(PC) Valera v. Vasquez

8 UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT 9 FOR THE EASTERN DISTRICT OF CALIFORNIA JOEL VALERA, No. 2:23-cv-0191-DAD-EFB (PC) 12 Plaintiff, 13 v. ORDER B.VASQUEZ, 15 Defendant.

17 Plaintiff is a state prisoner proceeding without counsel in an action brought under 42 18 U.S.C. § 1983. Currently before the court are plaintiff’s July 17, 2023 motions for appointment of counsel and for discovery. ECF Nos. 18, 20. For the reasons that follow, the court will deny both motions.

21 I. Motion for Counsel 22 District courts lack authority to require counsel to represent indigent prisoners in section 1983 cases. Mallard v. United States Dist. Court, 490 U.S. 296, 298 (1989). In exceptional circumstances, the court may request an attorney to voluntarily to represent such a plaintiff. See 28 U.S.C. § 1915(e)(1); Terrell v. Brewer, 935 F.2d 1015, 1017 (9th Cir. 1991); Wood v. Housewright, 900 F.2d 1332, 1335-36 (9th Cir. 1990). When determining whether “exceptional circumstances” exist, the court must consider the likelihood of success on the merits as well as the ability of the plaintiff to articulate his claims pro se in light of the complexity of the legal issues |} mvolved. Palmer v. Valdez, 560 F.3d 965, 970 (9th Cir. 2009). Having considered those factors, || the court finds there are no exceptional circumstances in this case.

3 II. Motion for Discovery 4 Plaintiffs discovery motion simply lists various discovery requests. Such requests must || be made directly on defendant and are not to be filed with the court “until they are used in the || proceeding [e.g., to support or oppose a motion to compel, to dismiss, or for summary judgment] || or the court orders filing.” Fed. R. Civ. P. 5(d)(1)(A). Plaintiff must pursue the discovery of | information through the processes provided in the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, Rules 26-37.

9 Il. Order 10 For the foregoing reasons, it is hereby ORDERED that: 11 1. Plaintiff's July 17, 2023 motion for appointment of counsel (ECF No. 18) is DENIED; 12 and 13 2. Plaintiffs July 17, 2023 motion for discovery (ECF No. 20) is DENIED.

15 || Dated: August 4, 2023. □□ PDEA EDMUND F. BRENNAN 16 UNITED STATES MAGISTRATE JUDGE