Barajas Centeno v. City of Carlsbad
- Proceeding
- district
- Area
- civil
- Panel
- Myron James Lorenz (author)
Analysis
The court considered a motion for a temporary restraining order filed by the plaintiff on behalf of himself and a non-party regarding police conduct and ADA violations. The court denied the motion, finding it lacked jurisdiction to grant relief to a non-party and that the plaintiff failed to demonstrate irreparable harm due to a significant delay in seeking relief.
| What the court decided | The model |
|---|---|
Motion for Temporary Restraining Order denied“The motion is therefore DENIED.” | agree with court The court correctly applied the principle that a court cannot issue injunctive relief for claims not pled in the complaint or for non-parties. The citation to *Pacific Radiation Oncology* and *De Beers* supports the jurisdictional bar. Additionally, the court correctly noted that the delay between the last alleged incident (December 2021) and the motion (January 2022) undermines the claim of irreparable harm, as supported by *Oakland Tribune*. |
Petition to appoint guardian ad litem denied“The Court therefore DENIES the petition.” | agree with court The court denied the request to appoint the plaintiff as guardian ad litem for a non-party. While the order does not explicitly state the legal standard for guardianship, the denial is consistent with the general principle that a litigant cannot represent a non-party without proper appointment, and the court's lack of jurisdiction over the non-party's claims reinforces this denial. |
The order itself: sound — The order is legally sound. It correctly identifies that the requested relief was unrelated to the claims in the action and involved non-parties, which is a jurisdictional bar under Ninth Circuit precedent. It also correctly applies the irreparable harm factor by noting the delay in seeking relief. The citations are appropriate and directly support the holdings.
Opinion
1 2 3 4 5 6 UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT 7 SOUTHERN DISTRICT OF CALIFORNIA 8 9 JOSE BARAJAS CENTENO, Case No.: 3:19-cv-2098-L-DEB 10 Plaintiff, 11 v. ORDER ON PLAINTIFF’S MOTION 12 CITY OF CARLSBAD, et al., FOR TEMPORARY RESTRAINING 13 Defendants. ORDER (ECF 182) 14 15 Pending before the Court is Plaintiff’s motion for a temporary restraining order. 16 (ECF 182). 17 The purpose of a temporary restraining order is to preserve the status quo until the 18 merits of the action are ultimately determined. University of Texas v. Camenisch, 451 19 U.S. 390, 395 (1981). A plaintiff “must establish that [they are] likely to succeed on the 20 merits, that [they are] likely to suffer irreparable harm in the absence of preliminary 21 relief, that the balance of equities tips in [their] favor, and that an injunction is in the 22 public interest.” Winter v. Natural Resources Defense Council, Inc., 555 U.S. 7, 20 23 (2008). 24 Plaintiff filed the motion on behalf of himself and a non-party, Jean Wortham.1 25 The motion concerns allegations that Carlsbad police officers engaged in unlawful 26 27 1 Plaintiff asks the Court to appoint him as Jean Wortham’s guardian ad litem under 28 1 |}conduct sometime in 2021 and that Carlsbad’s Police Department violated the Americans 2 || with Disabilities Act because there were no employees fluent in Spanish to assist non- 3 || English speakers in recovering personal property confiscated during police incidents. 4 The relief sought is unrelated to the claims in this action and involves non-parties. > For these reasons, the Court finds it lacks jurisdiction. Fed. R. Civ. P. 65; see, e.g., De 6 Beers Consol. Mines, Ltd. v. United States, 325 U.S. 212, 220 (1945) (“A preliminary injunction is always appropriate to grant intermediate relief of the same character as that 8 which may be granted finally. The injunction in question is not of this character. It is not an injunction in the cause, and it deals with a matter lying wholly outside the issues in the 10 suit.”); Zepeda v. United States Immigration Service, 753 F.2d 719, 727 (9th Cir. 1985) (“A federal court may issue an injunction if it has personal jurisdiction over the parties 12 and subject matter jurisdiction over the claim; it may not attempt to determine the rights 13 of persons not before the court.”); Pac. Radiation Oncology, LLC v. Queen's Med. Ctr., M4 810 F.3d 631, 633 (9th Cir. 2015) (“A court’s equitable power lies only over the merits of 15 the case or controversy before it. When a plaintiff seeks injunctive relief based on claims 16 not pled in the complaint, the court does not have the authority to issue an injunction.”) M7 The motion is therefore DENIED.” IT IS SO ORDERED. 18 19 Dated: January 24, 2022 20 H . James Lorenz, 21 United States District Judge 23 request. Jean Wortham is not a party to this case. The Court therefore DENIES the petition. 25 Regardless, Plaintiff also fails to show he is likely to suffer irreparable harm. The first 26 alleged police incident occurred on July 16, 2021, and the last incident occurred on December 16, 2021. Yet, he did not seek relief until now. See Oakland Tribune, Inc. v. 27 || Chronicle Pub. Co., 762 F.2d 1374, 1377 (9th Cir. 1985) (“plaintiff's long delay before 28 seeking a preliminary injunction implies a lack of urgency and irreparable harm.)