United States First Circuit

Dismissal of plaintiffs' civil rights action as a sanction for violations of scheduling deadlines is reversed and remanded where the court abused its discretion in dismissing the action since: 1) there was no pattern of the plaintiffs repeatedly flouting court orders; 2) the delay was not a case of extreme misconduct warranting dismissal; 3) the court did not consider whether a sanction as severe as dismissal with prejudice was needed or whether other sanctions might have sufficed; 4) defendants did not suffer prejudice; and 5) the court did not wait for the expiration of the deadline for plaintiffs to file an objection to the motion for sanctions before dismissing the case.

Appellate Information

• Decided 11/03/2006
• Published 11/03/2006

Judges

• LYNCH, Circuit Judge., Before BOUDIN, Chief Judge, STAHL, Senior Circuit Judge, and LYNCH, Circuit Judge.

Court

• United States First Circuit

Counsel

• For Appellant:
  
• Carlos Rodríguez-García and Maza & Green on brief for appellants.


• For Appellees:
  
• Susana I. Peñagarcíano-Brown, Assistant Solicitor General, Salvador J. Antonetti-Stutts, Solicitor General, Mariana Negrón-Vargas, Deputy Solicitor General, and Maite D. Oronoz-Rodríguez, Deputy Solicitor General, on brief for appellees Commonwealth of Puerto Rico and the Department of Education of the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico.