Donald C. Coggins Jr.

United States District Court for the District of South Carolina district Appointed by Donald Trump (Republican) 3 signed orders read

How Judge Coggins decides

Patterns drawn from this judge's own signed orders. Every observation links to the order it came from.

What persuades

Coggins exercises specific personal jurisdiction over an out-of-state intellectual-property holder that pressures a South Carolina plaintiff's customers: cease-and-desist letters sent to the plaintiff and to its retailers are intentional acts expressly aimed at the forum under the Calder effects test, even absent general jurisdiction.

“For the foregoing reasons, the Defendant's Motion to Dismiss, ECF No. 14, is DENIED.”

Cautions

On a motion to suppress he is skeptical of a thin reasonable-suspicion theory: he granted suppression where the officer candidly testified that nothing during the traffic stop added to the reasonable-suspicion calculus and the defendant had a plausible innocent explanation (Digiovanni).

“OPINION AND ORDER granting 43 Motion to Suppress as to Tashawn Daheem Williams signed by Honorable Donald C Coggins, Jr on 5/14/2018.”

Signed rulings

A grounded sample of orders signed by this judge, with the verbatim dispositive language.

Sunny Days Entm't, LLC v. Traxxas, L.P.
· 2019-03-25
Motions to dismiss (defendant) Denied

“For the foregoing reasons, the Defendant's Motion to Dismiss, ECF No. 14, is DENIED.”

Kirk v. Berryhill
· 2019-07-09
Social security appeal (plaintiff) Granted

“For these reasons the SSA's decision is REVERSED and the Court remands this matter to the Commissioner pursuant to sentence four of 42 U.S.C. § 405(g).”

United States v. Williams
· 2018-05-14
Motion to suppress (defendant) Granted

“OPINION AND ORDER granting 43 Motion to Suppress as to Tashawn Daheem Williams signed by Honorable Donald C Coggins, Jr on 5/14/2018.”

Caseload & timing

From public federal docket records for this judge.

Median case duration in the sampled dockets: 212 days (N = 8).

Coggins's sampled civil caseload includes Social Security appeals, federal habeas, prisoner civil-rights cases, ADA and Title VII employment disputes, trade-secret matters, and mandamus petitions. Magistrate Judges Paige J. Gossett, Jacquelyn D. Austin, and Thomas E. Rogers III appear on referred or nondispositive matters.

Put Judge Coggins's record to work

Ezel drafts and answers grounded in this exact profile: how Judge Coggins actually rules, not a generic AI guess.

Opens in Ezel Pro. Every answer is grounded in Judge Coggins's own signed orders and cites them.