In an Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) action based on defendant’s failure to hire plaintiff, summary judgment for defendant is affirmed where plaintiff failed to rebut defendant’s evidence suggesting that the male candidate it hired as Fiscal Officer had superior qualifications to plaintiff’s, as well as its evidence that she was not, at the time of the hiring decision, disabled within the meaning of the ADA. Read Johnson v. Weld County, No....
Courts must be allowed to consider evidence that jurors relied on racial bias or animus in convicting a defendant, the Supreme Court ruled yesterday. The ruling creates an important exception to the so-called “no-impeachment rule,” a rule of evidence that bars post-verdict testimony about juror deliberations. When those deliberations, due to juror bias, may have violated a defendant’s Sixth Amendment right to an impartial jury, courts must be allowed to consider such evidence, the Court explained in a 5-3 decision written by Justice Kennedy....
Juvenile records are generally sealed, but the Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals ruled this week that a district court could use a defendant’s juvenile adjudication as the basis for a sentence enhancement in a child pornography case. Francis Joseph Woodard pleaded guilty to possession of child pornography. The statutory sentencing range for a child porn possession is 0 to 10 years imprisonment. That range increases to not less than 10 years nor more than 20 years for a defendant who has a prior conviction involving sexual abuse....
In a proceeding to enforce a default judgment, denial of petitioner’s motion seeking an order and requiring respondent to deliver to petitioner certain stock certificates is vacated where a court sitting in New York may order a bank over which it has personal jurisdiction to deliver stock certificates owned by a judgment debtor (or cash equal to their value) to a judgment creditor, pursuant to N.Y. C.P.L.R. Article 52, when those stock certificates are located outside New York....
If you’ve never heard of Sturgis before, either you’re allergic to two wheeled motor vehicles, or you just haven’t known anyone who just won’t shut up about it. Sturgis, South Dakota is home of the largest, and longest running, annual motorcycle rally in the country, and probably the world. Over the decades, merchandising, licensing, and commercialization have slowly crept into the annual rally. But unfortunately for the group purporting to hold all the rights, the Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals recently ruled that the organizer’s Sturgis trademark was invalid....
A California hospital secretly filmed 1,800 women during births, hysterectomies, and other procedures, according to a new lawsuit. The plaintiffs claim the recordings took place inside labor and delivery rooms at Sharp Grossmont Hospital and Sharp HealthCare in El Cajon. The hospital says the surveillance was part of an investigation “into whether an employee was stealing anesthesia,” court documents say. But the videos, which were made during a year-long period, showed a lot more than employees at work....
A federal appeals court said parking enforcement officers cannot chalk tires to track how long cars have been parked. In Taylor v. City of Saginaw, the U.S. Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals said the chalking/tracking violates the Constitution. The unanimous court said the practice violates the right to be free from unreasonable searches. It’s like entering property without a search warrant, the appeals panel said. Meanwhile, parking police scratched their heads and car alarms went off everywhere....
President Biden has promised the Department of Justice will issue new regulations regarding ghost guns by May 8. Ghost guns are unregistered gun kits that can be ordered online and then assembled by the buyer. The regulations will also cover related 3D printed guns, the blueprints of which can be downloaded online and used to manufacture firearms that can be very hard to trace. Meanwhile, the 9th Circuit held in a recent opinion that courts do not have the right to prohibit a Trump administration regulation making it easier to download blueprints for 3D printed guns....
Every time we read an opinion, like the one in this Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals case, in which a court determines that a search was consensual because a “reasonable person” would known that he was free to leave a police interview, we wonder: Who are these “reasonable people?” We’re lawyers. We read suppression opinions all day long. And if a police officer pulled us over, asked us questions, told us “thank you, have a safe trip,” but then asked if he could ask more questions, we wouldn’t feel like we were free to leave....
In a case of biting that hand that fed her, a woman sued a free, drug-addiction recovery program under the Fair Housing Act (FHA), saying that the organization forced her to participate in religious services. In an opinion released on Monday, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that the claim failed as a matter of law. The Boise Rescue Mission (BRM), originally incorporated as Christ’s Gospel Mission, Inc., operates an “intensive, Christ-based residential recovery program for people with chemical dependency or alcoholism....
This week, Judge Richard Posner authored a rather pithy and readable opinion in which his court affirmed a lower district court’s dismissal of a relator’s claim seeking a hefty reward for shining a light on a contractor’s fraud. Nice try, said Judge Posner. You can’t collect a bounty for a target already in hand. Heard About the Kickbacks Scheme? Medline, a major seller of medical equipment to medical providers who get reimbursed by federal programs including medicare, was sued in a qui tam suit by plaintiff Bogina on behalf of the United States....
Same-sex nuptials have taken place in parts of Alabama, after the U.S. Supreme Court voted 7-2 not to stay enforcement of a federal judge’s order that the state’s gay marriage ban was unconstitutional. The High Court’s decision paved the way for same-sex marriages to begin immediately (though some county courts still declined to issue marriage licenses, AL.com reports). Wait – I did say “7-2,” didn’t I? Justice Clarence Thomas, joined by Justice Antonin Scalia, wrote a three-page dissent that Court watchers are saying tips the Court’s hand vis-a-vis same sex marriage....
Leaving in force an appeals court decision that struck down North Carolina laws that targeted African-American voters, the U.S. Supreme Court declined to hear a challenge to the decision. The high court gave no reason for refusing to hear the case, but Chief Justice John Roberts said its action should not be read to say anything about the merits. Instead, he suggested it was more about the battle between the government officials who had petitioned for review and then retracted the request....
Could Southampton get a casino after all? The Second Circuit Court of Appeals ruled on Monday that the battle over a new Native American casino should be handled in state court, not federal court, reports The Wall Street Journal. The Shinnecock Indian Nation began construction of a 61,000-square-foot casino on a Southampton plot known as Westwoods in 2003. The same year, the State of New York, the New York State Racing and Wagering Board, and the New York State Department Of Environmental Conservation, (together, the State), sued the Tribe in New York State Supreme Court to stop the construction....
Many creditors have disagreements with their credit card company. Whether it’s a disputed charge, a surprise annual fee, or a shift in the interest rate, disputes are bound to happen. When an issue arises, most user agreements mean consumers are obliged to resolve those disputes via arbitration rather than lawsuits. But those days may be over. Suing a Credit Card Company A 2012 rule from the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) allows consumers to bring class action lawsuits against financial institutions like credit card companies....
Defendant’s firearm possession conviction is affirmed where defendant argued that he was entitled to possess guns for hunting on a Navajo reservation pursuant to a treaty between the United States and the Navajo Nation, but defendant forfeited those rights by committing his prior felonies. Read US v. Fox, No. 08-2190 Appellate Information Filed July 29, 2009 Judges Opinion by Judge McConnell Counsel For Appellant: Roger A. Finzel, Assistant Federal Public Defender, Albuquerque, NM...
District court’s grant of defendant’s motion to dismiss retrial for mail fraud is reversed as it incorrectly determined that issue preclusion applied since the defendant failed to meet his burden of demonstrating that the acquittals in the first trial necessarily decided in his favor an issue that would be ultimately be required to convict him in the second, and as such, nothing about defendant’s conspiracy acquittal leads to a conclusion that the jury necessarily determined that he did not act with an intent to defraud....
Petition for Review of Removal Order Denied In Valadez-Munoz v. Holder, No. 06-72510, a petition for review of the Board of Immigration Appeals’ (BIA) dismissal of petitioner’s appeal from the Immigration Judge’s (IJ) order of removal, the court denied the petition where 1) the BIA did not improperly determine that petitioner had “falsely represented himself . . . to be a citizen of the United States” under 8 U.S.C. section 1182(a)(6)(C)(ii)(I); and 2) the BIA did not err when it determined that petitioner could not take advantage of the timely recantation doctrine....
Jules Verne, Gene Rodenberry, and George Lucas imagined cities of the future, but they will not live there. Neither will most lawyers. That’s because it will be at least a generation before anybody can take flying cars to work and vacations in space. For now, lawyers will be lucky if they get in on the ground floor of the next big thing. But it’s fun to think about practicing law in a future city – as long as the robots don’t take over first....
The Tenth Circuit held that Universal Underwriters Insurance Company (parent company, Zurich), the insurer of a car dealership, had a duty to defend he dealership when it was sued. Automax Hyundai South, was sued by two of its customers who alleged that Automax had fraudulently represented the condition of the car they sold and that they had inflated the income of one of the customers to ensure loan approval, among many other claims....
