United States Court of Appeals For the Seventh Circuit ____________________ No. 23-1086 JORDAN WHITAKER, Plaintiff-Appellant, v. MICHAEL DEMPSEY, et al., Defendants-Appellees. ____________________

Appeal from the United States District Court for the Northern District of Illinois, Western Division. No. 18 CV 50373 — Philip G. Reinhard, Judge. ____________________

SUBMITTED JULY 24, 2023 — DECIDED OCTOBER 10, 2023 ____________________ WOOD, Circuit Judge, in chambers. Jordan Whitaker, an Il- linois prisoner, seeks leave to appeal in forma pauperis. He had just enough money to pay in full the appellate filing and dock- eting fees when he filed the notice of appeal, and so the dis- trict court denied the request. Whitaker now renews his mo- tion with this court. FED. R. APP. P. 24(a)(5). Because the dis- trict court did not adequately consider the balance the Prison Litigation Reform Act (PLRA) struck between the need to col- lect fees and a prisoner’s discretionary use of his funds, I grant 2 No. 23-1086 Whitaker’s motion and provide this explanation for the bene- fit of courts considering similar requests in the future. The normal rule in federal court is that plaintiffs and ap- pellants must prepay fees when initiating litigation. See 28 U.S.C. § 1914(c); FED. R. APP. P. 3(e). Those who cannot afford to prepay fees may move for leave to proceed in forma pau- peris. 28 U.S.C. § 1915(a)(1). If the motion is successful, the court will waive the prepayment requirement, though the lit- igant continues to owe the fees. See Abdul-Wadood v. Nathan, 91 F.3d 1023, 1025 (7th Cir. 1996). To that end, the PLRA man- dates that a court apply a statutory formula to any prisoner bringing a case in forma pauperis and collect an initial partial filing fee equal to 20% of the greater of the prisoner’s average monthly deposits or balances in the past six months, and then collect the remainder of the fees in installments based on 20% of the prisoner’s monthly income until the full debt is paid. 28 U.S.C. § 1915(b)(1)–(3). The current cost for bringing an ap- peal is $505, comprised of a $5 fee for filing a notice of appeal under 28 U.S.C. § 1917 and a $500 docketing fee under § 1913. Whitaker is appealing an adverse order of summary judg- ment on his claims that officials at Illinois’s Dixon Correc- tional Center were deliberately indifferent to the risk that he would harm himself. The district court entered final judgment on December 12, 2022, and Whitaker filed a timely notice of appeal on January 11, 2023, thus incurring the obligation to pay $505. After some delay attributable to miscommunica- tions between him and the district court, Whitaker moved for leave to proceed in forma pauperis and attached the prison trust No. 23-1086 3 account statement required by the PLRA. 1 28 U.S.C. § 1915(a)(2). The statement showed a current balance of $45 as of May 12, 2023, but on January 6—just before the notice of appeal—Whitaker had a balance of $573. Between those points, he had received $282 in additional deposits; he spent almost all his money at the prison commissary, with a small remainder going to postage. The district court denied the motion. It recognized that el- igibility to proceed as a pauper depended on the litigant’s sit- uation when the fee became due. See Robbins v. Switzer, 104 F.3d 895, 898 (7th Cir. 1997). And, it observed, Whitaker had enough money to pay the fees in full when they were due and when this court sent him a notice informing him as much. Be- cause Whitaker, like other prisoners, received “the necessities of life” from the state, Lumbert v. Ill. Dep'