UNPUBLISHED
UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
FOR THE FOURTH CIRCUIT
No. 11-2267
PAMELA M. JONES,
Plaintiff - Appellant,
v.
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,
Defendant - Appellee.
Appeal from the United States District Court for the Eastern
District of Virginia, at Newport News. Mark S. Davis, District
Judge. (4:09-cv-00129-MSD-DEM)
Submitted: April 20, 2012 Decided: April 30, 2012
Before MOTZ, KING, and WYNN, Circuit Judges.
Vacated and remanded by unpublished per curiam opinion.
Pamela M. Jones, Appellant Pro Se.
Unpublished opinions are not binding precedent in this circuit.
PER CURIAM:
Pamela M. Jones appeals the district court’s order
denying her motion for reconsideration and motion for extension
of time to perfect service of summons. We vacate and remand.
We review the district court’s order for an abuse of
discretion. L.J. v. Wilbon, 633 F.3d 297, 304 (4th Cir.), cert.
denied, 132 S. Ct. 757 (2011). A district court abuses its
discretion by acting arbitrarily or irrationally, failing to
consider judicially recognized factors constraining its exercise
of discretion, or relying on erroneous factual or legal
premises. Id.
Unfortunately, the district court’s recorded analysis
was minimal. It stated only that it found Jones’ arguments
unpersuasive and unconvincing. By doing so, we are left to only
guess at the factors the district court considered in reaching
its decision or the weight it afforded to any individual factor.
The order does give us one clue as to what the district court
found determinative: it stated that Jones could have simply re-
filed her complaint and properly served the Government upon the
district court’s dismissal rather than pursue an appeal and
motion for reconsideration. Thus, lack of prejudice to Jones
appears to have factored—perhaps significantly—into the district
court’s decision. However, Jones stated multiple times in her
amended motion for reconsideration that she was precluded by the
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Federal Tort Claims Act’s six-month statute of limitations from
re-filing her complaint upon the district court’s dismissal.
Thus, the district court’s dismissal—even though it was without
prejudice—effectively terminated her ability to pursue her
claim. As best as we can tell, then, the district court’s order
relied on a faulty factual premise that caused the court to
erroneously discount the prejudice to Jones in reaching its
decision. See Lemoge v. United States, 587 F.3d 1188, 1195-96
(9th Cir. 2009) (holding that, in resolving a motion under Fed.
R. Civ. P. 60(b)(1), a district court should consider the
prejudice to the movant when the dismissal arose from
noncompliance with Fed. R. Civ. P. 4(m)).
We therefore find that the district court’s order
denying Jones’ motion was an abuse of its discretion. We vacate
the district court’s order and remand for fresh consideration of
the matter. We dispense with oral argument because the facts
and legal contentions are adequately presented in the materials
before the court and argument would not aid the decisional
process.
VACATED AND REMANDED
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