The common problem in American courts is for cases to be instantly dismissed for a lack of merit due to slight errors made by lawyers, despite their central claims being of significance to the public. The Raysor v. Safi civil lawsuit displays a less common problem: how cases truly without merit clutter the courts’ dockets and thus force judges to reject potentially more weighty disputes.
Events began in November 2017, when officer Troy Ann Safi responded to a domestic dispute in Brooklyn, New York. Ftema Raysor was beating her boyfriend with a hairbrush and biting his ear. Kings County District Attorney dropped criminal charges against Raysor during the initial arraignment process.
Two years later, in November 2019, Raysor filed a federal civil rights complaint pro se in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of New York. A year still later, in December 2020, she amended her case by asking for $100 million in damages, and narrowing her claims from many more to two: false arrest and excessive force by Officer Safi. These initial complaints were a standard civil rights complaint hat accused NYPD of false arrest, racial bias and physical assault. Across the following years, Raysor failed to provide discovery on the federal case, while also pursuing a state case.
Finally, on November 12, 2025, the parties submitted a draft joint pretrial order. Then, at the Pretrial on December 29, 2025, U.S. District Judge Diane Gujarati warned Raysor that the witness list she had submitted for this meeting was deficient because she had subpoenaed irrelevant high-profile figures: Donald Trump, a former First Lady, Barack Obama, NYC Mayor Eric Adams, Reverend Al Sharpton and U.S. Senator Markwayne Mullin. At the January 20, 2026 meeting, Raysor’s filing remained noncompliant. So, on February 18, the judge refused to schedule a trial date until Raysor amended her witness list, and the case was referred to court mediation. On June 11, the parties held a video mediation settlement conference before a federal magistrate judge, but failed to reach an agreement. The judge issued another pretrial order on June 18 for Raysor to fix her filing, which she again refused at a July 8 hearing. Finally, on July 21, the city filed a motion to dismiss.
But the case was not immediately dismissed, and instead escalated on August 12-14 when Raysor submitted what the court termed “fantastical” filings that claimed her life was in danger. In this submission, Raysor explained why she was still insisting on subpoenaing high-profile individuals by stating: “I am running for President of United States of America and was when this event took place my witness are relevant.” She insisted she was refusing “to sit back and let the Law Department kill me.” She refused to cite “cases” because “this is a matter of life or death.” In parallel with these increasingly alarming to the defendants claims, she also set up a protest tent and began living outside the federal courthouse, and began posting photographs and alleged threats against the defense lawyers on YouTube and Instagram. She apparently did indeed register to run as an independent for president in the 2028 election: and this was partly what she was documenting on her social media.
Only after this breakdown—and not immediately afterwards but two weeks later—did Judge Gujarati finally dismiss this lawsuit with prejudice (i.e., without a right to appeal). Did the slowness of the American judicial system drive this filer mad, or did it drive her to the rational solution that instead of subpoenaing presidents she had to run for president to finally obtain some justice? Was she delusional at any point, or is this a woman who succeeded in manipulating judges to keep her case on their docket for a decade? Why was she given such extraordinary number of chances to amend her complaint? Plenty of pro se and public-defender litigants have rational claims rejected on technicalities. This case many lessons to teach us all. But these lessons are too mysterious for a law class.
