Opinion
Case No. 16 C 8030
09-02-2016
JULIAN A. BELL, Plaintiff, v. COOK COUNTY MUNICIPALITY, et al., Defendants.
MEMORANDUM ORDER
This Court's August 18, 2016 memorandum order (the "Order") was issued sua sponte to call to the attention of pro se plaintiff Julian Bell ("Bell") what the Order described as "a number of matters that require early attention." Because Bell's filings in this case had provided no address other than Stateville Correctional Center (where he was then in custody, having been transferred from the Cook County Jail) and had included a statement that "I leave this prison 8-13-2016," this Court had no choice other than to have the Order docketed in the hope that Bell would follow up on his case himself.
As n.3 to the Order noted, Bell's "filings reflect that he is hardly a stranger to the federal courts." In response to the direction in Complaint ¶ III that he list all earlier state or federal lawsuits, Bell referred to a successful habeas action he filed back in 1980, a personal injury suit he brought in 1994, another personal injury suit he brought in 2011 and a third personal injury suit he brought in 2014 -- all of those cases having been litigated in this District Court. --------
Although the Order was issued on the premise that Bell's familiarity with litigation should have led him to provide the essential information about his current whereabouts promptly, so that the Order set an August 29 date for his response and provided that silence would result in a dismissal of this action without prejudice, August 29 came and went without any response by Bell. After waiting a few days this Court had the case docket printed out, and it contained these two post-Order entries:
1. Here is Dkt. No. 6, dated August 18 and entered on August 19:
MAIL RETURNED, new case filing acknowledgement letter, filing instructions, and stamped IFP form sent to Julian A. Bell returned as undeliverable, return to sender. New address found, re-mailed to 1613 W. Washington Blvd., Chicago, IL 60612.
2. Here is Dkt. No. 7, dated August 25 and entered on August 31:
MAIL RETURNED, for new case filing instructions and documents sent to Julian A. Bell returned as undeliverable, return to sender. No new contact information received.
What the Order had forecast thus appeared to be eminently reasonable, so that this Court had dictated a memorandum order dismissing both the Complaint and this action without prejudice. But just before the issuance of that order this Court's regular review of ECF filings spotted a reference to one by Bell -- and a printout of that filing discloses that Bell has now provided a P.O. Box number as his current mailing address. Hence this Court is sending Bell, together with a copy of this memorandum order, another copy of the Order for his prompt attention to curing the deficiencies described there.
/s/_________
Milton I. Shadur
Senior United States District Judge Date: September 2, 2016