Goddard v. Sares-Regis Group, Inc., No. 25-cv-05882-EMC (Oct. 21, 2025)

Case details
Full caption
Thomas Joseph Goddard v. Sares-Regis Group, Inc., et al.
Country
United States
Jurisdiction
Federal
Decided
Oct. 21, 2025
Disposition
Motion Granted
THOMAS JOSEPH GODDARD, Plaintiff, v. SARES-REGIS..., Slip Copy (2025) © 2025 Thomson Reuters. No claim to original U.S. Government Works.12025 WL 2969295Only the Westlaw citation is currently available.United States District Court, N.D. California.THOMAS JOSEPH GODDARD, Plaintiff,v.SARES-REGIS GROUP, INC., et al., Defendants.Case No. 25-cv-05882-EMC (EMC)|Filed 10/21/2025ORDER GRANTING MOTIONTO DISMISS WITH PREJUDICEEDWARD M. CHEN United States District Judge*1 Before the Court is Defendants' Motion to Dismissthe First Amended Complaint. Dkt. No. 38. For thereasons discussed below, Defendants' Motion to Dismiss isGRANTED WITH PREJUDICE.I. FACTUAL BACKGROUNDPlaintiff currently resides at 1910 N. Main St, Unit627, Walnut Creek, CA 94596 in an apartment ownedby Defendant APARTMENTS CAPITAL LLC, A Dand managed by Defendant SARES REGIS GROUPRESIDENTIAL, INC. In early March of 2025, Plaintiffrequested extra time for his rental payment grace period as adisability accommodation. Dkt. No. 24-1 at 7. On March 13,Defendants granted this accommodation, allowing Plaintiff topay rent by the seventh of the month without being charged alate fee or pay-or-quit notice. Id. Defendants noted that if rentwas not paid by the seventh of the month, the late fee wouldbe applied and a 3-day notice served. Id. Shortly after beinggranted this accommodation, Plaintiff failed to pay rent withinthe extended grace period. Dkt. No. 24 at 3. After Plaintiffcontinued to fail to pay rent, Defendant served him with a pay-or-quit notice on July 10. Id. The same day, Plaintiff requesteda new accommodation: that Defendant reduce his monthlyrent from $2,850 to $400. Id. at 4. Defendant refused thisrequest and this lawsuit followed.II. PROCEDURAL BACKGROUNDOn July 14, Plaintiff filed the instant suit, seeking an exparte temporary restraining order against his eviction. Dkt.Nos. 1-2. After a hearing, the Court granted the TROin limited part, restraining Defendants from initiating anunlawful detainer action against Plaintiff for 28 days, andset a preliminary injunction hearing. Dkt. No. 21. Afterhearing the parties' oral argument, the Court denied Plaintiff'smotion for preliminary injunction because Plaintiff had notshown likelihood of irreparable harm, Plaintiff had not shownthe balance of hardships tipped sharply in his favor, andPlaintiff had not shown a likelihood of success on the merits.Dkt. No. 29. Plaintiff filed a motion for reconsideration,which the Court denied. Dkt. No. 33. On September 3,2025, Plaintiff filed a FAC stating the following causes ofaction: 1) Fair Housing Act – disability discrimination; 2) FairHousing Act – religious discrimination; 3) Fair Housing Act– Retaliation; 4) Americans with Disabilities Act (“ADA),Title II ; 5) Rehabilitation Act – Section 504; 6) Conspiracyto Interfere with Civil Rights; 7) Negligent Infliction ofEmotional Distress; 8) Intentional Infliction of EmotionalDistress; 9) Fair Housing Act – Breach of Agreed ReasonableAccommodation; 10) Discrimination. Dkt. No. 36.On September 18, Defendants filed the instant Motion toDismiss. Plaintiff's deadline to file a response to the Motionto Dismiss was October 2, 2025. Dkt. No. 38. Plaintiff failedto file a response to the Motion to Dismiss by October2, and did not seek any extension of time or otherwiseprovide an explanation for this failure to respond, althoughon October 6 Plaintiff requested leave to file a SecondAmended Complaint. Dkt. No. 45. On October 8, Defendantsfiled a Notice of Plaintiff's Non-Opposition to the Motion toDismiss. Dkt. No. 47.*2 On October 10, the Court denied Plaintiff's motion forleave to amend. Dkt. No. 49. Due to Plaintiff's pro se status,the Court granted Plaintiff a sua sponte extension to respondto the Motion to Dismiss until October 16, two weeks after theresponse was originally due. Id. The Court warned Plaintiffthat if Plaintiff failed to file a response to Defendant's Motionto Dismiss, the Court would grant the motion as unopposed.Id. Plaintiff did not file a response by October 16, and as ofthe entry of this Order, has still not filed a response.Plaintiff has made other filings, however. In violation of theCourt's October 10 Order that, due to Plaintiff's unpromptedand voluminous filings, Plaintiff must seek leave of Courtbefore making further filings (other than the late motion todismiss response) Plaintiff has continued in this conduct,making five additional filings with a combined page-count ofover 700 pages over the span of ten days. Dkt. Nos. 50, 51,
THOMAS JOSEPH GODDARD, Plaintiff, v. SARES-REGIS..., Slip Copy (2025) © 2025 Thomson Reuters. No claim to original U.S. Government Works.253, 54, 56. On October 14, Plaintiff also failed to appear at thescheduled 1:30 pm Case Management Conference hearing.Instead of appearing, Plaintiff filed a same-day motion for an“emergency hearing” for 3:30 pm that afternoon, in violationof Local Rule 7-2(a). Dkt. No. 53.On October 20, Defendant filed a notice noting Plaintiff'scontinued failure to oppose its motion, despite the Court'sOctober 16 deadline. Dkt. No. 56. Less than an hourlater, Plaintiff filed a 192-page “Emergency Response toDefendants' Notice of Non-Opposition,” in which he arguedthat his Motion for Leave to File Second Amended Complaintand proposed Second Amended Complaint constituted hisopposition. Dkt. No. 56.III. DISCUSSIONA motion may be granted when a party fails to oppose it.Local Rule 7-3(a-b); Rider v. JPMorgan Chase Bank N.A.,No. 20-CV-06888-LHK, 2021 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 12486, at *4(N.D. Cal. Jan. 22, 2021) (“[A] district court may properlygrant a motion for failure to file an opposition.”; accord, e.g.,Gwaduri v. INS, 362 F.3d 1144, 1146-47, n.3 (9th Cir. 2004)(holding that it “is beyond question” that courts may grantunopposed motions). Plaintiff has not filed an oppositiondespite multiple warnings from Defendants and this Court.To the extent that Plaintiff relies on Rule 15, Rule 15 makesclear that a party may amend its pleadings “once as a matterof course” and in “all other cases” may amend only withleave of court or consent of the opposing party. Fed. R. Civ.Pr. 15(1)-(2). Here, the Court denied Plaintiff leave to file aSecond Amended Complaint. Dkt. No. 49. The Court grantsthe unopposed motion to dismiss.Beyond Plaintiffs' failure to oppose, the merits also supportdismissal. Plaintiffs' 100-page First Amended Complaintstates ten causes of action under various federal civil rightslaws, including the Fair Housing Act and the Americanswith Disability Act, alleging disability-based and religiousdiscrimination. The FAC, like Plaintiff's other filings, devotescountless pages to extraneous issues, including actions takenby non-parties such as his former employer and “statisticalanalysis.” See e.g. Dkt. No. 36 at 3 (“Additional evidence ofsystematic discrimination includes the unprecedented massrecusal of all thirty-nine Contra Costa Superior Court judgeson July 24, 2025 (Ex. DD), ongoing seizure of essentialassistive technology devices preventing compliance withcourt-ordered treatment (Ex. EE), and cross-jurisdictionalretaliation documented in federal proceedings in New Jersey(Ex. FF) and employment discrimination proceedings inthis District (Ex. GG). The mathematical probability ofthese coordinated events occurring randomly is less than10−36, equivalent to selecting a specific grain of sandfrom all beaches on Earth.”); id. at 9 (“The mathematicalprecision of these events—termination exactly 365 daysbefore eviction proceedings on July 15, 2025—demonstratescoordination exceeding random probability. Anniversarytiming analysis yields a Z-score of 10.66 standard deviations(p < 10−26), establishing presumptive evidence of conspiracyunder 42 U.S.C. § 1985(3).”); id. at 15 (“The probabilityof repossession occurring five days before anniversary ofprevious vehicle theft is less than 1 in 73 (p = 5/365 =0.0137)”); id. at 18 (“Following Plaintiff's purchase of Israelistickers on Amazon, systematic service discrimination beganacross multiple platforms.”). The complaint does not complywith Rule 8's requirement that a claim must be “short andplain.” Fed. R. Civ. Pro. 8(a)(2). This alone is another groundfor dismissal. See e.g, McHenry v. Renne, 84 F.3d 1172, 1174(9th Cir. 1996).*3 The core of Plaintiff's complaint, as the Courtunderstands it, is that Defendants refused to accommodatePlaintiffs' disability and medical issues. Although Defendantsgranted Plaintiffs' request for a grace period to pay rent untilthe seventh day of the month, Plaintiff claims in the FAC thatDefendants violated this accommodation by serving a pay-or-quit notice. The complaint does not address the undisputedfact that shortly after receiving this accommodation, Plaintifffailed to pay rent and has not paid rent since. See Dkt. No.29 (as of this August, Plaintiff's arrearage was over $7,000).The FAC also omits the fact, conceded by Plaintiff at hishearing for preliminary injunction, that the accommodationDefendants have failed to grant him is a rent decrease from$2,850 to $400 until Plaintiff receives money from his otherpending lawsuits and disability claims. See id. As the Courtexplained in its Order denying a preliminary injunction, adenial of “meaningful access” to a program due to a person'sinability to “satisfy a condition of eligibility because of hisfinancial circumstances” is not a violation of the ADA. SeeWeinreich v. Los Angeles Cnty. Metro. Transp. Auth., 114F.3d 976, 979 (9th Cir. 1997); Dkt. No. 29. Plaintiff alsoargues that Defendants' filing of a pay-or-quit notice wasretaliation, but this notice followed Plaintiffs' failure to payrent for two months, a clear non-retaliatory basis. Dkt. No.29. Finally, all of Plaintiffs' claims of religious discriminationrelate to actions by individuals that are unaffiliated withDefendants, including Plaintiff's former employer Slickdeals,other employees at Slickdeals, and his former girlfriend.While Plaintiff claims his former girlfriend is affiliated with
THOMAS JOSEPH GODDARD, Plaintiff, v. SARES-REGIS..., Slip Copy (2025) © 2025 Thomson Reuters. No claim to original U.S. Government Works.3Defendants, the exhibits he points to do not support this. Seee.g., Dkt. No. 36 at 12 (citing Exhibit Q at Dkt. No. 10-1 at212); see also Dkt. No. 38 at 8.Defendants seek dismissal with prejudice. A court maydeny leave to amend after considering factors such as “badfaith, undue delay, prejudice to the opposing party, futilityof the amendment, and whether the party has previouslyamended his pleadings.” Bonin v. Calderon, 59 F.3d 815,845 (9th Cir.1995). Here, the factors support dismissal withprejudice. Plaintiff has already amended his complaint inSeptember with the benefit of the Court's ruling denying hispreliminary injunction. Rather than providing new facts, theFAC provided additional irrelevant incidents, argument, andstatistics, and omitted relevant facts that Plaintiff had alreadyadmitted to before the Court.Plaintiff's Motion for Leave to File a Second AmendedComplaint further confirms that amendment would be futile.Plaintiff sought amendment to address “new developments”including (1) that Defendants served another pay-or-quit notice (2) that Defendants expressed willingness toparticipate in settlement discussions (3) that the CaliforniaCivil Rights Department resumed mediation proceedings inPlaintiffs' separate case there (4) that Defendants filed a jointcase management statements providing their positions ondiscovery, trial, and settlement. Dkt. No. 49. As the Courtexplained in its order denying leave to amend, the stateof settlements discussions, the status of mediation in otherproceedings, and Defendants' “positions on discovery, trial,and settlement” are not relevant to Plaintiff's pleadings. Id.The Court found that Defendants' service of an additionalpay-or-quit notice would not alter Plaintiffs' pleadings,since Defendants' basis for serving the pay-or-quit remainsPlaintiff's failure to pay rent. Id. The SAC that Plaintiff soughtto file was over 150-pages, heightening rather than curingPlaintiff's Rule 8 problem. Plaintiff's prior amendment and hisproposed second amendment demonstrate that leave to amendis futile in this case. Plaintiff's case is legally meritless.The factors of bad faith and prejudice to the opposingparty also strongly support dismissal with prejudice. Asnoted, Plaintiff's filings in this action have been excessive,almost wholly irrelevant to the claims alleged, and havemade factual statements unsupported or contradicted by theattached exhibits. Defendants have already reviewed overa thousand pages of confused and legally irrelevant filingsfor claims that the Court had found to lack merit even afteramendment. There is no cause to require Defendants toundergo further time and litigation expense, particularly asamendment would be futile.Finally, the Court notes that Plaintiffs' filing have containedrepeated misrepresentations of Plaintiff's prior statements andactions, Defendants' actions, and the Court's own actions.This may stem from the fact that Plaintiffs' filings havelikely been generated in whole or in part through GenerativeArtificial Intelligence. Given Plaintiff's pro se and in formapauperis status, the Court will not issue a show cause orderunder Rule 11 at this time.*4 Accordingly, for all the reasons stated above, Defendants'Motion to Dismiss is GRANTED WITH PREJUDICE. TheClerk of Court is directed to enter a final judgment.IT IS SO ORDERED.All CitationsSlip Copy, 2025 WL 2969295End of Document© 2025 Thomson Reuters. No claim to original U.S. Government Works.
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