IN THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT 

FOR THE MIDDLE DISTRICT OF ALABAMA 

NORTHERN DIVISION 

JEREMIAH W. GREEN, ) 

 ) 

 Plaintiff, ) 

 ) 

v. ) CIVIL ACTION NO. 2:06-cv-667-WKW-WC 

 ) 

ELMORE COUNTY JAIL, et al., ) 

 ) 

 Defendants. ) 

DEFENDANT SUE ROBERTS’S RESPONSE TO PLAINTIFF’S DECLARATION

 COMES NOW Elmore County, Alabama, Jail Warden Sue Roberts, Defendant in the 

above-styled cause, and submits her Response to the Plaintiff’s August 8, 2006 Declaration. 

 In Dean v. Barber, 951 F.2d 1210 (11th Cir. 1992), one of the decisions cited by the 

Plaintiff in support of his attempt to plead “Doe” defendants,1

 the district court rejected the 

plaintiff’s effort to name the “Chief Deputy of the Jefferson County Jail” as a defendant. 

However, the Eleventh Circuit determined that the plaintiff, Dean, should have been allowed to 

add “Chief Deputy of the Jefferson County Jail John Doe” as a defendant because Dean 

“described with sufficient clarity the head of the Jefferson County Jail as his additional defendant 

and brought to the attention of the court that [he] had yet to receive Sheriff Bailey’s report, 

which would have provided [him] with the information needed to specifically name the ‘Chief’.” 

Dean, 951 F.2d at 1216; see also Russell v. Mobile County Sheriff, 2000 WL 1848470, *1 n.2 

 

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 The Plaintiff’s Motion to Amend Defendants/Motion in Support of “Doe” Defendants (Doc. #7-1) inexplicably 

cites numerous decisions in which the respective courts held that “Rule 15(c) does not allow an amended complaint 

adding new defendants to relate back if the newly-added defendants were not named originally because the plaintiff 

did not know their identities.” Barrow v. Wethersfield Police Dep’t, 66 F.3d 466, 470 (2d Cir. 1995). Furthermore, 

despite significant effort, counsel for Defendant Roberts was unable to locate the Martin II v. Niagara, et al., 1:05-

cv-0868 (W.D.N.Y. 2006) decision discussed by the Plaintiff in his aforementioned Motion to Amend 

Defendants/Motion in Support of “Doe” Defendants (Doc. #7-1). 

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(S.D. Ala. 2000) (finding that plaintiff adequately identified the defendant when he named the 

“Sheriff of Mobile County” as a defendant). This excerpt strongly suggests that the district 

court’s refusal to allow Dean to add “Chief Deputy of the Jefferson County Jail John Doe” as a 

defendant was deemed erroneous because it was only a matter of time before Dean received the 

sheriff’s report and would have had the name of the individual who he designated as the “Doe” 

defendant. 

 The instant Plaintiff, on the other hand, is not awaiting receipt of the defendant’s report – 

in fact, he has already received such a report, and should not be supplied the information he 

requests. His August 8, 2006 Declaration does not describe any Elmore County Jail employee 

by rank or position as precisely as did the plaintiff in Dean, supra, nor does the instant Plaintiff 

request to add only one easily identifiable defendant. Instead, he seeks to add five (5) “Doe” 

defendants who are referenced according to vague physical traits and the order in which he 

encountered them at the Jail (e.g., “Jack Doe was my second contact at the Elmore County Jail”). 

Such general characteristics are insufficient to permit the tardy addition of five (5) “Doe” 

defendants, especially when those ambiguous characteristics are compared to a unique identifier 

like “Chief Deputy of the Jefferson County Jail John Doe” used by the plaintiff in Dean, supra. 

See Dean, 951 F.2d at 1216 (“Dean described with sufficient clarity the head of the Jefferson 

County Jail as his additional defendant”). As a result, there is no guarantee that the individuals 

listed below are, in fact, the Elmore County Jail employees who the Plaintiff seeks to name as 

defendants. 

 Furthermore, Warden Roberts reiterates that fictitious party pleading is generally not 

permitted under the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure. See Rommell v. Automobile Racing Club 

of America, Inc., 964 F.2d 1090, 1098 n.14 (11th Cir. 1992); Harris v. Palm Harbor Homes, Inc., 

Case 2:06-cv-00667-WKW-WC Document 48 Filed 02/12/2007 Page 2 of 4
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198 F. Supp. 2d 1303, 1304 (M.D. Ala. 2002); Collins v. Fingerhut Companies, Inc., 117 F. 

Supp. 2d 1283, 1283, n.1 (S.D. Ala. 2000); Edwards v. Alabama Dep’t of Corrections, 81 F. 

Supp. 2d 1242, 1257 (M.D. Ala. 2000); Wiggins v. Risk Enterprise Mgmt. Ltd., 14 F. Supp. 2d 

1279 (M.D. Ala. 1998); Floyd v. Allstate Ins. Co., 989 F. Supp. 1435, 1436 (M.D. Ala. 1998); 

McAllister v. Henderson, 698 F. Supp. 865, 869 (N.D. Ala. 1988); Weeks v. Benton, 649 F. 

Supp. 1297, 1298 (S.D. Ala. 1986); 15 Am. Jur. 2d Civil Rights § 155 citing Weeks, supra (“in a 

circuit where a ‘John Doe’ pleading is forbidden, a motion to strike fictitious defendants from a 

civil rights complaint will be granted”); but see Harris v. Beaulieu Group, L.L.C., 394 F. Supp. 

2d 1348, 1356-57 (M.D. Ala. 2005) (declining to dismiss lawsuit “based on the extraordinary 

circumstances presented” by the fact that the only claims remaining were those against fictitious 

parties) (emphasis added). 

 Following a review of the Plaintiff’s August 8, 2006 Declaration (Doc. #7-2), Defendant 

Roberts submits the following information in response to the Court’s January 26, 2007 Order 

(Doc. #43-1). The individual identified in the Plaintiff’s August 8, 2006 Declaration as “John 

Doe” may or may not be Correctional Officer Luke Reaves. The individual identified in the 

Plaintiff’s August 8, 2006 Declaration as “Jack Doe” may or may not be then-Sergeant Bill 

McCoy. The individual identified in the Plaintiff’s August 8, 2006 Declaration as “Jim Doe” 

may or may not be Lieutenant Clarence Buggs. The individual identified in the Plaintiff’s 

August 8, 2006 Declaration as “Jane Doe” may or may not be Lieutenant Dorothy Weldon. The 

identity of the individual identified in the Plaintiff’s August 8, 2006 Declaration as “Jeff Doe” is 

unknown. 

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 RESPECTFULLY SUBMITTED this the 12th day of February, 2007. 

 s/ C. Richard Hill, Jr. 

 C. RICHARD HILL, JR. (HIL045) 

 DANIEL D. FORDHAM (FOR055)

 Attorneys for Defendants Elmore County Jail 

 and Warden Sue Roberts 

 WEBB & ELEY, P.C. 

 7475 Halcyon Pointe Drive (36117) 

 Post Office Box 240909 

 Montgomery, Alabama 36124 

 Telephone: (334) 262-1850 

 Fax: (334) 262-1889 

 E-mail: rhill@webbeley.com 

CERTIFICATE OF SERVICE

 I hereby certify that on this the 12th day of February, 2007, I electronically filed the 

Defendant’s Response to the Plaintiff’s Declaration with the Clerk of the Court using the 

CM/ECF system, and that I have mailed by United States Mail, postage prepaid, to the following 

non-CM/ECF participant: 

Jeremiah W. Green 

Federal Prison Camp – Atlanta 

Post Office Box 150160 

Atlanta, Georgia 30315-0160 

 s/C. Richard Hill, Jr. 

OF COUNSEL

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