NOT PRECEDENTIAL
UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE THIRD CIRCUIT

___________ No. 10-2889

___________ THOMAS I. GAGE, Appellant v. STATE OF NEW JERSEY

________________ ____________________ On Appeal from the United States District Court for the District of New Jersey (D.C. Civil Acti on No. 10-cv-02603) District Judge: Honorable Freda L. Wolfson

________________ ____________________ Submitted Pursuant to Th ird Circuit LAR 34.1(a) November 24, 2010 Before: SLOVITER, FISHER and WEIS, Circuit Judges (Opinion filed: November 26, 2010 )

___________ OPINION

___________ PER CURIAM. The District Court sua sponte dismis sed Thomas I. Gage’s complaint as deficient under Rule 8(a)(2) of the Federal Ru les of Civil Procedure. Concluding that the District Court’s dismissal was not an abuse of its discretion, we w ill affirm the judgment of the District Court.1 I. On May 20, 2010, Gage paid the $350 filing fee to initiate this civil action against the State of New Jersey in federal cour t. Gage’s complaint contained generalized allegations of corruption and treason against va rious local and state government officials. In addition, Gage alleged that his real property was slated to be sold at a sheriff’s auction, in violation of his federal due process rights. He thus requested, inter alia, that the District Court “enforce a void on all of Judge Fred H. Kumpf’s unlawful court orders against me, our property and my business comp any, Infinity Builders, Inc,” and that “all the state authorities who have warred [sic] ag ainst the United States Constitution in this case . . . be punish[ed] by a se ntence of incarceration.” Gage attached to his complaint the sheriff’s sale notice, indicating that Wells Fargo (the mortgagee) was going to effectuate the sale of Gage’s property on June 8, 2010. 1 On June 11, 2010, the District Court sua sponte dismissed Gage’s complaint without prejudice, concluding that it did not comply with the pleading requirement of Rule 8(a)(2). Specifically, the District Court stated that the compla int’s allegations “are the typical ‘unadorned, the defendant[s]- unlawfully-harmed-me accusations[s]’ not permitted under the federal pleading standard s,” (Dist. Ct. order at 2) (quoting Ashcroft v. Iqbal , 129 S. Ct. 1937, 1949 (2009)), and that “in light of Plaintiff’s allegations, it appears that Defendant State of New Je rsey is not the proper defendant.” Id. Gage

1 According to Gage, the sale did not ta ke place until July 6, 2010, and he was given until July 16, 2010, to lodge formal objections.2 appealed and sought a temporary restraining order to block the sheriff’s sale of his real property. 2

II. We must first consider our jurisdicti on to hear this appeal. The District Court dismissed Gage’s complaint without pr ejudice, and the general rule is that “an order which dismisses a complaint without prej udice is neither final nor appealable.” Borelli v. City of Reading , 532 F.2d 950, 951 (3d Cir. 19 76) (per curiam). However, “[i]f the plaintiff cannot cure the defect that led to dismissal or elects to stand on the dismissed complaint . . . we have held that the order of dismissal [without prejudice] is final and appealable.” Welch v. Folsom , 925 F.2d 666, 668 (3d Cir. 1991); see also Deutsch v. United States , 67 F.3d 1080, 1083 (3d Cir. 1995 ). Since Gage has elected to stand on his complaint, see Frederico v. Home Depot , 507 F.3d 188, 192-93 (3d Cir. 2007), we exercise jurisdicti on under 28 U.S.C. § 1291.
III. Because the District Court dismisse d Gage’s complaint as insufficiently pled under Rule 8, our review is for abuse of discretion. See In re Westinghouse Sec. Litig. , 90 F.3d 696, 702 (3d Cir. 1996). That sta ndard is highly deferential; an abuse of discretion will be found when a District Cour t’s decision “rests upon a clearly erroneous finding of fact, an errant conc lusion of law or an improper a pplication of law to fact.”

2 We denied Gage’s request for a tem porary restraining order, as well as his subsequent request fo r reconsideration.3 Hagan v. Rogers , 570 F.3d 146, 152 (3d Cir. 2009) (c itation omitted). We find no such errors in this case. “Under Rule 8(a)(2), a complaint n eed present only a short and plain statement of the claim showing that the pleade r is entitled to relief, in order to give the defendant fair notice of what the . . . clai m is and the grounds upon which it rests.” In re Ins. Brokerage Antitrust Litig. , --- F.3d ---, 2010 WL 3211147, at *6 (3d Cir. Aug. 16, 2010, Nos. 07-4046, 08-1455, 08-1777) (citations and quotations omitted). “That is to say, there must be some showing sufficien t to justify moving the case beyond the pleadings to the next stage of litigation.” Phillips v. Cnty. of Allegheny , 515 F.3d 224, 234-35 (3d Cir. 2008); see also Swanson v. Citibank, N.A. , 614 F.3d 400, 404 (7th Cir. 2010) (“For cases governed only by Rule 8, it is not necessary to stack up inferences side by side and allow the case to go forward only if the plaintiff’s in ferences seem more compelling that the oppos ing inferences.”). Gage’s claims are rooted in a real property dispute in Warren County, New Jersey. (Pet. Br. at 15) (“The true matter of the fact [sic] is that for the last 12 years I have been trying to resolv e some issues about my property, Block 86.01, Lot 18.”). 3 While much of the complaint can be fairly characterized as a meandering diatribe, it does

3 In a prior suit, the District Court su mmarized Gage’s claims as follows: “Gage alleges . . that he has been the ‘victim ofproperty discrimination,’ arising from his illfated attempts to subdivide his residential property in an effo rt to make the property more marketable.” Gage v. Twp. of Warren , DC Civ. No. 09-519, p. 1 (D.N.J. June 10, 2009).4 include an allegation by Gage that “[t]he Supe rior Court of Somerset court House in State of New Jersey, have order the Sheriff of Somerset County to deprive us of our property, by a pending sale without due process of law . . .” (errors and emphas is in original). And, as noted above, Gage appended the sheriff’s sale notic e to his complaint. The critical inquiry on appeal is, then, whether Gage’s complaint should have been deemed comp liant with Rule 8(a)(2), to the extent it could be construed as attempting to raise a procedural due process cl aim concerning the alle ged deprivation of a protected property interest. See Burns v. Pa. Dep’t of Corr. , 544 F.3d 279, 285 (3d Cir. 2008) (“To prevail on a proced ural due process claim, a litig ant must show (1) that the state deprived him of a protected interest in life, liberty, or prope rty and (2) that the deprivation occurred without due process of law.”). We answer in the negative, and conclude that the District Court did not abus e its discretion when it sua sponte dismissed the complaint. Even construed liberally, see Erickson v. Pardus , 551 U.S. 89, 94 (2007) (per curiam), there is too little factual matter in Gage’s complaint “to justify moving the case beyond the pleadings to th e next stage of litigation.” Phillips , 515 F.3d at 234-35. Moreover, the factual matter that is present “is so undeveloped that it does not provide [the] defendant the type of notice of cl aim which is contemplated by Rule 8.” Id. at 232. Accordingly, we will affirm the judgmen t of the District Court. We do not consider Gage’s motion for appointment of coun sel, as he did not file a motion to proceed in forma pauperis in connection with that motion and there is no statutory basis for5 entertaining his motion other than 28 U.S.C. § 1915(e)(1). Gage’s motion for “emergency stay” is denied.