Sing v. Mineral County, 3:15-cv-00259

Ram Sing sued Mineral County alleging a 2015 raid of his business and theft of personal property, asserting claims labeled grand theft, robbery, conspiracy, and abuse of power and seeking $500,000,000.
Plaintiff moved for default judgment after Mineral County did not appear; the court initially denied default judgment because service of process was defective under Fed. R. Civ. P. 4(j) and Nev. R. Civ. P. 4(d)(5).
The court ordered Plaintiff to cure service defects and file amended proof of service within 30 days. Plaintiff filed a Motion to Reinstate Default Judgment with an amended proof of service.
The amended proof raised credibility concerns: the process server’s signature resembled Plaintiff’s and the amended affidavit replaced the originally named recipient (Christopher Nepper) with Clifford Cichowlaz, raising suspicion of attempted after-the-fact correction.
The court found service remained insufficient (no proper identification of an authorized county representative) and the complaint itself was substantively deficient even under pro se liberal pleading standards.

Issue	Plaintiff's Argument	Defendant's Argument	Held
Whether service of process was cured	Amended proof cured prior service defects by identifying a county official served	Service had not been properly accomplished; original service defective	Service deficiencies not cured; service remains insufficient under Rule 4 and Nevada rule
Whether default judgment should be reinstated	Default judgment should be entered because defendant failed to appear	Default judgment inappropriate due to defective service and deficient pleadings	Denied — default judgment not reinstated
Whether complaint states claims sufficient for default judgment	Complaint’s allegations are adequate under liberal pro se standards	Complaint is barebones and fails to plead sufficient facts	Complaint is insufficient even for pro se; weighs against default judgment
Whether Eitel factors support default judgment	Not specifically developed beyond procedural request	Multiple Eitel factors (prejudice, merits, sufficiency, amount at stake, dispute possibility, merits-preference) weigh against entry	Balance of Eitel factors disfavors default judgment

Eitel v. McCool, 782 F.2d 1470 (9th Cir. 1986) (factors guiding court’s discretion to enter default judgment)
TeleVideo Sys., Inc. v. Heidenthal, 826 F.2d 915 (9th Cir. 1987) (court accepts well-pleaded allegations as true after default)
Warner Bros. Entm’t Inc. v. Caridi, 346 F. Supp. 2d 1068 (C.D. Cal. 2004) (default judgment is discretionary, not automatic)
PepsiCo, Inc. v. Cal. Sec. Cans, 238 F. Supp. 2d 1172 (S.D. Cal. 2002) (discussion of Eitel factors and prejudice inquiry)
Danning v. Lavine, 572 F.2d 1386 (9th Cir. 1978) (Rule 8 liberal pleading standard applied in default contexts)
Haines v. Kerner, 404 U.S. 519 (1972) (pro se pleadings held to less stringent standards)
Landstar Ranger, Inc. v. Parth Enter., Inc., 725 F. Supp. 2d 916 (N.D. Cal. 2010) (assessing proportionality of claimed damages under Eitel)