Source: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-cand-3_19-cv-01709/USCOURTS-cand-3_19-cv-01709-2/pdf.json

Nature of Suit Code: 440
Nature of Suit: Other Civil Rights
Cause of Action: 42:1983 Civil Rights Act

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United States District Court

Northern District of California

UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT

NORTHERN DISTRICT OF CALIFORNIA

BRENT SHIPP, et al.,

Plaintiffs,

v.

LIBBY SCHAAF, et al.,

Defendants.

Case No. 19-cv-01709-JST 

ORDER DENYING MOTION TO 

DISMISS

Re: ECF No. 25

Before the Court is Defendants’ (collectively, the “City”) motion to dismiss this action as 

moot. ECF No. 25. The Court will deny the motion.

I. BACKGROUND

Pro se Plaintiffs Brent Shipp and Eric De Guzman initially filed this action on April 2, 

2019. ECF No. 1. Plaintiffs, who were unhoused at the time and living in an encampment located 

at East 12th Street and 16th Avenue in the City of Oakland, brought claims under the Fourth, 

Eighth, and Fourteenth Amendments. Id. at 3. In explaining the relief sought, Plaintiffs stated: 

“We want the City of Oakland to stop evicting us [and] shuffling us around until they have safe, 

dignified, permanent housing for us. If they can’t house us they must leave us alone. In the case 

of evictions, we want the City of Oakland to follow their so called policy and stop throwing away 

people’s belongings.” Id. at 5.

Plaintiffs simultaneously filed a motion for a temporary restraining order (“TRO”) and 

preliminary injunction on an ex parte basis, citing the City’s plan to temporarily close the 

encampment on April 3, 2019, to conduct a “clean and clear” operation. ECF No. 3. The Court 

granted the motion for a TRO that day and ordered the City to show cause why a preliminary 

injunction should not issue. ECF No. 11. After hearing from the City, the Court held a hearing on 

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April 16, 2019. ECF No. 16. The Court denied the motion for a preliminary injunction. ECF No. 

17.

On May 13, 2019, the City moved to dismiss this action, arguing that Plaintiffs’ claims had 

become moot after the City conducted two “clean and clear” operations on April 30, 2019, and 

May 8, 2019. ECF No. 25. Plaintiffs did not file an opposition. The Court held a hearing on 

August 1, 2019.

II. LEGAL STANDARD

The doctrine of mootness requires a court to dismiss a case “when the issues presented are 

no longer ‘live’ or the parties lack a legally cognizable interest in the outcome.” Already, LLC v. 

Nike, Inc., 568 U.S. 85, 91 (2013) (quoting Murphy v. Hunt, 455 U.S. 478, 481 (1982) (per 

curiam)). Mootness is a high bar, however, and a case “becomes moot only when it is impossible 

for a court to grant any effectual relief whatever to the prevailing party.” Chafin v. Chafin, 568 

U.S. 165, 172 (2013) (quoting Knox v. Serv. Emps. Int’l Union, Local 1000, 567 U.S. 298, 307 

(2012)). “As long as the parties have a concrete interest, however small, in the outcome of the 

litigation, the case is not moot.” Id. (quoting Knox, 567 U.S. at 307-08).

In addition, there are two recognized exceptions to the mootness doctrine. First, 

“voluntary cessation of a challenged practice does not moot a case unless ‘subsequent events 

ma[ke] it absolutely clear that the allegedly wrongful behavior could not reasonably be expected to 

recur.’” Trinity Lutheran Church of Columbia, Inc. v. Comer, 137 S. Ct. 2012, 2019 n.1 (2017) 

(alteration in original) (quoting Friends of the Earth, Inc. v. Laidlaw Envtl. Servs. (TOC), Inc., 528 

U.S. 167, 189 (2000)). Second, a case is not moot where the dispute is “capable of repetition, yet

evading review.” Spencer v. Kemna, 523 U.S. 1, 17 (1998) (citation omitted). This exception 

applies “if (1) the challenged action is in its duration too short to be fully litigated prior to its 

cessation or expiration, and (2) there is a reasonable expectation that the same complaining party 

will be subjected to the same action again.” United States v. Sanchez-Gomez, 138 S. Ct. 1532, 

1540 (2018) (quoting Turner v. Rogers, 564 U.S. 431, 440 (2011)).

III. DISCUSSION

With its motion, the City submitted a declaration stating that it conducted a clean and clear 

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of Plaintiffs’ encampment on two days, beginning on April 30, 2019, and completing the cleaning 

on May 8, 2019. ECF No. 25-1 ¶ 9. Further, the City represents that “there is no imminent plan 

or intent to ‘clean and clear’ this homeless encampment again after the May 8, 2019 cleaning.” Id.

¶ 11. In the City’s June 6, 2019 reply, it likewise stated that there had been no change in those 

plans. ECF No. 27 at 2. Accordingly, the City argues, this case is now moot because the 

temporary closure has taken place and the City has no plans to conduct another operation at this 

encampment again. ECF No. 25 at 5-7.

The City’s position has some appeal, and Plaintiffs’ failure to file an opposition or appear 

at the hearing suggests that this case may be moot for practical purposes. Nonetheless, the City’s 

motion unduly focuses on the specific injunctive relief Plaintiffs sought at the start of this case, 

without looking to their complaint as a whole. Given Plaintiffs’ pro se status, the complaint is 

understandably ambiguous. But the gravamen of the complaint broadly contests the City’s general 

practices related to encampments for the unhoused. Cf. Erickson v. Pardus, 551 U.S. 89, 94 

(2007) (“[A] pro se complaint, however inartfully pleaded, must be held to less stringent standards 

than formal pleadings drafted by lawyers.” (citation omitted)). For instance, Plaintiffs state that 

“[w]e want the City of Oakland to stop evicting us [and] shuffling us around until they have safe, 

dignified, permanent housing for us.” ECF No. 1 at 5. This broad request contradicts the notion 

that the only relief Plaintiffs sought was to enjoin a single operation. So construed, it is not 

“impossible for a court to grant any effectual relief whatever” on Plaintiffs’ claims. Chafin, 568 

U.S. at 172 (citation omitted).1 

Even were the Court to construe this dispute more narrowly, the City’s motion fails to 

address the voluntary cessation exception to mootness. “The ‘heavy burden of persua[ding]’ the 

court that the challenged conduct cannot reasonably be expected to start up again lies with the 

party asserting mootness,” and the City has not carried its burden. Laidlaw, 528 U.S. at 189

(alteration in original) (citation omitted). The City has pointed to no binding change in policy that 

 

1 The City’s reliance on the contention that operation did not “result[] in the property destruction 

that [Plaintiffs] alleged would happen,” ECF No. 25, is misplaced. That evidence goes to the 

merits of Plaintiffs’ claim that the City does not follow its policies, not whether this action is 

moot. 

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would prevent it from conducting either temporary or permanent closures at Plaintiffs’ 

encampment in the future, nor any external events that would make such an operation unlikely. 

See Trinity Lutheran, 137 S. Ct. at 2019 n.1 (explaining that action was not moot where agency 

could simply “revert to its policy”). Instead, its misapprehends this burden when it states that 

“although Mr. De Guzman and Mr. Shipp may be subjected to future ‘clean and clear’ 

interventions, there is no evidence that it is reasonably probable that the City will not follow its 

policy and procedures or that the “clean and clear” will result in improper personal property 

destruction.” Because the burden of showing mootness falls on the City, the absence of any 

evidence is not helpful to its position. 

The Court need not address the capable of repetition exception in detail, but makes two 

points. First, the City provides 72 hours of notice prior to a closure. The fact that the parties were 

able to obtain initial consideration of the merits through ex parte injunctive relief on an emergency 

basis does not mean that a closure operation’s duration is sufficient “to be fully litigated prior to 

its cessation or expiration,” Sanchez-Gomez, 138 S. Ct. at 1540 (citation omitted), because the 

Court’s consideration of a TRO request does not mean the issues have been “fully litigated.” See

Doe v. Harris, No. C12-5713 TEH, 2012 WL 6101870, at *1 n.3 (N.D. Cal. Nov. 7, 2012) (“The 

Court recognizes that Defendants have not had an opportunity to be fully heard on these issues, 

and the Court's grant of a TRO shall not be considered any indication of the Court's views of the 

merits of the issues raised by Plaintiffs or whether, after further briefing, the Court will grant 

preliminary injunctive relief.”). If a same-day TRO could suffice for these purposes, then almost 

no action would ever be capable of “evading review.” Second, there is effectively no evidentiary 

record from which the Court could evaluate whether “there is a reasonable expectation that 

[Plaintiffs] will be subjected to the same action again.” Id. (citation omitted).

Accordingly, this action is not moot.

CONCLUSION

For the foregoing reasons, the Court denies the City’s motion to dismiss. Although the 

Court cannot find mootness on the current record, it recognizes that the circumstances of this case 

– particularly the lack of communication from Plaintiffs since the Court denied their preliminary 

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injunction motion – suggest that Plaintiffs may in fact no longer seek any relief.

Accordingly, the Court hereby ORDERS Plaintiffs to attend the case management 

conference currently scheduled for 2:00 p.m. on September 24, 2019, in Courtroom 6, 2nd Floor, 

1301 Clay Street, Oakland, California 94612. Failure to do so, or failure to otherwise comply with 

this order, will result in dismissal with prejudice pursuant to Rule 41(b) of the Federal Rules of 

Civil Procedure, which means that Plaintiffs will not be allowed to pursue their claims any further.

IT IS SO ORDERED.

Dated: August 15, 2019

______________________________________

JON S. TIGAR

United States District Judge

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