Opinion ID: 557202
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Review of the August 24 Order

Text: 30 An appeal from an order denying a Rule 60(b) motion brings up for review only the denial of the motion and not the merits of the underlying judgment for errors that could have been asserted on direct appeal. See Browder v. Director, Department of Corrections of Illinois, 434 U.S. 257, 263 n. 7, 98 S.Ct. 556, 560 n. 7, 54 L.Ed.2d 521 (1978); Sampson v. Radio Corporation of America, 434 F.2d 315, 317 (2d Cir.1970); 7 Moore's Federal Practice p 60.30, at 60-344 to 60-345 (2d ed. 1990). Accordingly, only the August 24 order, and not the April 20 judgment, is directly before us. The standard for review of the denial of a Rule 60(b) motion is abuse of discretion. See Browder v. Director, Department of Corrections of Illinois, 434 U.S. at 263 n. 7, 98 S.Ct. at 560, n. 7; Sampson v. Radio Corporation of America, 434 F.2d at 317; 7 Moore's Federal Practice p 60.30, at 60-345 n. 6. A confluence of factors leads us to the conclusion that this standard is met here. 31 First, it is noteworthy that to the extent that the court dismissed the complaint under Rule 56, its ruling was inappropriate. In ruling on a motion for summary judgment, the court was required to draw all permissible inferences in favor of Branum as the nonmoving party. See, e.g., Anderson v. Liberty Lobby, Inc., 477 U.S. 242, 106 S.Ct. 2505, 91 L.Ed.2d 202 (1986). Plainly it did not do so. Rather, the court inferred from exhibits 8 and 9 to the complaint that Branum had in fact been afforded whatever hearing due process required. The entire thrust of those two exhibits, however, whose authors were presumably objective members of the mathematics faculty, was that the scheduled hearing could not be a fair one because the immediate professional prospects of at least half of the committee members were dependent on persons against whom Branum's grievance was filed. In order to conclude from these documents that there was no dispute as to the university's having provided Branum with a proper hearing, the court could only have drawn inferences against Branum, not in his favor. 32 Second, to the extent that the court dismissed the complaint pursuant to Rule 12(b)(6), we are troubled by the fact that the dismissal was with prejudice. Though we would agree that it was proper to require Branum (a) to comply with Fed.R.Civ.P. 8(a), which requires that a complaint set forth a plain and concise statement of the plaintiff's claim, and (b) to be more specific as to the conduct with which each defendant was charged, in order to give the defendants notice sufficient to enable them to answer and prepare for trial, such a dismissal ordinarily should be accompanied by leave to file an amended complaint. See, e.g., Salahuddin v. Cuomo, 861 F.2d 40, 42 (2d Cir.1988). Further, in ruling on the Rule 12(b)(6) motion, the court was required to accept the material facts alleged in the complaint as true, see, e.g., Cooper v. Pate, 378 U.S. 546, 84 S.Ct. 1733, 12 L.Ed.2d 1030 (1964) (per curiam); Dwyer v. Regan, 777 F.2d 825 (2d Cir.1985), modified on other grounds, 793 F.2d 457 (2d Cir.1986), and not to dismiss unless it appears beyond doubt that the plaintiff can prove no set of facts in support of his claim which would entitle him to relief, Conley v. Gibson, 355 U.S. 41, 45-46, 78 S.Ct. 99, 102, 2 L.Ed.2d 80 (1957). The latter principle is to be applied with particular strictness when the plaintiff complains of a civil rights violation, see, e.g., Dwyer v. Regan, 777 F.2d at 829; Owens v. Haas, 601 F.2d 1242, 1247 (2d Cir.), cert. denied, 444 U.S. 980, 100 S.Ct. 483, 62 L.Ed.2d 407 (1979); Escalera v. New York City Housing Authority, 425 F.2d 853, 857 (2d Cir.), cert. denied, 400 U.S. 853, 91 S.Ct. 54, 27 L.Ed.2d 91 (1970), or where the plaintiff is appearing pro se, see Haines v. Kerner, 404 U.S. 519, 520-21, 92 S.Ct. 594, 595-96, 30 L.Ed.2d 652 (1972). A pro se complaint is to be read liberally. Id. Certainly the court should not dismiss without granting leave to amend at least once when a liberal reading of the complaint gives any indication that a valid claim might be stated. See Fed.R.Civ.P. 15(a) (leave to amend shall be freely given when justice so requires); 3 Moore's Federal Practice p 15.08, at 15-65 (2d ed. 1990); Foman v. Davis, 371 U.S. 178, 182, 83 S.Ct. 227, 230, 9 L.Ed.2d 222 (1962) (generally, permission to amend should be freely granted). 33 Although the district court stated in its August 24 order denying reconsideration that in construing the complaint it had given Branum every benefit of the doubt, such treatment is nowhere evident. For example, as discussed above, the court treated Branum's due process claim as protesting only the denial of a hearing, not the denial of an unbiased hearing. Further, in stating that Branum had no property interest in continuing his education, the court did not mention New York law's recognition of an 'implied contract' between [a college or university] and its students, requiring the academic institution [to] act in good faith in its dealing with its students. Olsson v. Board of Higher Education, 49 N.Y.2d 408, 414, 426 N.Y.S.2d 248, 251, 402 N.E.2d 1150, 1153 (1980). Such an implied contract, recognized under state law, provides the basis for a property interest that would be entitled to constitutional protection. See Perry v. Sindermann, 408 U.S. 593, 601-03, 92 S.Ct. 2694, 2699-700, 33 L.Ed.2d 570 (1972). Though ordinarily the courts may not second-guess an educational institution's academic judgments, see Regents of University of Michigan v. Ewing, 474 U.S. 214, 225-28, 106 S.Ct. 507, 513-15, 88 L.Ed.2d 523 (1985), a Rule 12(b)(6) dismissal of a student's claim is improper where the contention is that the institution's action was motivated by bad faith or ill will unrelated to academic performance, see Clements v. County of Nassau, 835 F.2d 1000, 1004 (2d Cir.1987). The district court appears to have ignored the complaint's assertion that defendants revived for Branum, and only Branum, a precondition abandoned a decade earlier as unsound, thereby permitting an inference of some nonacademic motivation. See, e.g., Regents of University of Michigan v. Ewing, 474 U.S. at 225, 106 S.Ct. at 513 (substantial departure from accepted academic norms may demonstrate that the person or committee responsible did not actually exercise professional judgment). 34 Finally, there is no mention by the court, either in the April 20 transcript or in its two written orders, of Branum's claim of racial discrimination except to characterize it in the April 20 order as a passing comment. Yet the GSO memorandum annexed to the complaint stated that GSO had received reports that the unfavorable treatment of Branum was racially motivated; the complaint itself alleged that Branum had been unable to secure teaching and doctoral candidacy privileges commonly enjoyed by other graduate students because of his race; and the complaint stated that a Caucasian student had been treated more favorably with respect to securing a prompt and unbiased grievance proceeding. 35 Thus, the complaint plainly contained the seeds of several viable claims that were not discussed by the court. Though these flaws in the court's original judgment dismissing the complaint with prejudice are not directly before us on this appeal from the denial of the Rule 60(b) motion, they become material in light of the unusual procedural context in which the judgment was entered. 36 It was of course within the court's discretion to change the date of the hearing; but it was incumbent on the court to ensure that no party would be unduly prejudiced by that change. Here, the court sent Branum notice by certified mail on April 17, requesting a return receipt. We are at a loss to understand its reasoning on April 20 that the fact that nothing ha[d] come back ... indicat[ed] that the letter was properly delivered to the plaintiff. It was hardly likely that the letter itself, even if ultimately undeliverable, would have been returned to the court in such a short time; and since the return receipt had not come back, there was no reason to infer that the notice had in fact been delivered. As it later transpired, delivery had not yet in fact been effected. In any event, we have serious doubts about the wisdom of proceeding with a hearing whose date has been advanced on extremely short notice, where that notice was by mail, and the court has not received a return receipt or any other indication that the pro se litigant has received the notice. 37 Further, since the court decided to proceed on April 20 in the absence of an indication that Branum had received notice of the change in date, it should have taken extra precautions to avoid prejudice to Branum from the change in date. It would have been prudent, for example, to take the matter on submission on April 20 (as defendants suggested) and to hold the decision in abeyance until April 27, which apparently had been not only the date for the hearing but also the date by which Branum was to submit any opposition to the motion. Alternatively, if the court felt it must announce its decision immediately, it could simply have delayed entry of the final judgment until the previously scheduled date had arrived. We note in passing that if the court had refrained from entering final judgment until April 27, Branum's May 8 motion for reconsideration would easily have been timely as a motion under Rule 59(e), see Fed.R.Civ.P. 6(a) (when the period of time prescribed or allowed by the federal rules or local court rules is less than 11 days, intermediate Saturdays and Sundays are excluded in the computation), and would have tolled the time for the filing of the notice of appeal from the judgment, thereby permitting us to review the merits of the court's dismissal of the complaint. 38 In ruling on the motion to vacate the judgment, the district court did not give any consideration to the prejudicial impact on Branum of its advancement of the hearing date and its swift entry of order and judgment. Nor did it give adequate consideration to the fact that Branum had obtained counsel to appear on his behalf on April 27. We are confident that had Branum been represented by counsel at whatever hearing the court held, counsel would have been able (a) to persuade the court that summary judgment was entirely inappropriate, and (b) to bring to the court's attention the several potentially viable claims in the complaint that the court appears to have overlooked, and to persuade the court to grant permission to amend the complaint. Thus, we think it plain that Branum was prejudiced by the court's advancement of the date for the hearing and its failure to take available precautions to avoid that prejudice. 39 In light of the procedures leading to the entry of the judgment, the prejudice to Branum resulting from those procedures, and the district court's failure to give any consideration to that prejudice in connection with the Rule 60(b) motion, we conclude that the court's failure to grant Branum relief from the judgment was an abuse of discretion.