Tony N. Leung
How Judge Leung rules, drawn from 20 signed orders. Every observation links to the order it came from.
About Judge Leung
Tony N. Leung served as a U.S. magistrate judge for the District of Minnesota beginning in 2011. He previously served as a Minnesota state trial judge in Hennepin County and practiced law. He earned degrees from Yale University and New York University School of Law.
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).
- Amended Administrative Order: Procedures for Storage and Management of Sealed Documents ↗
- General Order No. 1: Filing Sealed Documents with Highly Sensitive Information ↗
- General Order No. 2: Removing Sealed Documents with Highly Sensitive Information from CM/ECF ↗
- Administrative Order: Encryption of Electronic Materials and Cloud Storage Links ↗
How Judge Leung decides
Patterns drawn from this judge's own signed orders. Every observation links to the order it came from.
Procedural preferences
In Spencer v. United States Department of Justice, he recommended dismissing a prisoner's civil claims at screening because success would imply an uninvalidated conviction or sentence was unlawful; the district judge accepted the recommendation.
“Construed as including civil claims, Spencer's Complaint fails under the doctrine announced in Heck v. Humphrey, 512 U.S. 477 (1994). ... Prosecutors are absolutely immune from civil suits for damages based on actions they take to prosecute a case.”
In Gallegos v. Rardin, the district judge accepted Leung's unobjected-to recommendation, denied the habeas petition, and dismissed the action without prejudice.
“Finding no clear error, and based on all the files, records, and proceedings ... The Report and Recommendation [ECF No. 16] is ACCEPTED”
Signed rulings
A grounded sample of orders signed by this judge, with the verbatim dispositive language.
“Defendants' Motion for Summary Judgment (Doc. No. [95]) is GRANTED.”
“Shawn Ray Brtek's Motion to Suppress Tangible Evidence & Statements Due to Fourth Amendment Violations (Doc. No. [33]) is DENIED.”
“Defendant Daniel Basile's motion to dismiss, (Dkt. 29), is GRANTED.”
“Petitioner's Petition for a Writ of Habeas Corpus under 28 U.S.C. Sec. 2241 [ECF No. 1] is DENIED; and 3. The action is DISMISSED WITHOUT PREJUDICE.”
District Judge Nancy E. Brasel accepted Magistrate Judge Leung's December 22, 2020 recommendation. This is a 28 U.S.C. 1915A prisoner-complaint screening dismissal rather than a ruling on a party motion. The plaintiff (a federal prisoner) objected; Brasel conducted de novo review and accepted the recommendation, dismissing the complaint without prejudice. Leung and Brasel held the civil claims barred by Heck v. Humphrey (a judgment for the plaintiff would imply his conviction or sentence were invalid), alternatively barred by absolute prosecutorial immunity and the rule that a Bivens claim cannot run against a federal agency; and any habeas theory was barred because his 28 U.S.C. 2255 motion had already been denied by the sentencing court.
“For the reasons set forth below, the Court recommends that Plaintiff's motion for sanctions be granted.”
“Defendant's Motion to Compel Discovery Responses, ECF No. 27, is GRANTED.”
“This matter is before the Court, United States Magistrate Judge Tony N. Leung, on Dakota County's Motion to Compel Discovery Against Plaintiff (ECF No. 30) and the Galloway Defendants' Joint Motion to Compel Discovery Against Plaintiff (ECF No. 36). For the reasons stated below, the Court grants both motions.”
“Plaintiff's request for leave to file a motion to reconsider (ECF No. 201) is DENIED.”
“Defendant's Motion to Suppress Search and Seizure Evidence (Doc. No. [23]) is DENIED.”
“Defendant Humberto Rangel-Torres's Motion to Suppress All Identifications of Defendant Obtained Through Unconstitutional Identification Procedures (ECF No. 48) be DENIED”
“The Court ADOPTS, as modified above, the Report and Recommendation of United States Magistrate Judge Tony N. Leung dated April 14, 2015 [Docket No. 35]. 2. Defendant's Motion to Suppress Evidence [Docket No. 18] is DENIED.”
Caseload & timing
From public federal docket records for this judge.
- Leung-assigned consent dockets confirmed via the docket records (sampled through 2026-07-04, not exhaustive): consumer-credit/FDCPA matters (Broberg v. Debt Arbitrators 480; Hupperts v. APOGEE Retail 480, a class settlement) and a large, ongoing consent Social Security appeals cohort running from 2011 through 2025 (Berryhill/Colvin/Dudek-era appeals).
- His far larger referral workload (captioned -TNL under a district judge) spans criminal suppression (US v. Brtek), prisoner/Bivens screening (Spencer v. DOJ), 2241 and 2254 habeas (Gallegos v. Rardin; Ward v. Gandhi), civil-rights MSJ (Benson v. Piper), and pro se civil dismissals (Gregg v. Basile): all surfaced in the published orders.
- Not exhaustive; durations not tabulated in this thin sample.
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 | 0 |
| Report | Motions over six months | Cases over three years |
|---|---|---|
| Mar 2026 | 0 | 0 |
| Sep 2025 | 0 | 0 |
| Mar 2025 | 0 | 0 |
| Sep 2024 | 0 | 0 |
| Mar 2024 | 0 | 0 |
| Sep 2023 | 3 | 0 |
| Mar 2023 | 3 | 0 |
| Sep 2022 | 0 | 0 |
| Mar 2022 | 0 | 0 |
| Sep 2021 | 0 | 0 |
| Mar 2021 | 0 | 0 |
| Sep 2020 | 0 | 0 |
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 United States District Court for the District of Minnesota, not for Judge Leung: 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 | 2,681 | 8.2 months |
| Closed with no court action | 1,499 | 5.6 months |
| Closed before pretrial | 645 | 7.4 months |
| Closed during or after pretrial | 525 | 13.3 months |
| Closed during trial | 12 | 39.4 months |
| 12 months ending | Cases closed | Median time |
|---|---|---|
| Sep 2025 | 2,681 | 8.2 months |
| Sep 2024 | 2,636 | 8.3 months |
| Sep 2023 | 2,579 | 7 months |
| Sep 2022 | 2,701 | 5.8 months |
| Sep 2021 | 2,737 | 7.7 months |
| Sep 2020 | 3,259 | 14.3 months |
| Sep 2019 | 8,151 | 21.6 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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