Shankar v. Microsoft Corporation

THE HONORABLE JOHN C. COUGHENOUR UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT 7 WESTERN DISTRICT OF WASHINGTON AT SEATTLE RAGHAVENDRAN SHANKAR, CASE NO. C24-0308-JCC 10 Plaintiff, MINUTE ORDER 11 v. MICROSOFT CORPORATION, 13 Defendant.

15 The following Minute Order is made by direction of the Court, the Honorable John C.

16 Coughenour, United States District Judge: 17 This matter comes before the Court on Plaintiff’s most recent motion for leave to file an amended complaint (Dkt. No. 17)1 and Plaintiff’s motion for leave to withdraw prior motions (Dkt. No. 18). Leave to amend a pleading “shall be freely given when justice so requires.” Fed. R. Civ. P. 15(a). However, courts may decline to do so if there is strong evidence of “‘undue delay, bad faith or dilatory motive on the part of the movant, repeated failure to cure deficiencies by amendments previously allowed, undue prejudice to the opposing party by virtue of allowance of the amendment, [or] futility of amendment, etc.’” Sonoma Cnty. Ass’n of Retired Emps. v. Sonoma Cnty., 708 F.3d 1109, 1117 (9th Cir. 2013) (quoting Foman v. Davis, 371 U.S. 25 26 1 At the time Plaintiff so moved, the Court had not yet ruled on prior motions seeking leave to amend (Dkt. Nos. 12, 14, 15, 16.)

1 178, 182 (1962)). And although the Court gives some measure of flexibility to pro se plaintiffs, see Blaisdell v. Frappiea, 729 F.3d 1237, 1241 (9th Cir. 2013), such flexibility is not without limits, see Ghazali v. Moran, 46 F.3d 52, 54 (9th Cir. 1995).

4 In this case, Plaintiff has filed what appear to be eight different versions of his complaint in the two months since he initiated suit. (See Dkt. Nos. 5, 9, 10, 12, 14, 15, 16, 17.) In most (although not all) instances, Plaintiff sought the Court’s leave to amend. (See Dkt. Nos. 12, 14, 15, 16, 17.) Although, again, the Court had not yet ruled on most of these requests before Plaintiff again moved for leave to amend.

9 Given Plaintiff’s pro se status, the Court will consider only Plaintiff’s most recent motion for leave to amend (Dkt. No. 17) and strike the prior motions, as requested, in part, in Plaintiff’s motion to withdraw (Dkt. No. 18). However, Plaintiff is forewarned that his excessive filings may impede the Court’s ability to proceed with this litigation in an expedient fashion. See El- Shaddai v. Woodford, 2007 WL 704598, slip op. at 1 (E.D. Cal. 2007).

14 Accordingly, Plaintiff’s motion to withdraw prior motions (Dkt. No. 18) is GRANTED.

15 The Clerk is DIRECTED to STRIKE Docket Numbers 12, 14, 15, and 16. The Court will consider Plaintiff’s remaining motion for leave to amend (Dkt. No. 17) once it becomes ripe on May 28, 2024.

18 DATED this 2nd day of May 2024.

Ravi Subramanian Clerk of Court s/Kathleen Albert Deputy Clerk