United States District Court, District of Columbia
CHRISTINE MILLS, RUNAKO BALONDEMU, GERALDINE DUNCAN, PRISCILLA IJEOMAH, LAWRENCE PERRY, WILLIAM ROWLAND, DAVID HUBBARD, CLIFTON KNIGHT, SHARON TAYLOR, and CHARLES MWALIMU, both individually and on behalf of a class of others similarly situated, Plaintiffs,
v.
JAMES H. BILLINGTON, Librarian of Library of Congress, Defendant.
CLARK
LAW GROUP, PLLC Attorneys for Plaintiffs
OFFICE
OF THE UNITED STATES ATTORNEY Attorneys for Defendant
OF
COUNSEL DENISE MARIE CLARK, ESQ. JASON TODD COHEN, AUSA
MEMORANDUM-DECISION AND ORDER
FREDERICK J. SCULLIN, JR. SENIOR UNITED STATES DISTRICT JUDGE
I.
INTRODUCTION
Pending
before the Court is Plaintiffs' motion for
reconsideration of the Court's March 30, 2016 Order,
see Dkt. No. 277, and the March 31, 2016 judgement,
see Dkt. No. 278, that the Clerk of the Court
entered in compliance with that Order. See Dkt. No.
279. Defendant opposes the motion. See Dkt. No. 280.
II.
DISCUSSION[1]
A.
Standard of review
A party
may move to alter or amend a judgment under either Rule 59(e)
or Rule 60(b) of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure.
See Fed. R. Civ. P. 59(e); Fed.R.Civ.P. 60(b). Under
Rule 59(e), a party must file "[a] motion to alter or
amend a judgment . . . no later than 28 days after the entry
of the judgment." Fed.R.Civ.P. 59(e). Under Rule 60(c),
a party must file "[a] motion under Rule 60(b) . . .
within a reasonable time - and for reasons (1), (2), and (3)
no more than a year after the entry of the judgment . . .
." Fed.R.Civ.P. 60(c).
Defendant
acknowledges that, under either Rule 59 or Rule 60,
Plaintiffs filed their motion for reconsideration within the
required time frame. The parties' disagreement, however,
relates to whether Plaintiffs have met the other requirements
that would warrant this Court granting their motion for
reconsideration. As the District of Columbia Circuit noted in
Dyson v. Dist. of Columbia, 710 F.3d 415 (D.C. Cir.
2013), "'[a] Rule 59(e) motion is discretionary and
need not be granted unless the district court finds that
there is an intervening change of controlling law, the
availability of new evidence, or the need to correct a clear
error or prevent manifest injustice.'" Id.
at 420 (quoting Ciralsky v. CIA, 355 F.3d 661, 671
(D.C. Cir. 2004)).
B.
Analysis
The
facts of this case fall somewhere between the circumstances
that existed in Norris v. Salazar, 277 F.R.D. 22
(D.D.C. 2011), and Lepkowski v. U.S. Dep't of
Treasury, 804 F.2d 1310 (D.C. Cir. 1986), the two cases
that Defendant cites in opposition to Plaintiffs' motion.
In this case, Plaintiffs' counsel did not file any
opposition to Defendant's motion to dismiss until after
the Courtroom Deputy Clerk had telephoned him twice to find
out whether he intended to do so. Eventually, Plaintiffs'
counsel filed a memorandum of law in opposition to
Defendant's motion; but, as the Court noted in its March
30, 2016 Order granting Defendant's motion,
[n]ot only was this memorandum untimely but it cited no law,
nor provided any record-supported facts, to support
Plaintiffs' position that the Court should not grant
Defendant's motion. In addition, at oral argument,
Plaintiffs' counsel provided no valid excuse for his
failure to respond to Defendant's motion within the
required time frame.
See Dkt. No. 277 at 2 n.1.
1.
Plaintiffs' motion ...