Officer v. State of Washington

UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT WESTERN DISTRICT OF WASHINGTON 9 AT SEATTLE 11 VERNON W OFFICER, JR, CASE NO. 2:23-cv-00860-TL 12 Plaintiff, ORDER ON PLAINTIFF’S MOTION v. FOR CONTINUANCE STATE OF WASHINGTON et al., Defendants.

17 This matter is before the Court on Plaintiff’s Motion for Continuance. Dkt. No. 13.

18 Specifically, Plaintiff asks for a one (1) year extension of the Court-issued deadline to amend his complaint to state a plausible claim for relief. Id. at 1; see also Dkt. No. 10 (Order of Dismissal with Leave to Amend), Dkt. No. 11 (Minute Order granting Plaintiff’s previous request for more time). Plaintiff notes that he has secured the assistance of legal counsel to review his case and potentially provide guidance on how to appropriately respond to the Court’s prior Order of Dismissal. Dkt. No. 13 at 1. Plaintiff argues that additional time is required to allow his counsel to review the large volume of materials associated with his case. Id. 1 The Court has broad discretion to grant a time extension for good cause, especially when sought in advance of the deadline. Fed. R. Civ. P. 6(b)(1). As with all civil procedural rules, the Court is required to “liberally construe[ Rule 6(b)(1)] to effectuate the general purpose of seeing that cases are tried on the merits.” Ahanchian v. Xenon Pictures, Inc., 624 F.3d 1253, 1259 (9th Cir. 2010) (internal quotation marks omitted) (quoting Rodgers v. Watt, 722 F.2d 456, 459 (9th Cir. 1983)).

7 In this case, the Court FINDS good cause to allow more time for Plaintiff to attain legal advice. That said, Plaintiff originally filed his deficient complaint more than six (6) months ago, and he has had four (4) months to review the Court’s prior Order of Dismissal to correct the identified deficiencies. The Court is not persuaded that an additional year-long extension is warranted.

12 Nonetheless, in the interest of “effectuat[ing] the general purpose of seeing that cases [proceed] on the merits,” the Court GRANTS Plaintiff a three (3) month extension (which will provide Plaintiff with a total of seven months to correct the identified deficiencies with his prior complaint) and ORDERS Plaintiff to file an Amended Complaint that plausibly states a claim for relief and complies with this Court’s prior Order of Dismissal (Dkt. No. 10) by no later than Friday, March 1, 2024. Plaintiff’s failure to meet this deadline or any of the requirements included in the Court’s prior order will result in the dismissal of this action with prejudice.

19 Dated this 7th day of December 2023.

A Tana Lin United States District Judge