Bridget Meehan Brennan
How Judge Brennan rules, drawn from 36 signed orders. Every observation links to the order it came from.
About Judge Brennan
Bridget Meehan Brennan is a judge of the United States District Court for the Northern District of Ohio. Appointed by President Joseph R. Biden, Judge Brennan received a commission on February 8, 2022.
Judge Brennan's practices and standing orders
Rules for cases before Judge Brennan, 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.
- Initial Standing Order (Civil Cases) ↗
- Standard form for Report of Parties' Planning Meeting (Civil Cases) ↗
Key rules
Motions
A substantive motion filed before the case management conference has a 20-page supporting memorandum limit.
“Any memorandum in support may not exceed twenty (20) pages.”
Motions
Filing a motion to dismiss does not suspend the duty to answer or comply with discovery.
“The filing of a motion to dismiss will not excuse the filing of an answer, compliance with discovery, and other rules or standing orders.”
Discovery
If a discovery meet and confer fails, the parties must jointly notify chambers before filing a motion.
“If the meet and confer does not resolve the dispute, the parties are directed to jointly notify the Court by phone”
Sealing
A motion to file redacted material should normally be filed at least seven days before the deadline.
“A motion for leave must be filed sufficiently in advance of the deadline, typically at least seven (7) days.”
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 Brennan decides
Patterns drawn from this judge's own signed orders. Every observation links to the order it came from.
What persuades
At the pleading stage, documentary allegations supporting an alias relationship were accepted as true and defeated a separate-entity argument that contradicted the complaint’s plausible allegations.
“But that conclusion contradicts the plausible allegations in the amended complaint. Because the amended complaint plausibly pleads Heartland is an alias of Simplified Living, and because the Court must take all well-pleaded allegations as true, Simplified Living’s Motion to Dismiss must be denied.”
The reviewed FLSA ruling separated categories of work by the strength of the evidence, granting judgment on unrelated work while preserving the tip-supporting-work issue for trial because a material factual dispute remained.
“Therefore, there is an outstanding dispute of material fact whether Steak N Shake improperly claimed a tip credit for time its servers performed tip-supporting work. Accordingly, summary judgment is not appropriate on this claim.”
Procedural preferences
A party could not introduce a materially different TCPA theory for the first time in summary-judgment opposition after discovery had closed without first seeking to amend the pleadings.
“Plaintiffs failed to first move to amend their pleadings before raising the new claims in opposition to summary judgment.”
The reviewed reconsideration motion failed because it cited no state authority showing that the state court had misapplied its own law, leaving the asserted clear-error theory unsupported.
“Given that Defendant’s reconsideration motion cites absolutely no Ohio caselaw standing for the proposition that the Ohio state court misapplied its own law in determining that the forum selection clause provided a valid basis for personal jurisdiction, Defendant has not met its burden of demonstrating why, as he contends, there is a ‘need to correct a clear error of law or prevent manifest injustice.’”
In the reviewed commercial case, the court declined supplemental jurisdiction over state-law claims whose alleged events involved different people and facts from the surviving federal false-advertising claim. Those claims were dismissed without prejudice.
“The events giving rise to the claims involve different people, different fact patterns, and, as pleaded, are not connected to each other.”
Cautions
A meritless pro se complaint did not, without more, justify sanctions in the reviewed case, although the court warned that future misrepresentations could change that result.
“While Plaintiff’s claims are meritless, the filing of this lawsuit does not warrant the imposition of sanctions.”
In a diversity case, Brennan required more than a speculative punitive-damages request to meet the amount-in-controversy threshold.
“Since Moore is invoking federal jurisdiction, he bears the burden of showing that his claims satisfy the amount in controversy,”
In a text-message suit against a dealership, she denied judgment on the pleadings because the messages’ possible sales purpose required more facts about the later communications.
“Toyota’s first message certainly appears to serve a dual purpose. The fact that the same sales manager sent the second message and Toyota sent all three messages in a close timeframe calls into question the purpose for sending the subsequent messages. As pleaded, more information is required before the Court can grant judgment in Toyota’s favor as a matter of law.”
Signed rulings
A grounded sample of orders signed by this judge, with the verbatim dispositive language.
“For the reasons stated herein, Defendant Simplified Living LLC's Motion to Dismiss (Doc. 9) is DENIED.”
“the City Defendants' motion for summary judgment on all counts is GRANTED (Doc. 103), Plaintiffs' motion for summary judgment is DENIED (Doc. 104), and Gardner's motion for summary judgment is GRANTED (Doc. 108).”
“For the reasons set forth herein, Defendant's Motion for Summary Judgment (Doc. 58) is GRANTED. Plaintiffs' Motion for Class Certification (Doc. 57) and Defendant's Motion to Strike or Exclude Plaintiffs' Supplemental Expert Declaration (Doc. 63) are DENIED as moot.”
“Given that Defendant's reconsideration motion cites absolutely no Ohio caselaw standing for the proposition that the Ohio state court misapplied its own law in determining that the forum selection clause provided a valid basis for personal jurisdiction, Defendant has not met its burden of demonstrating why, as he contends, there is a ‘need to correct a clear error of law or prevent manifest injustice.’ Accordingly, the motion is DENIED.”
“Plaintiff's motion for summary judgment is DENIED. (Doc. No. 24.)”
“The moving Defendants' motion for summary judgment is GRANTED. (Doc. No. 26.) The Court DISMISSES Plaintiff's claims against Officer Pajot. This case is DISMISSED with prejudice.”
“For the reasons stated in the Court's accompanying Memorandum Opinion and Order (Doc. No. 18), the Petition Under 28 U.S.C. § 2254 for Writ of Habeas Corpus is DENIED. The case is DISMISSED with prejudice.”
“For the reasons stated herein, Defendant MetroHealth System's Motion to Dismiss (Doc. 16) is GRANTED in part and DENIED in part. Count Three of Plaintiff Jennifer Bowman's Complaint is DISMISSED. The Motion to Dismiss is DENIED as to all other claims presented in the Complaint.”
“There is no genuine dispute of material fact that Steak N Shake claimed a tip credit for time its servers spent performing unrelated work in violation of the FLSA, the 1967 dual jobs regulation, and the 80/20 rule. Accordingly, Plaintiffs' motion for summary judgment is granted with respect to their dual jobs claim.”
“Therefore, there is an outstanding dispute of material fact whether Steak N Shake improperly claimed a tip credit for time its servers performed tip-supporting work. Accordingly, summary judgment is not appropriate on this claim.”
“Accordingly, the motion for sentence reduction (Doc. 55) is DENIED.”
“For the reasons stated herein, Defendant David Carroll's motion under 18 U.S.C. § 3582(c)(2) for a reduced sentence pursuant to Parts A and B of Amendment 821 to the Sentencing Guidelines is DENIED.”
“Accordingly, the CLE Defendants are DISMISSED and the Court DENIES Plaintiffs' Motion to Remand (Doc. No. 10).”
“For the reasons stated herein, American Express's motion to compel arbitration (Doc. 19) is GRANTED, and the matter is STAYED pending arbitration.”
Caseload & timing
From public federal docket records for this judge.
Median case duration in the sampled dockets: 291 days (N = 6).
- The sampled 2022-2023 docket includes federal criminal matters and civil disputes involving police and civil rights, employee benefits, consumer communications, False Claims Act allegations, voting access, contracts, wage claims, Social Security review, habeas petitions, prisoner claims, and subpoena proceedings.
- Magistrate Judge Darrell A. Clay appears in a sampled Social Security referral. This is not a complete caseload census.
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 | 2 |
| Report | Motions over six months | Cases over three years |
|---|---|---|
| Mar 2026 | 0 | 2 |
| Sep 2025 | 0 | 0 |
| Mar 2025 | 0 | 0 |
| Sep 2024 | 0 | 3 |
| Mar 2024 | 2 | 2 |
| Sep 2023 | 8 | 3 |
| Mar 2023 | 19 | 3 |
| Sep 2022 | 39 | 0 |
| Mar 2022 | 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 Northern District of Ohio, not for Judge Brennan: 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 | 2,048 | 7.1 months |
| Closed with no court action | 394 | 3.3 months |
| Closed before pretrial | 1,035 | 5.9 months |
| Closed during or after pretrial | 607 | 11.4 months |
| Closed during trial | 12 | 18 months |
| 12 months ending | Cases closed | Median time |
|---|---|---|
| Sep 2025 | 2,048 | 7.1 months |
| Sep 2024 | 2,008 | 7.4 months |
| Sep 2023 | 2,137 | 8.5 months |
| Sep 2022 | 2,330 | 9.8 months |
| Sep 2021 | 2,432 | 9.3 months |
| Sep 2020 | 2,788 | 10.3 months |
| Sep 2019 | 3,158 | 9.9 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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