A. Kathleen Tomlinson
How Judge Tomlinson decides
Patterns drawn from this judge's own signed orders. Every observation links to the order it came from.
What persuades
She enforces the citizenship-vs-residency distinction for diversity jurisdiction: a complaint that alleges only the parties' residency, without non-conclusory allegations of citizenship, fails to establish 28 U.S.C. 1332 jurisdiction, so she recommends dismissing/declining the state-law claims.
“diversity jurisdiction turns on the citizenship of each party, not the residency of each party. This is because “allegations of residency alone cannot establish citizenship . . . .””
On default-judgment damages inquests she does not award what the plaintiff merely claims: she recommends DENYING undocumented expenses (e.g. an out-of-pocket home-health-aide cost and an uncertified hospital bill) and gives the plaintiff a short, defined window to produce certified documentation.
“Judge Tomlinson recommended that the Court deny the plaintiff’s request for the following medical expenses due to a lack of sufficient documentation ... only award the plaintiff $140,308.84 if she could produce “a certified bill for services/amounts still owed to North Shore University Hospital”
Procedural preferences
She was a workhorse R&R magistrate for the Central Islip bench: across these orders her recommendations were referred by and adopted by Spatt, Hurley, Feuerstein, and Azrack. Where a party does not object within 14 days the district judge reviews only for clear error, so an unobjected Tomlinson R&R was, in practice, the ruling.
“The Court has reviewed Judge Tomlinson’s Report and finds it be persuasive and without any legal or factual errors. There being no objection to Judge Tomlinson’s Report, the Court adopts the Report.”
She manages her docket actively even without a motion: where a pro se plaintiff stops litigating she recommends dismissal for failure to prosecute under Rule 41(b).
“recommending that this case be dismissed for plaintiff’s failure to prosecute ... This case is dismissed with prejudice for plaintiffs failure to prosecute, see Fed. R. Civ. P. 41(b)”
Cautions
Her R&Rs were not always rubber-stamped: in a default-judgment damages inquest the district judge adopted the recommendation only in part and modified the damages award (correcting an internal discrepancy and adding a late-documented cost), so the recommended number is not always the final number.
“Judge Tomlinson’s Report and Recommendation is adopted in part and modified in part. The Court ... modifies the damages award to include the $140,308.84 in medical costs”
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.
| Default judgment N = 3 |
Granted: 3 | counts only |
| Summary judgment N = 1 |
Granted: 1 | counts only |
| Motions to dismiss N = 1 |
Granted: 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.
“ORDERED, that Judge Tomlinson’s Report and Recommendation is adopted in its entirety; and it is further ORDERED, that a default judgment be entered against the Defendants.”
“IT IS HEREBY ORDERED that Plaintiff’s motion for default judgment against the defendants Northwell Staffing Agency, LLC, and Veronica Woods ... is granted and that Defendants ... are permanently enjoined from (1) providing or promoting any services under the name NorthWell Staffing Agency”
“ORDERED, that Judge Tomlinson’s Report and Recommendation is adopted in part and modified in part. The Court awards the plaintiff: ... for a total award of $2,180,808.84.”
“plaintiffs’ motion for summary judgment pursuant to Rule 56 of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure is granted and the June 29, 2013 Arbitration Award is confirmed”
“Defendants’ motions to dismiss plaintiffs’ federal claims are granted. The Court declines to exercise supplemental jurisdiction over plaintiffs’ state law claims.”
Pro se 42 U.S.C. 1983 civil-rights action. Tomlinson recommended dismissing the case for FAILURE TO PROSECUTE under Rule 41(b) -- not a ruling on any party motion. District Judge Feuerstein adopted on clear-error review (no objections) and dismissed with prejudice. Recorded as a sua sponte dismissal: counts as an order read but is excluded from motion stats. Grounding quote: 'This case is dismissed with prejudice for plaintiffs failure to prosecute, see Fed. R. Civ. P. 41(b).'
Caseload & timing
From public federal docket records for this judge.
E.D.N.Y. referral magistrate, Central Islip (Long Island; suffix 'AKT'), 2006-2021. Two faces to her docket: (1) as the directly-assigned magistrate, a steady stream of criminal magistrate-judge matters (arrest/search warrants, initial appearances, pen-register and historical cell-site applications) and 636(c) consent civil cases; (2) as an R&R author for the district judges, the dispositive/default civil work captured in the reasoning layer -- ERISA and union welfare-fund collections (Sciascia, Empire State Carpenters), Lanham Act trademark (Northwell Health), FLSA/wage (Villatoro, Gomez surfaced in the consent sample), personal-injury default inquests (Annexstein), and pro se 1983 and diversity suits (Copelin, Maitland). Mix is qualitative this build (case-level metadata only).