Stephen Joseph Murphy III
How Judge III decides
Patterns drawn from this judge's own signed orders. Every observation links to the order it came from.
Procedural preferences
Like the rest of the mied bench, he reviews an unobjected-to magistrate R&R only for soundness, not de novo -- a party that wants de novo review of an SSA (or other referred) R&R must file specific, timely objections. His SSA cross-MSJ orders are a standardized template.
“De novo review of the magistrate judge’s findings is required only if the parties “serve and file specific written objections to the proposed findings and recommendations.” ... Because neither party filed objections, de novo review of the Report’s conclusions is not required.”
On AEDPA habeas timeliness he applies the Holland/Pace equitable-tolling test strictly and treats generalized COVID-19 hardship as insufficient absent fact-specific circumstances that actually prevented filing -- pointing out the petitioner prepared the petition without the law library and was never hospitalized.
“The COVID-19 pandemic is not an extraordinary circumstance for equitable tolling without “fact-specific circumstances related to the pandemic that hindered [Petitioner’s] ability to timely file a habeas petition.””
Cautions
On post-trial motions he is deferential to the jury: on a Rule 29 motion he will not reweigh witness credibility, and on a Rule 33 motion he denies a new trial where independent evidence (here a wiretap and pole camera) corroborates the testimony, finding no miscarriage of justice.
“the mountain of evidence obtained from a wiretap and a pole camera corroborated their testimony to the point where a rational jury could only have found Defendant guilty ... beyond a reasonable doubt. The Court will therefore deny the motion for a new trial.”
Motion outcomes
Counted from classified signed orders only. Percentages are shown only where the sample is large enough to be meaningful; smaller samples are reported as raw counts.
| Summary judgment N = 6 |
Granted: 3Denied: 3 | counts only |
| Motions to dismiss N = 1 |
Granted: 1 | counts only |
| Motion for judgment of acquittal N = 1 |
Denied: 1 | counts only |
| Motion for new trial N = 1 |
Denied: 1 | counts only |
A "1 of 1" is one ruling, not a tendency. Treat small samples as illustrative, not predictive.
Signed rulings
A grounded sample of orders signed by this judge, with the verbatim dispositive language.
“IT IS FURTHER ORDERED that Plaintiff’s Motion for Summary Judgment [16] is DENIED.”
“IT IS FURTHER ORDERED that Defendant’s Motion for Summary Judgment [17] is GRANTED.”
“IT IS FURTHER ORDERED that the motion for summary judgment [12] is DENIED.”
“IT IS FURTHER ORDERED that the motion for summary judgment [14] is GRANTED.”
“IT IS FURTHER ORDERED that Plaintiff’s Motion for Summary Judgment [16] is DENIED.”
“IT IS FURTHER ORDERED that the Defendant’s Motion for Summary Judgment [17] is GRANTED.”
“WHEREFORE, it is hereby ORDERED that Defendant’s renewed motion for a judgment of acquittal [43] is DENIED.”
“IT IS FURTHER ORDERED that Defendant’s motion for a new trial [44] is DENIED.”
“IT IS FURTHER ORDERED that the motion to dismiss [9] is GRANTED.”
Caseload & timing
From public federal docket records for this judge.
Nature-of-suit mix observed across his 'Stephen J. Murphy III' enumeration plus the graded orders. Murphy carries SSA disability appeals (heavy), state and AEDPA habeas (28 U.S.C. 2254 / 2244), criminal felony (e.g. drug conspiracy), and -- as an active/Chief judge -- a large volume of duty-docket search/seizure-warrant and miscellaneous applications (not counted as merits cases). Observational, not a coverage-complete count.