Miller v. Safe Home Security, Inc. et al

THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT
DISTRICT OF UTAH
GREGORY R. MILLER, an individual,
Plaintiff,
v.
SAFE HOME SECURITY, INC.; and
SECURITY SYSTEMS, INC.,
Defendants.
REPORT AND RECOMMENDATION
Case No. 2:25-cv-00172-JNP-JCB
Chief District Judge Jill N. Parrish
Magistrate Judge Jared C. Bennett
I NTRODUCTION1
American author, Arthur Bloch, once observed, “Friends come and go, but enemies
accumulate.”2 This lawsuit supports that observation. The amended complaint3 painstakingly
details Plaintiff Gregory R. Miller’s (“Mr. Miller”) labyrinthine journey from first acquiring Jack
Elbaum (“Mr. Elbaum”) as an enemy,4 followed by Mr. Elbaum’s Utah companies,5 to finally
1 This case is referred to Magistrate Judge Jared C. Bennett under 28 U.S.C. § 636(b)(1)(B). ECF
No. 16.
2 Arthur Bloch, Murphy’s Law: The 26th Anniversary Edition, 84 (2003).
3 ECF No. 14.
4 Miller v. Elbaum, No. 2:22-cv-00587-HCN; Fluent Home LTD v. Elbaum, No. 2:18-cv-00570-
TC, ECF Nos. 43, 52 (Mr. Miller’s motions to intervene). There are also actions filed in state
court furthering this enmity. See, e.g., NPEC, LLC v. Miller, No. 130905131 (3d Dist. Ct. Utah
2013).
5 Miller v. Stormont, No. 2:25-cv-00857-AMA-DAO; Glyde Solar, LLC v. Newby, No. 2:24-cv-
00057-AMA, ECF No. 37 (Mr. Miller’s motion to intervene).
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adding Defendants Safe Home Security, Inc. (“SHSI”) and Security Systems, Inc. (“SSI”), which
are Connecticut companies with which Mr. Elbaum is allegedly affiliated.
This labyrinthine journey is precisely the problem here in terms of complying with Fed.
R. Civ. P. 8’s requirement that a complaint contain “a short and plain statement of the claim
showing that the pleader is entitled to relief.”6 As shown below, the amended complaint is so full
of irrelevant allegations cataloguing Mr. Miller’s enemy-accumulating odyssey that the court
struggles to figure out which well-pleaded facts show that Mr. Miller is entitled to relief from the
only two named defendants, SHSI and SSI. Consequently, the court recommends dismissal
without prejudice, granting Mr. Miller leave to amend his complaint so that he can comply with
Rule 8, and denying as moot SHSI and SSI’s motion to dismiss.7
ANALYSIS
Mr. Miller’s amended complaint fails to comply with Rule 8. Under Rule 8, a complaint
“must contain . . . a short and plain statement of the claim showing that the pleader is entitled to
relief,”8 and “[e]ach allegation must be simple, concise, and direct.”9 “Rule 8 serves the
important purpose of requiring [a plaintiff] to state [his] claims intelligibly so as to inform the
defendants of the legal claims being asserted.”10 To comply with Rule 8,
a complaint must explain what each defendant did to [the plaintiff];
when the defendant did it; how the defendant’s action harmed [the
plaintiff]; and, what specific legal right the plaintiff believes the
6 Fed. R. Civ. P. 8(a)(2).
7 ECF No. 17.
8 Fed. R. Civ. P. 8(a)(2).
9 Fed. R. Civ. P. 8(d)(1).
10 Mann v. Boatright, 477 F.3d 1140, 1148 (10th Cir. 2007); see also United States ex rel. Brooks
v. Stevens-Henager Coll., 305 F. Supp. 3d 1279, 1307 (D. Utah 2018).
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defendant violated. . . . [T]hese are, very basically put, the elements
that 	enable 	the 	legal 	system 	to 	get 	weaving—permitting 	the
defendant sufficient notice to begin preparing its defense[,] and the
court sufficient clarity to adjudicate the merits.11
Additionally, “[a] Rule 8 pleading is not the proper place for the plaintiff to plead all of
the evidence or to fully argue the claims.”12 “Something labeled a complaint but written more as
a press release, prolix in evidentiary detail, yet without simplicity, conciseness[,] and clarity as to
whom [the plaintiff is] suing for what wrongs, fails to perform the essential functions of a
complaint.”13 “It is not the role of the court to sort through a lengthy complaint to construct the
plaintiff’s case.”14
If a complaint does not comply with Rule 8, “a court may dismiss it under [Fed. R. Civ. P.
41(b)] for failure ‘to comply with [the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure].’”15 “Employing Rule
41(b) to dismiss a case without prejudice for failure to comply with Rule 8 . . . allows the
plaintiff another go at trimming the verbiage; accordingly, a district court may, without abusing
its discretion, enter such an order without attention to any particular procedures.”16
11 Nasious v. Two Unknown B.I.C.E. Agents, 492 F.3d 1158, 1163 (10th Cir. 2007); see also
Stevens-Henager Coll., 305 F. Supp. 3d at 1307.
12 Chavez v. Huerfano Cnty., 195 F. App’x 728, 730 (10th Cir. 2006).
13 Mann, 477 F.3d at 1148 (citation modified); see also Stevens-Henager Coll., 305 F. Supp. 3d at
1307.
14 Chavez, 195 F. App’x at 730.
15 Stevens-Henager Coll., 305 F. Supp. 3d at 1307 (quoting Fed. R. Civ. P. 41(b)) (second
alteration in original).
16 Nasious, 492 F.3d at 1162.
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Mr. Miller’s amended complaint is neither “a short and plain statement . . . showing that
[he] is entitled to relief,”17 nor are its allegations “simple, concise, and direct.”18 Any reader
easily becomes lost in the labyrinthine prose and wonders how the allegations actually provide
facts sufficient to state a claim against SHSI and SSI. As stated above, “[i]t is not the role of the
court to sort through a lengthy complaint to construct the plaintiff’s case.”19 Further, even putting
aside its length, Mr. Miller’s amended complaint does not contain sufficient allegations to
apprise either defendant of what each of them did to Mr. Miller; when each of them did it; how
each of their actions harmed Mr. Miller; and what specific legal right Mr. Miller believes each of
them violated.20 To the contrary, the overwhelming majority of Mr. Miller’s factual allegations
are about other people, entities, and proceedings involving them without any specific link to any
particular cause of action, making it impossible for the two named defendants to determine
which claims are made against them individually.21 By doing so, Mr. Miller fails to set forth his
claims in a way that gives SHSI and SSI “sufficient notice to begin preparing [their] defense[,]
and the court sufficient clarity to adjudicate the merits.”22
17 Fed. R. Civ. P. 8(a)(2).
18 Fed. R. Civ. P. 8(d)(1).
19 Chavez, 195 F. App’x at 730.
20 Nasious, 492 F.3d at 1163.
21 Hart v. Salois, 605 F. App’x 694, 701 (10th Cir. 2015) (“It is not the sheer length of his filing,
the number of paragraphs, or the number of claims, that triggers the Rule 8 violation. Rather, the
culprit is [the plaintiff]’s failure to connect his 60 separate claims to the [c]omplaint’s hundreds
of factual allegations. Moreover, [the plaintiff]’s multiple collective allegations against the
defendants and his corresponding failure to identify each individual defendant’s culpable actions
only exacerbated this significant deficiency.”).
22 Nasious, 492 F.3d at 1163.
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Relatedly, Mr. Miller’s amended complaint improperly engages in the disfavored practice
of “group pleading.” The United States Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit has oft criticized
this practice where a complaint uses “defendants” as a collective term and fails to distinguish as
to what acts are attributable to whom.23 After relating his lengthy, enemy-accumulation saga, Mr.
Miller abruptly alleges that “Defendants published websites under [Mr.] Miller’s name”24 that
were harmful to him. Other than showing that Mr. Elbaum is affiliated with SHSI and SSI, the
amended complaint fails to provide any well-pleaded factual allegations showing how these two
defendants are even affiliated with the offending websites. Moreover, even if the court infers that
Mr. Elbaum is the author of the websites, there is nothing in the amended complaint to suggest
that he authored the websites in his capacity as an officer of either SHSI or SSI. Mr. Miller’s
group pleading approach further illustrates the prolix nature of his amended complaint.
Because Mr. Miller’s amended complaint does not comply with Rule 8, it should be
dismissed without prejudice under Rule 41(b),25 but considering Mr. Miller’s pro se status, the
23 See, e.g., Robbins v. Oklahoma, 519 F.3d 1242, 1250 (10th Cir. 2008).
24 ECF No. 14 at 16. The court is not citing to paragraph numbers in the amended complaint
because they inexplicably repeat numbers. For example, from pages 1-7, the paragraphs
sequentially number 1-38. But then, instead of paragraph 39, the paragraph following 38 is
paragraph 36. This same oddity occurs again on page 9 when the paragraph following 44 is 39.
These numbering oddities along with the enemy-accumulating odyssey that the amended
complaint details lead the court to believe that this amended complaint is merely the copy-and-
paste accumulation of actions past. That does not help Mr. Miller comply with Rule 8.
25 Nasious, 492 F.3d at 1162 (providing that a court may “dismiss a case without prejudice for
failure to comply with Rule 8 . . . without abusing its discretion [and] without attention to any
particular procedures” and that the “harsher remedy” of dismissal with prejudice is appropriate
only if the court considers certain criteria, including whether the court warned the plaintiff in
advance that dismissal with prejudice was a likely sanction).
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court should provide him with leave to amend his complaint.26 Mr. Miller should be warned that
his amended complaint must comply with Rule 8, or it will be subject to dismissal with prejudice
under Rule 41(b).
RECOMMENDATION
For the reasons stated above, the court HEREBY RECOMMENDS:
1. 	Mr. Miller’s amended complaint27 be DISMISSED WITHOUT PREJUDICE
under Rule 41(b) as a prolix, group pleading.
2. 	Considering Mr. Miller’s pro se status, he be allowed to amend his complaint to
comply with Rule 8.
3. 	Mr. Miller be warned that his amended complaint must comply with Rule 8, or it
will be subject to dismissal with prejudice under Rule 41(b).
4. 	SHSI and SSI’s motion to dismiss28 be DENIED AS MOOT.
NOTICE TO PARTIES
Copies of this Report and Recommendation are being sent to all parties, who are hereby
notified of their right to object.29 The parties must file any objections to this Report and
Recommendation within 14 days after being served with a copy of it.30 Failure to object may
constitute waiver of objections upon subsequent review.
26 Stevens-Henager Coll., 305 F. Supp. 3d at 1307-11 (dismissing a complaint without prejudice
under Rule 41(b) because the complaint did not comply with Rule 8 and providing leave to file
an amended complaint).
27 ECF No. 14.
28 ECF No. 17.
29 28 U.S.C. § 636(b)(1); Fed. R. Civ. P. 72(b)(2).
30 28 U.S.C. § 636(b)(1); Fed. R. Civ. P. 72(b)(2).
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DATED this 3rd day of February 2026.
BY THE COURT:
JARED C. BENNETT
United States Magistrate Judge
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