Federal magistrate denies recusal motion in Purdue Title IX lawsuit

IL file photo

A federal magistrate judge in the Indiana Northern District Court has denied a motion to recuse brought by a male student at Purdue University who was expelled after the school determined he had sexually assaulted a female student.

The student, identified in court documents as John Doe, cited past rulings in arguing Magistrate Judge Joshua Kolar should be recused because he has a bias or prejudice either against Doe or in favor of the school.

Doe’s case is back in the district court after a 7th Circuit Court of Appeals panel — which included current U.S. Supreme Court Justice Amy Coney Barrett — ruled in 2019 that dismissal of the student’s case was premature.

The case was assigned to Kolar on remand.

In August 2022, Kolar granted summary judgment in favor of Purdue on Doe’s 14th Amendment due process claim but allowed his Title IX claim to move forward. Kolar went on to deny Doe’s motion for reconsideration, and the 7th Circuit denied his petition for writ of mandamus.

Kolar held an unsuccessful settlement conference in February, and a trial was set for April.

But the trial date was vacated when the parties filed a joint motion to refer the case to a different magistrate judge for another settlement conference. That settlement conference was held in June, but no settlement was reached.

Doe filed the instant recusal motion July 9.

In a Monday order denying the motion, Kolar ruled Doe’s cited grounds for recusal were inadequate under the statutes set forth by the Supreme Court: 28 U.S.C. § 455, and 28 U.S.C. § 144.

Addressing timeliness, Kolar ruled Doe’s motion is “almost five months late” by the standards for the § 144 challenge. Kolar still addressed the substance of both challenges.

Kolar also noted that Doe only cited subsection (a) of § 455 as a basis for his § 455 argument, and did not cite subsection (b)(1).

“As noted, the Supreme Court has interpreted the impartiality standard in § 455(a) as encompassing the concept of ‘bias or prejudice’ expressly found in § 455(b)(1),” the order says, citing Liteky v. United States, 510 U.S. 540 (1994), where the high court explained subsection (a) and subsection (b) should not be applied “inconsistently.”

Kolar considered all three recusal provisions in his order.

Doe’s argument for recusal included disagreement with three opinions entered by Kolar: one sanctioning Doe for violating discovery orders, one addressing the parties’ summary judgment motions and one on Doe’s motion to reconsider the summary judgment opinion.

“John’s disagreement with the undersigned’s decisions — no matter how vehement or how colorfully described — does not demonstrate ‘personal bias or prejudice,’ nor does it constitute a reasonable basis to question the undersigned’s impartiality,” the order says.

Doe also alluded to discovery disputes, including Purdue’s motion seeking sanctions for spoilation of evidence.

“To the extent John points to any perceived criticism of his own actions, in the context of spoilation or any other discovery issue, that also is not a basis for recusal,” the order says.

Doe also objected to remarks Kolar allegedly made during the settlement conference, claiming in part that Kolar “told me settling was in my best interest and tried to pressure me into taking a wholly inadequate offer.”

Kolar disagreed with the argument and did not corroborate or deny the allegations because of the “confidential nature of a settlement conference.”

Finally, Doe argued the February mandamus petition that the 7th Circuit denied requires recusal.

“But a party cannot compel recusal merely through the act of complaining about the judge,” the order says. “That would effectively allow litigants to switch judges at any time for any reason.”

In a note near the end of the order, Kolar wrote he considered whether the recusal motion should be assigned to another judge.

“The better course here is to bring this matter to a close and proceed to trial,” the order says. “… It is certainly conceivable that mistakes were made in this litigation, and perhaps at some time in the future a higher court will rule that one or more of those mistakes came from the front of the courtroom. Every litigant is entitled to a fair and impartial judge, but no judge is infallible. At the same time, the judge has a duty to resolve disputes and bring the litigation to an end.”

The case — John Doe v. Purdue University, et al., 2:17-CV-33 — has had a far-reaching impact.

When it ruled in favor of Doe, the 7th Circuit rejected the formulas other circuit courts used to evaluate Title IX claims and offered its own method, which the 3rd District Court of Appeals went on to apply in a similar Title IX lawsuit.