CLD-269 NOT PRECEDENTIAL

UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS

FOR THE THIRD CIRCUIT

___________

No. 17-1526

___________

MICHAEL JONES,

Appellant

v.

U.S. DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION; SECRETARY OF THE U.S. DEPARTMENT 

OF EDUCATION; PENNSYLVANIA DEPARTMENT OF LABOR & INDUSTRY; 

OFFICE OF VOCATIONAL REHABILITATION; 

BUREAU OF BLINDNESS AND VISUAL SERVICES

____________________________________

On Appeal from the United States District Court

for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania

(D.C. Civil Action No. 2-14-cv-01667)

District Judge: Honorable Joseph F. Leeson, Jr.

____________________________________

Submitted for Possible Dismissal Pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 1915(e)(2)(B) or 

Summary Action Pursuant to Third Circuit LAR 27.4 and I.O.P. 10.6

June 1, 2017

Before: SHWARTZ, NYGAARD, and FISHER, Circuit Judges

(Opinion filed: June 6, 2017)

_________

OPINION*

_________

 * This disposition is not an opinion of the full Court and pursuant to I.O.P. 5.7 does not 

constitute binding precedent.
2

PER CURIAM

Michael Jones appeals pro se from the District Court’s February 17, 2017 order 

denying his post-judgment attack on the settlement agreement reached in his case. For 

the reasons that follow, we will summarily affirm that order.

I.

In 2014, Jones filed a counseled complaint in the District Court against multiple

defendants, seeking review of an arbitration decision issued by a panel convened by the 

United States Department of Education (“DOE”) pursuant to the Randolph-Sheppard Act, 

20 U.S.C. § 107 et seq.1

 In September 2015, the District Judge referred the case to a 

Magistrate Judge to conduct a settlement conference. In October 2015, the District Judge 

was informed that the parties had settled the case. As a result, the District Judge 

dismissed the case with prejudice, stating that the Magistrate Judge “shall retain 

jurisdiction over this matter to enforce the settlement terms.” (Dist. Ct. Order entered 

Oct. 27, 2015.) No party appealed from that dismissal order, and the settlement 

agreement was signed by the parties in December 2015.

 1 Under this statute, “the federal government, in partnership with consenting states, seeks 

to provide economic opportunities to the blind by granting priority to licensed blind 

vendors in contracts to operate vending facilities on federal property.” New Hampshire 

v. Ramsey, 366 F.3d 1, 5 (1st Cir. 2004) (emphasis omitted). A blind licensee who is 

dissatisfied with the operation of a participating state’s vendor program may seek a 

hearing before that state’s licensing agency. See id. at 6. The licensee may appeal the 

outcome of that hearing to a DOE panel, and judicial review of the panel’s decision may 

be sought in federal court. See id. The complaint brought by Jones, who is blind and 

was a licensee in Pennsylvania’s vendor program, revolved around the state licensing 

agency’s failure to award him a particular vending site.
3

In September 2016, Jones sent a pro se email to the Magistrate Judge, stating that 

“there may be serious challenges with th[e] settlement agreement.” (Dist. Ct. docket 

# 52-1, at 4.) The Magistrate Judge construed the email as a request to revoke the 

settlement agreement and held a telephone conference with the parties to discuss the

issue. During that conference, Jones claimed that he had agreed to the settlement under 

duress, that he had not received a Braille copy of the agreement before settling (as 

mentioned in Footnote 1, Jones is blind), and that a defendant had breached the 

agreement. At the end of the conference, the Magistrate Judge determined that, although 

Jones may not have received a Braille copy of the settlement agreement, Jones had ample 

time to confer with his family and three separate attorneys before settling. The 

Magistrate Judge found that those attorneys, who were “all extremely competent, 

extremely patient, extremely well informed, and advocated vigorously on behalf of Mr. 

Jones,” “advised him of his rights and the advisability of entering the agreement which he 

signed.” (Tr. of Telephone Conference held Sept. 30, 2016, at 24.) The Magistrate Judge 

noted that “the agreement includes significant benefits for Mr. Jones,” (id.),2 and found 

that the defendant in question had complied with the agreement, (see id.). The Magistrate

Judge also noted that Jones had previously represented to the defendants that he was 

entering into the agreement without any duress or undue influence from anyone. (See id.

 

 

2 As part of those benefits, Jones received $365,000 (another $85,000 was awarded to his 

three attorneys) and an approximately $30,000 debt of his was forgiven.
4

at 23-24.) Immediately after the conference, the Magistrate Judge entered an order 

denying Jones’s request to revoke the settlement as frivolous.

A few weeks later, Jones filed a pro se notice of appeal, seeking our review of the 

Magistrate Judge’s order. We dismissed that appeal in January 2017, explaining that we 

lacked jurisdiction to review that order because Jones had not appealed to the District 

Judge in the first instance. (See Jan. 19, 2017 Order entered in C.A. No. 16-4015.) Jones 

then returned to the District Court and filed a pro se “Emergency Motion,” effectively 

asking the District Judge to vacate the settlement and reopen his case. (See Jones’s 

Emergency Mot. 5 (“I am asking the court to open this Settlement and reverse it. . . . I am 

willing to return the money given to me [as part of the settlement].”).) As before, Jones 

claimed that he had agreed to the settlement under duress, and that he had not been 

provided with a Braille copy of the agreement. The District Judge treated this new 

motion as a request for relief from a judgment pursuant to Federal Rule of Civil 

Procedure 60(b). On February 17, 2017, the District Judge denied that relief. This timely 

appeal followed.

II.

We have jurisdiction over this appeal pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 1291. We review 

the District Judge’s denial of relief under Rule 60(b) for abuse of discretion. See Brown 

v. Phila. Hous. Auth., 350 F.3d 338, 342 (3d Cir. 2003).3 “An abuse of discretion may be 

 3 Jones does not challenge the District Judge’s decision to treat his motion as a request for 

Rule 60(b) relief, and we see no error in that treatment. See Sawka v. Healtheast, Inc., 
5

found when the district court’s decision rests upon a clearly erroneous finding of fact, an 

errant conclusion of law or an improper application of law to fact.” Reform Party of 

Allegheny Cty. v. Allegheny Cty. Dep’t of Elections, 174 F.3d 305, 311 (3d Cir. 1999) 

(en banc) (internal quotation marks omitted). We may take summary action if this appeal 

fails to present a substantial question. See 3d Cir. I.O.P. 10.6.

As the District Judge highlighted, the Magistrate Judge “held a series of 

conferences at which he was personally able to observe [Jones] and assess his 

responsiveness, demeanor, and ability to comprehend the terms of the settlement, and 

observe the guidance provided to Jones by his attorneys in reaching the settlement.” 

(Dist. Ct. Op. entered Feb. 17, 2017, at 4 (alteration in original) (internal quotation marks 

omitted).) With the benefit of those observations, and after considering the parties’ 

arguments during the post-settlement telephone conference, the Magistrate Judge found 

that Jones had not entered into the settlement under duress, and that his attorneys had 

“advised him of his rights and the advisability of entering the [settlement] agreement.” 

(Tr. of Telephone Conference held Sept. 30, 2016, at 24.). The District Judge 

subsequently relied on those findings in assessing the Rule 60(b) motion, and he 

 

989 F.2d 138, 140 (3d Cir. 1993) (explaining that “[a]ny time a district [court] enters a 

judgment, even one dismissing a case by stipulation of the parties, [it] retains, by virtue 

of Rule 60(b), jurisdiction to entertain a later motion to vacate the judgment on the 

grounds specified in the rule”) (alterations in original) (quoting Halderman ex rel. 

Halderman v. Pennhurst State Sch. & Hosp., 901 F.2d 311, 320 (3d Cir. 1990)); see also

Raab v. City of Ocean City, N.J., 833 F.3d 286, 294 (3d Cir. 2016) (explaining that a 

district court has jurisdiction to enforce a settlement agreement when its order dismissing 

the case specifies that jurisdiction over that agreement is being retained) (citing 
6

concluded that Jones had knowingly and voluntarily entered into the settlement. Jones 

has not demonstrated that this conclusion was error or that the factual findings 

undergirding it were clearly erroneous. Accordingly, we cannot conclude that the District 

Judge abused its discretion in denying Jones relief under Rule 60(b).4

Because this appeal does not present a substantial question, we will summarily 

affirm the District Court’s February 17, 2017 order. 

 

Kokkonen v. Guardian Life Ins. Co. of Am., 511 U.S. 375, 381 (1994)). 4 To the extent that Jones claims that the District Judge should have held an evidentiary 

hearing before ruling, that claim does not entitle Jones to relief here. Jones has not 

established that an evidentiary hearing was necessary, for the Magistrate Judge had 

already held a telephone conference to address Jones’s concerns about the settlement, and 

Jones has not specified what evidence he would have presented at the evidentiary 

hearing. See generally McDowell v. Phila. Hous. Auth., 423 F.3d 233, 238 (3d Cir. 

2005) (indicating that a district court has discretion to rule without holding an evidentiary 

hearing).