West v. Colorado Department of Corrections

Full title: DOUGLAS J. WEST, Plaintiff, v. THE COLORADO DEPARTMENT OF CORRECTIONS; and…

Court: United States District Court, D. Colorado

Date published: Jul 31, 2008

Civil Action No. 08-cv-01271-WYD-BNB (D. Colo. Jul. 31, 2008)

Opinion

Civil Action No. 08-cv-01271-WYD-BNB.

July 31, 2008

ORDER

BOYD BOLAND, Magistrate Judge

This matter is before me on the plaintiff's Motion to Amend Complaint [Doc. # 10, filed 7/18/2008] (the "Motion"). The plaintiff seeks to amend his Complaint to add a new defendant. The plaintiff has not attached a copy of the proposed amended complaint to his motion to amend.

The Federal Rules of Civil Procedure provide that a complaint may be amended as follows:

A party may amend the party's pleading once as a matter of course at any time before a responsive pleading is served. . . . Otherwise a party may amend the party's pleading only by leave of court or by written consent of the adverse party.

Fed.R.Civ.P. 15(a).

A responsive pleading has not yet been served in this case. Therefore, the plaintiff may amend his pleading as a matter of course. However, the plaintiff may not amend his Complaint by simply filing piecemeal amendments and supplements. Rather, he must file the entire proposed amended complaint. The plaintiff may not incorporate by reference his original Complaint into the amended complaint. The amended complaint must stand alone; it must contain all of the plaintiff's claims. Mink v. Suthers, 482 F.3d 1244, 1254 (10^th Cir. 2007) (stating that "an amended complaint supercedes an original complaint and renders the original complaint without legal effect") (internal quotations and citations omitted). Accordingly,

IT IS ORDERED that Plaintiff's Motion to Amend Complaint is DENIED WITHOUT PREJUDICE, subject to compliance with this Order.