Court will not act on Shoiter suit vs DPS

The U.S. District Court for NMI has vacated all pending proceedings in the lawsuit filed by a Department of Corrections inmate who is suing the department for allegedly denying him adequate medical care.

According to Chief Judge Ramona V. Manglona, she has vacated all pending proceedings in the case of Price Shoiter.

Manglona stated in her order that she has reconsidered her disposition from the Dec. 2, status conference where she ordered the parties to return for a settlement conference on Jan. 6, 2022, and ordered that the parties submit a proposed scheduling order.

Instead, the court now finds that the appropriate procedural mechanism is to vacate the settlement conference and issue an order requiring that the parties submit a new scheduling order until either party files a motion to either enforce the settlement or reopen proceedings.

“The court will take no further action in this closed matter until a party formally submits a motion to enforce the settlement agreement (which would be an independent claim for specific performance) or a motion to reopen the matter,” she said.

The matter recently came before the court at the request of Shoiter to set a status conference regarding the intent of the defendants to proceed with the settlement agreement in this matter.

The settlement agreement was entered into in February 2021 and resolved Shoiter’s Section 1983 claims and included a conditional clemency provision. However, conditional clemency has not been granted and no payment had been made to date.

For those reasons, the court vacated all pending dates and deadlines and will take no further action until a formal motion is submitted by a party or jointly by the parties.

According to court documents, Shoiter was serving a 10-year prison term for sexually abusing a 7-year-old girl when he sued Corrections officials for breaching a previous settlement agreement. He alleged that Corrections officials had continued to deny him adequate medical care.

Shoiter sought reparations for general, consequential, compensatory, and punitive damages; and a declaration that the defendants’ actions violated his constitutional rights.

On Feb. 11, 2021, after receiving a notice of an agreement of dismissal from the parties, Manglona dismissed Shoiter’s complaint with prejudice.