper files under the "dealer's choice" principle adopted by the judges of this District Court.
LR 5.2(f) has been in its present form for at least 3 full years (it was last amended in November 2013), and this Court's directive for delivery of a paper copy of every filing to its chambers is the first paragraph in its website.
Yet this Court's over-the-weekend review of newly-filed cases added to its calendar during the month of December revealed fully six cases, ranging from 10 to 20 days old, in which no counterparts of the complaints, or of related applications for in forma pauperis treatment or of related motions for designation of counsel, have come to its chambers. This case is one of them. Accordingly counsel for the plaintiffs is ordered to deliver a paper copy of all such documents, together with a $100 check to the "Clerk of the District Court" in payment of a fine for violation of the LR, to this Court's chambers forthwith.
This Court has found such large-scale noncompliance particularly troubling, for judges and their staffs are more than sufficiently burdened by the proliferation of federal litigation without having a policing chore added to their responsibilities. --------
/s/_________
Milton I. Shadur
Senior United States District Judge Date: January 9, 2017