Opinion ID: 762576
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Submission of the Filing Fee or IFP Application

Text: 14 Since we have decided that the Houston mailbox rule applies to habeas corpus petitions for statute of limitations purposes, we must decide whether Jones' petition should still be denied as untimely because it was not accompanied by either the required filing fee or an application to proceed IFP before the statute of limitations had expired. 15 Several courts have been confronted with this issue. Unlike the near-unanimous treatment of the mailbox rule for habeas cases, however, the authority is split on whether the petition must be accompanied by either the filing fee or an IFP application. In fact, in this circuit, district courts are split on the issue. We find Petitioner's argument more persuasive and hold that, for statute of limitations purposes, an inmate's petition for habeas relief need not be accompanied by the required filing fee or IFP application, so long as one or the other is sent within a reasonable time after the petition and there is no evidence of bad faith on Petitioner's part. 16 According to Rule 3(a) Governing § 2254 Cases, a petition for habeas relief shall ... be accompanied by the filing fee prescribed by law unless the petitioner applies for and is given leave to prosecute the petition in forma pauperis. If the petitioner desires to prosecute the petition in forma pauperis, he shall file the affidavit required by 28 U.S.C. § 1915. Rule 3(a) Governing § 2254 Cases. Among the cases analyzing whether the filing fee or IFP application must accompany the habeas petition is United States ex rel. Barnes v. Gilmore, 987 F.Supp. 677 (N.D.Ill.1997). In that case, the district court ruled that for statute of limitations purposes, the five dollar filing fee had to be included with the prisoner's petition for habeas corpus. Id. at 682. There, the petitioner applied to proceed IFP with his habeas petition, but IFP status was denied because the petitioner had adequate funds to pay the modest filing fee. Id. Thus, the court reasoned that his IFP application could not have been filed in good faith because of the amount of money the prisoner had in his account, and especially in light of the fact that he did not pay the filing fee until several months after he filed his petition. Id. Similarly, in United States ex rel. Palaggi v. Page, No. 97 C 2994, 1998 WL 397837 (N.D.Ill. July 10, 1998), the court held that a petition for habeas relief, along with either the filing fee or IFP application, must be submitted to the prison officials before the statute of limitations runs in order to be timely. Id. at  2, n. 3. 17 Some district courts in this circuit have held that the statute of limitations should be tolled during the pendency of IFP status. See United States ex rel. Cardenas v. DeTella, No. 97 C 3005, 1998 WL 708858 (N.D.Ill. Sept. 24, 1998); Bailey v. Gilmore, 5 F.Supp.2d 587 (N.D.Ill.1998). Again, there is an apparent disparity between the Rules and the case law; if an IFP application is denied, then the petitioner must pay a filing fee. According to the Rules, the petition will not be filed until the fee is paid. As stated above, since an inmate cannot foresee how or when a court will rule on an IFP application, the reasonable interpretation is to allow a tolling in the statute of limitations while the IFP application is pending. In Cardenas and Bailey, supra, both inmates submitted their IFP applications with their petitions for habeas relief, thus the petitions were deemed timely because they were given to prison officials before the statute of limitations had run, even though the filing fees were not paid until later. 18 At least two district courts have decided that the filing fee or IFP application need not accompany the petition for habeas corpus in order for the petition to be timely for statute of limitations purposes. In United States ex rel. Williams v. DeTella, 37 F.Supp.2d 1048 (N.D.Ill.1998), the district court referred to the fee status as collateral housekeeping, and the real claim for relief is the actual petition. Id. at 1049. The court stated that the AEDPA does not define what an application is and the petition is complete without either the filing fee or the IFP application, so long as they are submitted within a reasonable time after the petition. Id. In Washington, supra, the district court went so far as to say that the Houston mailbox rule supplants Rule 3(b) in governing the substantive filing date of a habeas petition, and it is timely when given to the prison officials whether or not it is submitted with the filing fee or IFP application. Washington, 1998 WL 171827 at  3. 2 19 In this case, we agree with the logic of the latter two district court decisions. So long as an inmate gets the habeas petition to the prison officials within the prescribed time limit, his petition will be deemed timely for statute of limitations purposes regardless of whether it is accompanied by the five dollar filing fee or IFP application. This holding is also consistent with the Rules Governing Habeas Cases in that Rule 2(c) states that the petition shall be in substantially the form annexed to these rules. Rule 2(c) Governing § 2254 Cases. However, as we previously noted, these rules merely govern the filing requirements for procedural purposes rather than substantive purposes for statute of limitations concerns. Moreover, a district court should regard as 'filed' a complaint which arrives in the custody of the clerk within the statutory period but fails to conform with formal requirements in local rules. Gilardi v. Schroeder, 833 F.2d 1226, 1233 (7th Cir.1987) (quoting Loya v. Desert Sands Unified School Dist., 721 F.2d 279, 281 (9th Cir.1983)). 20 This ruling is also consistent with other civil litigation proceedings wherein an untimely submission of a filing fee does not time-bar a cause of action that has otherwise been timely filed. See Gould v. Members of the N.J. Division of Water Policy and Supply, 555 F.2d 340 (3rd Cir.1977) (failure to pay the filing fee on time cannot render an otherwise timely notice of appeal untimely); Johnson v. Brown, 803 F.Supp. 1414 (N.D.Ind.1992) (for Title VII cases, complaint is deemed filed when it is in the clerk's possession, regardless of untimely payment of filing fee); Rodgers on Behalf of Jones v. Bowen, 790 F.2d 1550 (11th Cir.1986) (case seeking Social Security benefits deemed filed upon actual or constructive possession of complaint by the clerk, regardless of untimely payment of filing fee). 21 Although Jones did not submit his application to proceed IFP along with his habeas petition, he sent his application, along with his filing fee, immediately after receiving notification from the clerk to do such. The court then rejected Jones' IFP application and ordered him to pay the five dollar filing fee. As a result, the court did not deem his petition filed until May 7, 1997, which is the day the clerk received the filing fee. There is no evidence that Jones acted in bad faith in his failure to provide either his IFP application or the five dollar filing fee with the original petition. In essence, the result is what would have occurred if Jones had submitted his IFP application with his original petition, waited for the negative ruling on the application, and then sent his filing fee. There is no negative impact from Jones' failure to submit the documents in question with his habeas petition. While we understand the government's position with respect to this issue, Jones' substantial compliance with the Rules satisfactorily meets the filing requirements for his pro se petition for habeas relief. Therefore, we find that, for statute of limitations purposes, Jones timely submitted his petition for habeas relief upon tendering it to prison officials for mailing.