MATTHEW WASHINGTON, Plaintiff, vs. A.A. ALAIMO, Judge; AVANT EDENFIELD, Chief Judge; DUDLEY H.
BOWEN, JR., Judge; WILLIAM T. MOORE, JR., Judge; W. OWENS, Judge; JAMES E. GRAHAM, Magistrate
Judge; C.W. HICKS, JR., Magistrate Judge, Defendants.
CIVIL ACTION NO. CV695-104
UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT FOR THE SOUTHERN DISTRICT OF GEORGIA, STATESBORO DIVISION
934 F. Supp. 1395; 1996 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 11235
May 17, 1996, Decided
May 17, 1996, FILED
Case DISMISSED WITH PREJUDICE.
COUNSEL:
MATTHEW WASHINGTON, Plaintiff, pro se.
JUDGES:
WILLIAM T. MOORE, JR., UNITED STATES DISTRICT JUDGE, SOUTHERN DISTRICT OF GEORGIA
OPINIONBY:
WILLIAM T. MOORE, JR.
OPINION:
ORDER
On April 5, 1996, this Court ordered Plaintiff to show cause why this Court should not impose
Rule 11 sanctions upon him for filing a motion for improper purposes. The motion which Plaintiff
filed was entitled "Motion to Kiss My Ass" (Doc. 107) in which he moved "all Americans at large
and one corrupt Judge Smith [to] kiss my got [sic] damn ass sorry mother ****er you." This Court
gave Plaintiff until April 25, 1996, to respond and specifically warned: "Failure to comply with
this Order will result in dismissal of this case." Plaintiff has appealed the show-cause order to
the United States Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit. As the April 5 Order was not a final
order, Plaintiff's appeal is an interlocutory appeal and, as such, this Court retains
jurisdiction over the parties and matters in this case. 28 U.S.C. ß 1292(b). As of the date
indicated below, Plaintiff has not responded to the show-cause order. Therefore, this Court
DISMISSES WITH PREJUDICE the above-captioned case for Plaintiff's complete disregard of and
noncompliance with an explicit court order. Fed. R. Civ. P. 41(b); Local Rule 41.1(b); see
Goforth v. Owens, 766 F.2d 1533 (11th Cir. 1985) (holding that district court's power to dismiss
action under Rule 41(b) for failure to obey court order is inherent aspect of its authority to
enforce its orders). All outstanding motions are hereby rendered MOOT.
This Court also observes that this is not the first instance in which Plaintiff has abused the
civil right forum of this Court provided through 42 U.S.C. ß 1983 and finds that certain
restrictions, as outlined below, need to be placed upon prospective lawsuits initiated by
Plaintiff in order to protect parties from abusive litigation and to protect the federal
judiciary's integrity of purpose.
On March 20, 1976, Plaintiff walked into a Savannah sporting goods store and paid $ 149 for a 12
gauge shotgun. The next day, five Chatham County Police officers responded to a complaint from a
woman on Stuyvesant street. She stated that she was afraid to sit on her back porch because
someone was shooting a gun. The police officers investigated the incident and found the source of
the trouble to be Plaintiff, who initially confronted the officers while on his front porch.
Plaintiff then ran into his house. Two of the officers pursued him through the front door while
the other three entered his house through the back door. Plaintiff could not be seen in the house
and the officers began searching for him. One officer, J. Waters, happened upon a closet and soon
thereafter saw the end of a shotgun barrel coming out of the darkness of the closet. Officer
Waters warned the others to get back and the shotgun fired. Buckshot pellets hit Officer Waters
in the head and Officer J.R. McNeely in the left hand. Plaintiff fired the gun again and the
second shot hit Officer Alex Hodgson in the chest; Officer Hodgson died from the injuries
sustained. Plaintiff, who had previously been acquitted of another murder charge by reason of
insanity, was arrested sometime that day. (See Savannah Morning News, March 22, 1976, p. 1B.)
Plaintiff was convicted for the murder of Officer Hodgson and for three counts of aggravated
assault. On January 24, 1977, the Superior Court of Chatham County (Cheatham, J.) sentenced
Plaintiff to life imprisonment for the murder conviction (Chatham Co. Indictment No. 25162), ten
years for the aggravated assault of Pat Howard (Chatham Co. Indictment No. 25163), ten years for
the aggravated assault of Waters (Chatham Co. Indictment No. 25164), and ten years for the
aggravated assault of McNeely (Chatham Co. Indictment No. 25165); the sentences were set to run
consecutively. The Georgia State Department of Corrections committed Plaintiff to Georgia State
Prison in Reidsville where he is currently serving his sentence.
Since his commitment to the state prison system, Plaintiff has become a frequent litigant within
the federal courts seeking relief through the auspices of 42 U.S.C. ß 1983. The Clerk of Court
for the Superior Court of Chatham County has also informed this Court that Plaintiff is
frequently suing for various forms of relief through the state court system as well. What
distinguishes Plaintiff from most prisoner litigants in federal courts is that he pays his filing
fee rather than submit an application to proceed in forma pauperis under the provisions of 28
U.S.C. ß 1915. It has come to the attention of this Court that Plaintiff's litigation practice
is largely, if not entirely, underwritten by the Federal Treasury as he periodically receives a
substantial check for veterans' disability benefits. By paying his filing fee, Plaintiff has thus
far avoided the filter of the 28 U.S.C. ß 1915(d) frivolity review. As a result, patently
frivolous lawsuits have languished in this district longer than would otherwise be warranted with
other prisoner litigants.
Plaintiff has shown in his dealings with the courts in this District that he lacks the ability or
will to govern his suits with the civility and order required by the Local Rules and by the
Federal Rules of Civil Procedure. He has wasted the time of many an innocent party and he has
flippantly used the resources of the judiciary with his abusive motions filing practice.
In Matthew Washington v. Bobby Whitworth, et al., 6:91cv87, this Court's experience with
Plaintiff began. In that case, Plaintiff filed the Complaint on November 8, 1991, and soon
commenced his motion filings practice. In February 1992, he moved to change venue. Then, he
initiated the trademark of his practice: the Motion to Amend Complaint. He moved to amend his
complaint on March 6, 1992, on April 15, 1992, and on December 14, 1992. After a couple
allowances of amendment, Judge Dudley H. Bowen, Jr., began denying Plaintiff's motions to amend.
Soon thereafter he moved to disqualify Judge Bowen and began filing "Extraordinary Motions to
Amend" including one which desired to add the United States Secret Service as a party.
Plaintiff began filing frivolous motions on a weekly basis and, in that relatively simple civil
rights lawsuit, he ended up filing more than seventy-five pleadings, all of which required the
considered attention of this Court and Judge Bowen. These motions included "Motion to Behoove an
Inquisition" and "Motion for Judex Delegatus" and "Motion for Restoration of Sanity" and "Motion
for Deinstitutionalization". In one instance, he indicated the recreational tilt of his
litigation when he filed a "Motion for Publicity" regarding a trial which had been set for March
23, 1995, in Statesboro. At the time of trial, Plaintiff filed a "Motion to Vacate Jurisdiction"
which was denied. Even after judgment as a matter of law was entered against him at the trial,
Plaintiff did not perceive his case as complete. He renewed the filing of "Extraordinary Motions
to Amend" and filed his appeals, fees paid, with the United States Court of Appeals for the
Eleventh Circuit.
After one year of motions filing after the case had been closed, this Court ordered Plaintiff to
quit submitting motions in a closed case and directed the Clerk to return to Plaintiff any
further pleading filed by him. Plaintiff "one-upped" the Clerk when he filed a Notice of Appeal
from that order; the notice, of course, had to be placed in the case file.
In Matthew Washington v. James T. Morris, et al., 4:93cv114, Plaintiff set out to sue a host of
individuals, including the Superior Court judge who presided over his the Hodgson murder trial
and the attorney who defended him in that trial. Plaintiff filed the complaint on May 20, 1993,
and sought to amend it on June 7, 1993, July 21, 1993, July 23, 1993, November 2, 1993, November
5, 1993, December 14, 1993, December 22, 1993, January 23, 1995, March 2, 1995, March 29, 1995,
and on October 20, 1995. At least one of these Motions to Amend sought to add Magistrate Judge
James E. Graham as a party defendant. Plaintiff filed fifty-four pleadings in that case, all of
which required the considered attention of Judge Anthony A. Alaimo or Magistrate Graham. The
motions ranged from the mundane, such as "Motion for Change of Venue", to the arcane, such as
"Motion for Cesset pro Cessus" and "Motion for Judex Delegatus", to the curious, such as "Motion
for Nunc pro Tunc" and "Motion for Psychoanalysis", to the outlandish, such as "Motion to Impeach
Judge Alaimo" and "Motion to Renounce Citizenship" and "Motion to Exhume Body of Alex Hodgson".
Plaintiff also filed numerous interlocutory appeals, which required the attention and utilization
of the resources of the Court of Appeals. The case was disposed of on the pleadings in
Defendants' favor.
Continued . . .