Opinion
CIVIL ACTION NO. 00-3794.
April 24, 2001
ORDER
Before the Court is pro se plaintiff Andre Patrick Staggers' motion to vacate judgment pursuant to Fed.R.Civ.P. 60. The Court has considered plaintiffs motion, the record and the relevant law and finds that the motion is denied for the reasons that follow.
Plaintiff is an inmate currently incarcerated at the Federal Correctional Institute located in Seagoville, Texas. On December 24, 2000, plaintiff filed a 42 U.S.C. § 1983 claim alleging violations of his constitutional rights while jailed at St. John the Baptist Parish Jail. Those violations allegedly took place on June 21, 1999. The Magistrate Judge issued a report and recommendation, mailed on January 16, 2001 denying plaintiffs complaint on the grounds that his claim had clearly prescribed because the complaint was filed more than six months after the one year prescriptive period had run. Plaintiff filed no objections to the Magistrate Judge's report and this Court adopted the opinion as its own and entered judgment in favor of defendants and against plaintiff on February 9, 2001.
On March 5, 2001, plaintiff filed the instant motion requesting relief from the judgment, claiming that he temporarily away from the prison in Texas on a writ to Louisiana. As such, he claims that at the time he returned to the Texas prison, he had only 3 days to respond to the Report and Recommendation.
Rule 60(b) permits relief from a final judgment on the grounds of mistake, inadvertence, surprise or excusable neglect. Fed.R.Civ.P. 60(b)(1). However, plaintiffs motion, filed nearly one month after judgment was rendered does not put forth a substantive objection to the Report and Recommendation or suggest how the Court erred in deciding that plaintiffs claim prescribed. In other words, plaintiff does not state why he needs to file a late objection to the Report and Recommendation. Moreover, the Court did not simply grant a default judgment in favor of defendant, rather it carefully considered the factual allegations and relevant time line and agreed with the Report and Recommendation that even when read in the broadest possible light, plaintiffs claim was frivolous because it had clearly prescribed. See 28 U.S.C. § 1915(e)(2);Moore v. McDonald, 30 F.3d 616 (5th Cir. 1994); Reeves v. Collins, 27 F.3d 174 (5th Cir. 1994). Plaintiffs complaint was clearly untimely. Any objection to the Report and Recommendation would be fruitless.
In any even, plaintiff has not demonstrated excusable neglect. The Report and Recommendation was mailed on January 16, 2001. Allowing three days for mailing, any objections to the report were due by February 2, 2001. The judgment was signed February 8 and entered February 9. Thus, even accepting plaintiffs factual allegation that upon return from Louisiana he had only three days before the deadline to file objections, at the time the judgment was entered, plaintiff had allowed ten days to elapse (from the time he allegedly returned to his place of incarceration) without filing an opposition or request for extension. Indeed, plaintiff did not file anything until March 5, 2001, thirty one days after the objections were due and thirty four days after plaintiff allegedly returned from other criminal matters in Louisiana. Plaintiffs argument of excusable neglect is baseless when he allowed such a significant amount of time to pass before seeking relief. Accordingly,
IT IS ORDERED that plaintiffs motion to vacate judgment is DENIED.