Gretchen Suzanne Lund
How Judge Lund rules, drawn from 16 signed orders. Every observation links to the order it came from.
About Judge Lund
Gretchen Suzanne Lund is a judge of the United States District Court for the Northern District of Indiana. Appointed by President Joseph R. Biden, Judge Lund received a commission on January 29, 2024.
Judge Lund's practices and standing orders
Rules for cases before Judge Lund, as published on the court's website (checked October 9, 2026). Judges revise these often, so confirm the current version on the court's site before you file.
Key rules
Motions
A criminal jury trial continuance motion must specify the requested length and go to the magistrate judge.
“A motion to continue a jury trial should specify the length of the continuance requested and should be directed to the Magistrate Judge.”
Trial
File proposed jury instructions at least 21 days before the final pretrial conference.
“Any proposed jury instructions (identifying the source and/or supporting authority for each proposed instruction) must be filed at least 21 days before the final pretrial conference.”
Standing orders for every case in this court
Orders the court applies to all of its cases, whichever judge has them, as published on the court's website (checked October 9, 2026).
How Judge Lund decides
Patterns drawn from this judge's own signed orders. Every observation links to the order it came from.
What persuades
On employment-discrimination summary-judgment motions Lund grants the defense where the plaintiff cannot meet the legitimate-expectations element or identify a similarly situated comparator (McDonnell Douglas/Ortiz), and where alleged harassment is neither severe nor pervasive.
“The Court hereby GRANTS the Defendants' Motion for Summary Judgment [DE 41]. The Court DIRECTS the Clerk of Court to enter judgment against Plaintiff and in favor of the Defendants. The Plaintiff takes nothing by her Complaint.”
On state-law claims at the pleading stage, she tests each required legal interest and mental-state element against concrete factual allegations; an expected inheritance did not supply a vested property interest, and conclusory self-dealing allegations did not plead conversion intent or fraud.
“For these reasons, Defendants’ Motion to Dismiss [DE 23] is GRANTED without prejudice. The Court DIRECTS the Clerk of Court to DISMISS this case and enter judgment accordingly.”
Procedural preferences
She enforces Local Rule 56-1: where the nonmovant fails to controvert the movant's statement of material facts with record citations and files an improper affidavit, she accepts the movant's facts as true.
“The Court hereby GRANTS Defendant's Motion for Summary Judgment. [DE 19]. The Court DIRECTS the Clerk of Court to enter judgment against Plaintiff and in favor of Defendant. Plaintiff takes nothing by his Complaint.”
In prisoner screening, she allowed amendment when a deficient complaint might be curable, but dismissed after the amended complaint repeated defects and further amendment would be futile. A request for preliminary relief also failed when the operative complaint stated no viable claim.
“For these reasons, the court: (1) DENIES Hale’s Motion for Response (ECF 21); and (2) DISMISSES this case under 28 U.S.C. § 1915A.”
In patent litigation, she enforces the specificity and supplementation duties in the local patent rules. Reconsideration does not rescue theories that were not timely disclosed when the facts became known, and previously available evidence is not newly discovered evidence.
“Par-Kan did not comply with the Court’s local patent rules, nor did it try to do so when it could have.”
Cautions
In one prisoner case, an improper grievance rejection made the administrative remedy unavailable and defeated the defendant’s exhaustion-based summary-judgment motion.
“Accordingly, the undisputed facts show the grievance office made Scott’s administrative remedies unavailable by improperly rejecting Grievance 203754 without any valid basis.”
Signed rulings
A grounded sample of orders signed by this judge, with the verbatim dispositive language.
“The Court hereby GRANTS the Defendants' Motion for Summary Judgment [DE 41]. The Court DIRECTS the Clerk of Court to enter judgment against Plaintiff and in favor of the Defendants. The Plaintiff takes nothing by her Complaint.”
“both Defendant Assemblers' Motion for Summary Judgment [DE 47] and Defendant Home Depot's Motion for Summary Judgment [DE 53] are GRANTED. The Court DIRECTS the Clerk of Court to enter judgment against the Plaintiffs in favor of the Defendants. The Plaintiffs take nothing by his complaint.”
“The Court hereby GRANTS Defendant's Motion for Summary Judgment. [DE 19]. The Court DIRECTS the Clerk of Court to enter judgment against Plaintiff and in favor of Defendant. Plaintiff takes nothing by his Complaint.”
“In his Response, Plaintiff agrees to ‘dismiss his race claim with prejudice.’ [DE 25, page 1]. No further analysis by the Court is necessary.”
“For these reasons, Defendants’ Motion to Dismiss [DE 23] is GRANTED without prejudice. The Court DIRECTS the Clerk of Court to DISMISS this case and enter judgment accordingly.”
“For these reasons, the court: (1) DENIES Alex L. Hale’s Motion for Preliminary Injunction (ECF 11); (2) GRANTS Alex L. Hale until April 15, 2025, to file an amended complaint;”
“For these reasons, the court: (1) DENIES Hale’s Motion for Response (ECF 21); and (2) DISMISSES this case under 28 U.S.C. § 1915A.”
“For the foregoing reasons, the Court ADOPTS the report and recommendation, [DE 28], over Plaintiff’s objections and in its entirety, and the Commissioner’s decision is AFFIRMED.”
“Plaintiff failed to meet the burden under either Section 455 or Section 144 to establish that recusal is necessary. As a result, Plaintiff’s Motion for Recusal, [DE 70], is DENIED.”
“For these reasons, the Court DENIES Par-Kan’s Motion for Reconsideration [DE 203].”
“Accordingly, the Court ADOPTS Magistrate Judge Martin’s Report and Recommendation [DE 18] in full and GRANTS the Motion to Dismiss Plaintiff’s Complaint [DE 9] and DISMISSES this case without prejudice.”
“For these reasons, the plaintiff’s motion for a preliminary injunction (ECF 13) is DENIED.”
“USS’ Motion for Default Judgment [DE 152] is DENIED with leave to re-file once the claims against the nondefaulting Defendants have been resolved.”
Pending matters in the official report
Reported by the Administrative Office of the U.S. Courts under the Civil Justice Reform Act, as of March 31, 2026.
| Motions pending more than six months | 0 |
| Bench trials submitted more than six months | 0 |
| Bankruptcy appeals pending more than six months | 0 |
| Social Security appeals pending more than six months | 0 |
| Civil cases pending more than three years | 7 |
| Report | Motions over six months | Cases over three years |
|---|---|---|
| Mar 2026 | 0 | 7 |
| Sep 2025 | 1 | 9 |
| Mar 2025 | 0 | 9 |
| Sep 2024 | 0 | 7 |
| Mar 2024 | 0 | 1 |
A snapshot on that date: matters listed may since have been decided or reassigned. A motion referred to a magistrate judge is counted for both judges. Motions in multidistrict litigation, section 2255 cases and Social Security appeals are not counted, and a very large three-year count is generally a multidistrict docket. Source: Appendix A of the report (PDF); about the report.
How long civil cases take in this court
For the whole of U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Indiana, not for Judge Lund: median time from filing to disposition of the civil cases the court closed in the 12 months ending September 30, 2025, as reported by the Administrative Office of the U.S. Courts.
| Cases | Median time | |
|---|---|---|
| All civil cases closed | 1,338 | 8.5 months |
| Closed with no court action | 68 | 2.6 months |
| Closed before pretrial | 958 | 7.6 months |
| Closed during or after pretrial | 302 | 14.5 months |
| Closed during trial | 10 | 43.6 months |
| 12 months ending | Cases closed | Median time |
|---|---|---|
| Sep 2025 | 1,338 | 8.5 months |
| Sep 2024 | 1,336 | 8.5 months |
| Sep 2023 | 1,248 | 9.4 months |
| Sep 2022 | 1,434 | 12.5 months |
| Sep 2021 | 1,258 | 12.7 months |
| Sep 2020 | 1,408 | 11.8 months |
| Sep 2019 | 1,576 | 13.8 months |
The table leaves out prisoner petitions, land condemnations, deportation reviews, recovery of overpayments and enforcement of judgments, and reports no median for fewer than 10 cases. A district that closed a large multidistrict litigation in the period shows very large counts and long medians for that year. Source: Table C-5, U.S. District Courts (spreadsheet).
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