IN THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT 

FOR THE MIDDLE DISTRICT OF PENNSYLVANIA

JUSTIN M. CORLISS, : CIVIL ACTION NO. 3:05-CV-0347

:

Plaintiff : (JUDGE JONES)

:

v. :

:

PETER J. O'BRIEN, et al., :

:

Defendants :

ORDER

September 23, 2005

THE BACKGROUND OF THIS ORDER IS AS FOLLOWS:

Plaintiff, Justin Corliss (“Plaintiff” or “Corliss”), an inmate at the State

Correctional Institution, in Somerset, Pennsylvania, filed this civil rights action pursuant

to 42 U.S.C. § 1983. Named as Defendants in the complaint are Monroe County Public

Defenders Brian Germano and Peter Quigley; Monroe County Judges, Peter O’Brien,

Ronald Vican and Carbon County Judge John P. Lavelle. 

Corliss complains that “as a direct and proximate result of the Defendants'

conspiratorial fraud and retaliatory conduct Plaintiff's access to the courts in Monroe

County has been irreparably and illegally obstructed, impeded and denied resulting in

legitimate causes of actions being denied, dismissed, impermissibly delayed, hindered

and obfuscated.” (Rec. Doc. 1, ¶ 10). As a result, he claims that he has “forever been

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denied fair adjudication of the issues in his criminal case.” (Rec. Doc. 1, ¶ 23).

Specifically, Plaintiff states that Defendants Germano and Quigley, “while being put on

notice of their transgressions, ineffectiveness and negligence, have refused and failed to

alert any court of the errors committed while they represented Plaintiff that entitled

Plaintiff to relief as a matter of law.” (Rec. Doc. 1, ¶ 26). With respect to Defendants

O'Brien, Vican and Lavelle, Plaintiff states that these Defendants “have penned 'opinions'

and orders in Plaintiff's matters at law that came before them that have no basis in law or

fact, and were designed to obfuscate facts and to mislead judges in the appellate courts,

and did, with the objective of obstructing Plaintiff's access to the courts.” (Rec. Doc. 1,

¶ 27). 

By Order dated April 29, 2005, Plaintiff's action was dismissed as legally frivolous

pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 1915A. (Rec. Doc. 9). Presently pending before the Court is

Petitioner's Motion for Reconsideration of this Court's April 29, 2005 Order. (Rec. Doc.

10). For the reasons set forth below, the Motion will be denied. 

Discussion

A motion for reconsideration is a device of limited utility. It may be used only to

seek remediation for manifest errors of law or fact or to present newly discovered

evidence which, if discovered previously, might have affected the court's decision.

Harsco Corp. v. Zlotnicki, 779 F.2d 906 (3d Cir. 1985), cert. denied, 476 U.S. 1171

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(1986); Massachusetts Mutual Life Insurance Co. v. Maitland, Civil No. 87-0827 (M.D.

Pa. March 1, 1989) (Rambo, J.). Accordingly, a party seeking reconsideration must

demonstrate at least one of the following grounds prior to the court altering, or amending,

a standing judgment: (1) an intervening change in the controlling law; (2) the availability

of new evidence that was not available when the court granted the motion; or (3) the need

to correct a clear error of law or fact or to prevent manifest injustice. Max's Seafood Café

v. Quineros, 176 F.3d 669, 677 (3d Cir. 1999)(citing North River Ins. Co. v. CIGNA

Reinsurance Co., 52 F.3d 1194, 1218 (3d Cir. 1995)). A motion for reconsideration is

appropriate in instances where the court has “...misunderstood a party, or has made a

decision outside the adversarial issues presented to the Court by the parties, or has made

an error not of reasoning, but of apprehension.” See Rohrbach v. AT & T Nassau Metals

Corp., 902 F. Supp. 523, 527 (M.D. Pa. 1995), vacated in part on other grounds on

reconsideration, 915 F. Supp. 712 (M.D. Pa. 1996), (quoting Above the Belt, Inc. v. Mel

Bohannan Roofing, Inc., 99 F.R.D. 99, 101 (E.D. Va. 1983)). A motion for

reconsideration may not be used as a means to reargue unsuccessful theories, or argue

new facts or issues that were not presented to the court in the context of the matter

previously decided. Drysdale v. Woerth, 153 F. Supp. 2d 678, 682 (E.D. Pa. 2001).

“Because federal courts have a strong interest in the finality of judgments, motions for

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1. The United States Supreme Court in Heck, announced that "in order to recover damages for

allegedly unconstitutional conviction or imprisonment, or for other harm caused by acts whose

unlawfulness would render a conviction or sentence invalid, a § 1983 plaintiff must prove that the

conviction or sentence has been reversed on direct appeal, expunged by executive order, declared

invalid by a state tribunal authorized to make such determination or called into question by a federal

court's issuance of a writ of habeas corpus." Heck, 512 U.S. at 477-78.

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reconsideration should be granted sparingly.” Continental Casualty Co. v. Diversified

Indus. Inc., 884 F.Supp. 937, 943 (E.D. Pa. 1995). 

Upon review of the Court's Order denying the Petition, the following was

concluded:

The court therefore rejects Corliss’ factual contentions as clearly baseless.

See Young v. Kann, 926 F.2d 1396, 1405 n. 16 (3d Cir. 1991) (conspiracy

claims which are based solely upon pro se plaintiff's subjective suspicions

and unsupported speculation are properly dismissed). The allegations in the

complaint are vague and conclusory and do not present a cognizable § 1983

conspiracy claim. . . . Consequently, any claims that Plaintiff may be

attempting to raise against the judges named as Defendants in this action,

would be based on actions taken by those Defendants in their exercise of

official duties, they are entitled to absolute immunity from monetary

damages. . . Accordingly, since the allegations against Attorneys Germano

and Quigley are premised on actions they took while serving as Plaintiff's

defense counsel, they are entitled to an entry of dismissal. . .Finally, it is

clear that Corliss cannot obtain relief under § 1983 on the grounds asserted

in this case absent a successful challenge to the underlying conviction. Heck

v. Humphrey, 512 U.S. 477 (1994).1 Although it appears that Corliss is

claiming that the deliberate mishandling of his criminal case deprived him

of a fair and adequate trial, there is no indication that he has successfully

challenged his conviction or sentence in state court.

Rec. Doc. 9, at 3-5. 

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Corliss' Motion for Reconsideration fails to demonstrate that there has been an

intervening change in the law, that there is newly discovered evidence, or that there has

been a clear error of law or manifest injustice committed. To the extent that Corliss raises

the argument that he is not seeking damages from the Judges named as Defendants in this

action, but is, instead, relying on the United States Supreme Court's decision in Pulliam

v. Allen, 466 U.S. 522 (1984), for the proposition that judicial immunity is not a bar to

injunctive relief sought against a judicial officer (doc. 10), his claim is meritless. Corliss’

request for injunctive relief against the named Judges is barred by the clear terms of §

1983, as amended by the Federal Courts Improvement Act of 1996 (“FCIA”). 

The FCIA amended 42 U.S.C. § 1983 to extend the reach of judicial immunity to

injunctive relief as well as to damages, and to preclude costs and attorney's fees in suits

against the judiciary. Bolin v. Story, 225 F.3d 1234, 1242 (11th Cir. 2000); Kampfer v.

Scullin, 989 F. Supp. 194, 201 (N.D. N.Y. 1997). The clear purpose of the FCIA was to

protect judges from injunctive suits when acting in their adjudicatory capacities.

The legislative history of FCIA indicates that Section 309 was solely intended to

correct the logical flaw of Pulliam v. Allen, 466 U.S. 522 (1984), by extending the reach

of judicial immunity to awards of attorney's fees and costs, as well as to demands for

injunctive relief. 466 U.S. 522 (1984). The FCIA merely returned the law related to

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2. The Senate Judiciary Committee recommended the applicable section (Section 311 of the

Senate Bill, now codified as Section 309) of the Federal Courts Improvement Act. S. 1887, 104th

Cong. (1996). The Committee report found the following:

This section [309] restores the doctrine of judicial immunity to the status it occupied

prior to the Supreme Court's decision in Pulliam v. Allen, 466 U.S. 522 (1984). . .

In Pulliam, the Supreme Court broke with 400 years of common-law tradition and

weakened judicial immunity protections. The case concerned a State magistrate who

jailed an individual for failing to post bond for an offense which could be punished

only by a fine and not incarceration. The defendant filed an action under 42 U.S.C.

1983, obtaining both an injunction against the magistrates' practice of requiring bonds

for nonincarcerable offenses, and an award of costs, including attorney's fees. The

Supreme Court affirmed, expressly holding that judicial immunity is not a bar to

injunctive relief in section 1983 actions against a State judge acting in a judicial

capacity, or to the award of attorneys' fees under the Civil Rights Attorneys Fees

Award Act, 42 U.S.C. 1988. Those statutes are now amended to preclude awards of

costs and attorneys fees against judges for acts taken in their judicial capacity, and to

bar injunctive relief unless declaratory relief is inadequate. 

S. REP. No. 104-366, at 36-7, (1996), reprinted in 1996 U.S.C.C.A.N. 4202, 4216-17. 

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judicial immunity to the same place it had been prior to the Supreme Court's decision in

Pulliam.

2

The FCIA applies to bar injunctive relief in this case. The Judges named in the

instant action were acting solely in their adjudicatory capacity. Thus, any injunctive

relief would directly relate to the Judges' adjudicatory role. Therefore, judicial immunity

applies and injunctive relief is barred under the FCIA. 

Thus, the Court finds that its Order of April 29, 2005, is not troubled by manifest

errors of law or fact and Corliss has not presented anything new, which if previously

presented, might have affected our decision. Consequently, the motion for

reconsideration will be denied.

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NOW, THEREFORE, IT IS ORDERED THAT:

1. Plaintiff's Motion for Reconsideration (doc. 10) is DENIED.

s/ John E. Jones III

JOHN E. JONES III

United States District Judge

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