UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT
NORTHERN DISTRICT OF ILLINOIS

CHAMBERS OF
MILTON I, SHADUR
SENIOR JUDGE

CHICAGO, ILLINOIS 60604

Ms. Dumas
January 7, 2005
Page Two

that will have been declared in defendants' submission as true
and (if those facts justify a decision in defendants! favor) may
enter summary judgment against you. In that event you will have

lost your case, and judgment will be entered in defendants'
favor.

That same result may follow if any matters that you do
submit are not legally sufficient to establish your claim against
defendants. Of course I am not ina position to indicate what is
necessary for that purpose. Instead I will simply evaluate any

submission that you choose to file on or before the February 18
deadline.

To assist judges in determining whether any factual disputes
exist and, if they do, whether such disputes are legally
significant, our District Court has adopted its own rules--LR
56.1 and 56.2, photocopies of which are also enclosed--to
supplement Rule 56. Defendants are expected to comply with LR
56.1(a) by providing their Statement of Uncontested Facts. As
part of any submission you choose to file, you will be expected
to comply with LR 56.1(b) (as you will note, that Rule
specifically provides that unless your own statement in response
shows that any part or parts of defendants' LR 56.1(a) statement
is or are disputed, the statement for the parts not identified by
you as in dispute] will be considered as having been admitted by

you).

Sincerely,
MIS: wb Milton I. Shadur
enclosure

cc: Robert BE. Shapiro, Esq.


UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT
NORTHERN DISTRICT OF ILLINOIS

CHAMBERS OF
MILTON |. SHADUR
SENIOR JUDGE

CHICAGO, ILLINOIS 60604

January 7, 2005

Ms. Betty J. Dumas
3620 South Calumet Avenue
Chicago IL 60653

Re: Dumas v. Dovenmuehle, et al.
No. 02 C 6271

Dear Ms. Dumas:

As you know, the lawsuit that you have brought against
Dovenmuehle Mortgage Inc. and William Mynatt, Jr. (“defendants”)
is pending before this Court. By order entered on January 4,
2005, I have extended to January 18 the date by which defendants
are to file their motion for summary judgment, together with
supporting papers, in accordance with Rule 56 of the Federal
Rules of Civil Procedure. At the same time, as contemplated by
Rule 56, I ordered that any responsive materials that you plan to
file must be submitted--mailed or delivered to me in my
chambers--in time to arrive here on or before February 18, 2005.
When I have reached my decision on the motion, my minute clerk
will advise both you and defense counsel to that effect.

Because of the importance and potentially final nature of a
summary judgment motion, this letter is intended to inform you
further of the consequences if you were to ignore the Court's
order, or if any materials that you do submit prove to be legally
insufficient. By their motion for summary judgment, defendants
will be asking to have the suit decided in their favor without a
full-scale trial, based on the evidence presented in the
documents that they attach to their motion. Unless you answer
the motion with your own affidavits or properly supported
documentary evidence or both, only defendants' evidence will be
before this Court. Thus your failure to respond in that way
would be the equivalent of your failing to present any evidence
in your favor at a trial.

Under Rule 56(e) of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, 4
copy of which is enclosed, you may not simply rest on any unsworn
documents that you may previously have filed in court. Such
documents are not a proper response to a motion for summary
judgment. Under the same Rule, if you do not submit affidavits
or documentary evidence by February 18, I may accept the facts


IN THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT
FOR THE NORTHERN DISTRICT OF ILLINOIS
EASTERN DIVISION

BETTY J. DUMAS

)
)
Plaintiff, )
)
Vv. ) No. 02 C 6271
)
DOVENMUEHLE MORTGAGE, INC., )
et. al., )
)
Defendants. )

MEMORANDUM ORDER

From time to time during the course of this litigation,
plaintiff Betty Dumas (*Dumas”) has regrettably sought to play
the race card in an inappropriate fashion (this Court is not of
course critical of Dumas’ basic need to claim, as the gravamen of
her action, that defendant Dovenmuehle Mortgage, Inc. and its
employees (collectively “Dovenmuehle,” treated for convenience as
a singular noun) discriminated against her because she is
African-American). Lest this characterization be deemed unfair,
it is only necessary to read the language that Dumas has employed
in Complaint 91 37-38 (in Dkt. No. 1) and in her numerous
racially slanted references in Dkt. Nos. 21, 26, 29 and 32.
Iindeed, Dumas herself inadvertently confirms that -- she has
employed the “race card” terminology in the course of disclaiming
it in Paragraph 8 of the filing that has occasioned this
memorandum order. In this instance that unfortunate effort makes

up the principal part of Dumas’ currently tendered “plaintiff


Motion To Enlarge Time in Which To File Response to Defendant’s
Motion for Summary Judgment,” which she has scheduled for
presentment on February 16.

After this action had been pending for something over two
years and discovery had been completed, Dovenmuehle filed its
properly supported Fed.R.Civ.P. (“Rule”) 56 motion for summary
judgment on January 18 of this year. This Court, in accordance
with its universal practice whenever pro se litigants must
address such a motion, sent Dumas a letter that carefully
explained the summary judgment procedure (Exhibit 1 to this
memorandum order), together with photocopies of Rule 56(e) and of
this District Court’s L.R. 56.1 and 56.2 implementing Rule 56,
and that granted Dumas until February 18 to respond. Now, just
before the due date of her response, Dumas has asked for another
60 days (until April 19) to do so.

This Court has reviewed the Dovenmuehle filing and finds it
difficult to understand why such an extended period should be
needed to respond to a motion that is based on numerous exhibits
that have been delivered to Dumas, importantly including the
transcript of her own videotaped deposition. It was for that
reason that this Court originally granted Dumas a month for her
response. But because Dumas’ failure to have done the necessary
work during that time frame would necessarily lead to her loss of

her case under L.R. 56.1, this Court grants her an additional 31


days -- until March 21, 2005 -- to comply with her obligations
under L.R. 56.1. This obviates the need for Dumas and
Dovenmuehle to appear at the scheduled presentment date of

February 16.

Milton I. Shadur
Senior United States District Judge

Dated: February 10, 2005

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