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Should Chemo Be Enough To Earn A Filing Extension? It Wasn't In This Court!

Cancer can't overcome a federal judge.

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In a world where lawyers routinely ask for and receive stays to watch football games, you’d think that “having cancer” might be a good enough excuse to secure a one-week stay. But for Judge Ursula Ungaro of the Southern District of Florida, chemotherapy didn’t reach the threshold for an extra week.

Back in November, defendant Suzannah L. Richards filed a motion in Ramjattan v. New York Life seeking an eight-day extension to respond to the complaint. According to Richards, her counsel was recently diagnosed with Non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma and would undergo chemo that week and needed the extra time to get a response together. It seems like, in the grand scheme of things, a de minimis delay for what one would hope constitutes good cause.

But Judge Ungaro shot down the request with extreme prejudice, which in Florida is something of a way of life. It’s an unfortunate stance for Judge Ungaro, who has actually been one of our favorite judges around here of late. In addition to partying for the Constitution, it was Judge Ungaro who struck a blow for freedom of the press when she ruled that BuzzFeed had not committed defamation when it printed the Steele dossier in full.

How could anyone toss a request for an “I’m potentially dying” stay? Well, according to the order there was one extenuating circumstance that apparently stuck in the judge’s craw:

In support of its motion, Richards states that it only retained its counsel on November 12, 2018 and its attorney was recently diagnosed with Non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma and he is undergoing chemotherapy this week. D.E. 17. This is not good cause for the extension requested. It is Richards’ responsibility to promptly hire counsel to represent her upon being served with summons and the complaint, such that she is able to comply with the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, rather than wait until two days before her response was due to obtain counsel. Moreover, Richards moved for an extension on the day her response was due.

So there’s the rub! She asked for the extension the day the response was due having only retained counsel the day before (the blockquote says two days, but the filing suggests it was the day before). Nothing peeves a judge more than the presumption and arrogance it takes to ask for an extension right when the motion is due. Basically, it tells the judge you see them as a rubberstamp and that your lack of respect is so pronounced that you don’t even have a back-up plan.

Still, the judiciary writ large needs to respect that regular folks don’t necessarily have a stable of lawyers saved in their phone. It might well take a civilian three weeks to come to grips with the fact that they’re being sued and find a lawyer that they’re comfortable with representing them. We talk about the justice system’s blinders when it comes to regular people in the context of pro se matters a lot, but it’s also a phenomenon for folks hiring outside counsel. While hiring an attorney the day before the due date is perhaps unjustifiably extreme, had Richards moved for an extension the week prior, would Judge Ungaro have awarded the stay? One would hope so, but the order’s emphasis on Richards having the responsibility to “promptly” hire counsel makes one skeptical.

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HeadshotJoe Patrice is a senior editor at Above the Law and co-host of Thinking Like A Lawyer. Feel free to email any tips, questions, or comments. Follow him on Twitter if you’re interested in law, politics, and a healthy dose of college sports news. Joe also serves as a Managing Director at RPN Executive Search.

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