Villar v. City of N.Y.

540 F.Supp.3d 437

Maria VILLAR, Plaintiff,

v.CITY OF NEW YORK, et al., Defendants.

09-cv-7400 (JSR) (GWG)

United States District Court, S.D. New York.

Signed May 21, 2021

Linda M. Cronin, Dominick Peter Revellino, Rocco G. Avallone, Cronin & Byczek, LLP, Susan Penny Bernstein, Law Office of Jeffrey L. Goldberg, P.C., Lake Success, NY, for Plaintiff.

Maria Villar, Richmond Hills, NY, Pro Se.

Aliza Jordana Balog, Jeremy Laurence Jorgensen, Jessica Giambrone, Mark Andrew Osmond, William Andrew Grey, Stephen Rickershauser, Jack Kevin Shaffer, NYC Law Department, Office of the Corporation Counsel, New York, NY, for City of New York.

Aliza Jordana Balog, Jeremy Laurence Jorgensen, Jessica Giambrone, Mark Andrew Osmond, NYC Law Department, Office of the Corporation Counsel, New York, NY, for New York City Police Department, Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly, Captain Timothy Kerr, Lieutenant John P. McGovern, Lieutenant Joseph Ferrara, Sergeant Brian McNulty, Sergeant Kesha Johnson, Police Officer Kelvin McKoy.

Aliza Jordana Balog, Jeremy Laurence Jorgensen, Jessica Giambrone, Mark Andrew Osmond, William Andrew Grey, Jack Kevin Shaffer, NYC Law Department, Office of the Corporation Counsel, New York, NY, for Deputy Inspector Michael Yanosik.

Aliza Jordana Balog, Jeremy Laurence Jorgensen, Mark Andrew Osmond, NYC Law Department, Office of the Corporation Counsel, New York, NY, for Deputy Commissioner Neldra Zeigler, Lieutenant Fuat Sarayli, Detective Luis Mienert.

John Stephen Schowengerdt, Phyllis Gail Calistro, NYC Law Department, Office of the Corporation Counsel, Theresa Jeanine D'Andrea, Morrison Cohen LLP, New York, NY, for Defendants.

MEMORANDUM ORDER

JED S. RAKOFF, U.S.D.J.

Yesterday, Susanne Toes of the New York Legal Assistance Group ("NYLAG") Clinic for Pro Se Litigants filed a Notice of Limited Scope Appearance of Pro Bono Counsel on behalf of pro se plaintiff Maria Villar.

Traditionally, federal courts have required that when an attorney appears on behalf of a client, that attorney must represent the client in all respects until judgment, unless relieved by the Court. The Local Rules in this District continue to embrace this approach. S.D.N.Y. Local Civ. R. 1.4 ("An attorney who has appeared as attorney of record for a party may be relieved or displaced only by order of the Court and may not withdraw from a case without leave of the Court granted by order. Such an order may be granted only upon a showing by affidavit or otherwise of satisfactory reasons for withdrawal or displacement and the posture of the case, including its position, if any, on the calendar, and whether or not the attorney is asserting a retaining or charging lien. All applications to withdraw must be served upon the client and (unless excused by the Court) upon all other parties."); see also S.D.N.Y. Local Crim. R. 1.2 ("Once a notice of appearance has been filed, the attorney may not withdraw except upon prior order of the Court pursuant to Local Civil Rule 1.4.").

In criminal cases, counsel is, of course, constitutionally guaranteed, and limited-scope appearances are usually ill-advised.¹ In civil cases, however, some commentators have suggested that limited-scope representation may help mitigate access-to-justice problems. See, e.g., A.B.A. Standing Comm. on the Delivery of Legal Servs., An Analysis of Rules that Enable Lawyers to Serve Self-Represented Litigants 2-3 ("With the input of lawyers, self-represented litigants can benefit from getting legal advice specific to their factual issues.... Additionally, some self-represented litigants can optimize their outcomes if they have a lawyer advocate their interests before the tribunal. This may not be necessary for the entire litigation, but only for a limited purpose. The added input from lawyers not only assists the litigants, but the courts, as well. The better the litigant is prepared, the more efficiently the court operates. While judges would no doubt prefer fully represented litigants, the choice in most venues is a self-represented litigant who is well prepared or one who is not."); Alicia M. Farley, An Important Piece of the Bundle: How Limited Appearances Can Provide an Ethically Sound Way To Increase Access to Justice for Pro Se Litigants, 20 Geo. J. Legal Ethics 563, 582-83 (2007) (describing the use of limited-scope representation in Washington, D.C. landlord-tenant disputes); James G. Mandilk, Attorney for the Day: Measuring the Efficacy of In-Court Limited Scope Representation, 127 Yale L.J. 1828 (2018) (based on review of every New Haven foreclosure case during 16-month period, finding that homeowners represented by limited-scope counsel on a single day had significantly better outcomes, not only on the counseled motion(s) occurring that day but also on their case as a whole, with a statistically significant increase in the likelihood that they kept their homes).

Recognizing the potential benefits of limited-scope representation for clients and for the courts, the American Bar Association and the authors of many states’ ethical rules have endorsed such arrangements, in appropriate circumstances. See, e.g., A.B.A. Model Rules of Prof'l Conduct, R. 1.2(c) ("A lawyer may limit the scope of the representation if the limitation is reasonable under the circumstances and the client gives informed consent."); N.Y. Rules of Prof'l Conduct, R. 1.2(c) ("A lawyer may limit the scope of the representation if the limitation is reasonable under the circumstances, the client gives informed consent and where necessary notice is provided to the tribunal and/or opposing counsel."). Court systems have correspondingly begun to amend their policies and procedures. E.g., W.D.N.Y. Local Civ. R. 83.8(A)(1) (establishing a volunteer panel of pro bono attorneys and providing that "[t]he presiding Judge may appoint counsel for a specific limited purpose, such as for participating in mediation pursuant to the Court's Alternative Dispute Resolution Plan, amending pleadings, conducting discovery, drafting or responding to motions, or for any other purpose the presiding Judge determines will serve the interests of justice"); Administrative Order 285/16 (N.Y. Dec. 16, 2016) ("I declare it the policy of the Unified Court System [of the State of New York] to support and encourage the practice of limited scope legal assistance in appropriate cases, and to encourage judges and justices to permit attorneys to appear for limited purposes in civil cases under certain] circumstances[.]").

Indeed, while this...