Fourth Circuit: Jeffrey Quatrone v. Gannett Company, Inc.

  Plan's retention of substantial amounts of spun-off business' stock in a single stock fund states a claim against the Administrator's common law duty of prudence.

While allowing the participants to select funds can satisfy the statutory duty of diversification, it does not address common-law prudence.

Liability is possible where a frozen defined contribution plan does not timely divest the single-stock fund.

Dissent: 

Participants could allocate their investments.  The fact that prudence and diversification are codified separately means that they shouldn't be merged in common-law analysis.

[Again, folks, just my scribbling.  This is never legal advice.]

Jeffrey Quatrone v. Gannett Company, Inc.

Fourth Circuit: Colette Wilcox v. Nathan Lyons

 

Generic claim of retaliation actionable as gender discrimination under Title VII does not sound as a cause of action under S1983; Section VII explicitly includes retaliation as an actionable harm, and this would be surplussage if inherent in the right.

Circuit split flagged.

Colette Wilcox v. Nathan Lyons

Fourth Circuit: US v. Mohamad Khweis

 Sufficient attenuation in time, place, and interrogators between un-Mirandized US law enforcement intelligence questioning of US citizen in the custory of a foreign state and subsequent Mirandized admissions.  Belief that admission of guilt to a US crime was a necessary condition of being released to US custody did not make the Mirandized statements involuntary.

Conspiracy to provide support to enemy force does not involve use of force sufficient to qualify as a crime of violence.

Concur/dissent: given duration of initial interrogation, attenuation in time and place within a deliberate two-step was insufficient, deft should have been told of inadmissibility of earlier statements.  

US v. Mohamad Khweis

Third Circuit: USA v. Julious Bullock

Categorically, division of statute that criminalizes assualting, resisting, or impeding certain federal employees or officers is a crime of violence for purposes of the sentencing bump.  As the element requires a display of physical aggression, it necessarily involves a use or threatened use of force.

USA v. Julious Bullock

Second Circuit: Metzler Investment GmbH and Construction Laborers Pension Trust

 

The District Court did not abuse its discretion in denying a motion for relief from the judgment as antecedent to leave to amend the complaint, as the complaint had already been amended once, the court explained the deficiencies, and the plaintiffs chose instead to wait for discovery to vindicate the claim.  The court's requirement of newly discovered evidence was appropriate, as movant identified no other extraordinary circumstances justifying relief.

Metzler Investment GmbH and Construction Laborers Pension Trust

Second Circuit: Perkins v. Commissioner

 

Treaty with Indian nation guaranteeing free use and enjoyment of land did not create a presumption of immunity from tax as an analogue to the general exemption in later private allotment Act.

Treaty with Indian nation guaranteeing freedom from taxes and assessments on the land, construed as the nation would have understood it, does not except usage and extraction by members of the tribe from taxation -- it merely addresses the possessory interest.

Perkins v. Commissioner

First CIrcuit: US v. Mejia Romero

 

Given reasonable inferences to be drawn from the warrant application according to the deft's behoof, sufficient nexus between the property, the deft, and the alleged crime, as the whole is greater than the sum of its parts.

Offense proscibed knowing crimal activity involving a certain type and quantity of drug, not necessarily the known involvement of a certain type and quantity of drug.

US v. Mejia Romero

First Circuit: Feliciano-Munoz v. Rebarber-Ocasio

While there is authority for the idea that a motion to dismiss can be converted to a motion for summary judgment, there is no authority for the opposite, as the cour would be sua sponte lowering the threshold requirements for the movant -- the fact that a cucumber can be made into a pickle doesn't necessarily mean that a pickle can be turned into a cucumber.

District court correctly construed the allegation of misrepresentations in the amended complaint to be a claim for fraud in the inducement (dolo), and correctly applied the sophisticated purchaser defense to determine that the purchaser's reliance was not reasonable.

Feliciano-Munoz v. Rebarber-Ocasio

Federal Circuit: The Boeing Company v. US

 

Government contractor did not waive statutorily mandated offsetting payments in contract terms that elected the governing administrative regulation that prohibited such offsets, since the government counterparty to the contract was required to follow the regulation that was contrary to law.

Government would have to at minimum identify a viable avenue of judicial redress available to contractor at formation.

Tucker Act jurisdiction for an illegal exaction claim requires nonfrivolous claim that the government, in obtaining the money, has violated federal constitution, statute, or regulation -- establishing that the claim is "money mandating" is not a jurisdictional threshhold.

The Boeing Company v. US

DC Circuit: Committee on the Judiciary v. Donald McGahn, II

 

Administration official's noncompliance with unchallenged legislative subpoena in furtherance of an enumerated power of the congress is sufficient concrete injury for Article III standing.

As the rules of the House delegate the subpoena power to the committee plaintiff, the harm is sufficiently particularized.

Appearance with sought documents would redress the harm.

Absent questions of individual particularized harm, separation of powers concerns do not inherently implicate standing.

Judicial enforcement of legislative subpoenas is the longstanding practice, doesn't disrupt balancing between legislative and executive since challenges to the subpoenas can be disputed, and much of the relevant precedent deals with the standing of individual legislators.

Dissent:

Judicial interference has only been the norm for about 40 years, other mechanisms exist.

Dissent:

Justiciability implicates injury-in-fact, as the analogy between harming a person and harming a branch of government is imprecise; separation of powers is inherently a consideration proper to standing analysis; denial of enumerated prerogative opens the door too widely; would permanently entangle the DC Circuit in the oversight process; Scotus has never resolved an interbranch dispute; unlike the Senate, the House has no legislative authority to seek judicial enforcement of subpoenas; even assuming standing arguendo, House plaintiff has no statutory or equitable cause of action; judicial enforcement diminishes the threat of impeachment.

Committee on the Judiciary v. Donald McGahn, II

DC Circuit: United States House of Representatives v. Steven Mnuchin (ORDER)

 

(Denial of en banc with remand to consider intervening precedent.)

Dissent from remand:

Parties did not necessarily agree with the implied QP of the consolidated cases.  Gathering for en banc and then punting wastes resources.

Dissent from remand:

Nonjusticiable.  Especially when only raised by one chamber.  Granting en banc sua sponte prior to panel holding was rare, and presumably done to cabin the holding with respect to the facts of the companion case.

United States House of Representatives v. Steven Mnuchin (ORDER)

DC Circuit: George Johnson v. CRB (SEALED) / In re: Sealed Case

 

This is not the case that you are looking for.

George Johnson v. CRB (SEALED)

Eleventh Circuit: SMILEDIRECTCLUB, LLC v. Tanja D. Battle, et al.

 

Ruling on state-action immunity is sufficiently similar to one on qualified immunity to be the subject of interlocutory appeal as a collateral order.  (This is a "binding alternative holding.")

Pro forma acceptance of Dental Board's rulemaking by the state's executive is insufficient active supervision by the government to shield the Board from antitrust claims under the state action doctrine; similarly, such acceptance of the rulemaking does not make the change an act of the sovereign, which would be shielded from suit ipso facto.

Concur / Joined in full:

Denial of state action immunity is a question of the interpretation of the Sherman Act, not one of constitutional right, and can be addressed after final judgment, especially in cases involving private parties.  Circuit split flagged.

Dissent:

As the lower court reserved judgment on the state action immunity claim for summary judgment, when the record would be more fully developed, the denial is insufficiently final, and the order risks contradiction by subsequent development of the record prior to summary judgment.

SMILEDIRECTCLUB, LLC v. Tanja D. Battle, et al

Ninth Circuit: Arconic, Inc. v. APC Investment Co.

 

Where a statute creates a right to seek contribution to an environmental settlement or judgment but provides that such contribution must be sought within three years of the entry of judgment, seeking contributions from de minimis co-polluters that indemnify them against any future claims does not start the clock to seek other contributions within a prospective limitations period triggered by a subsequent claim against the same site.  A right to contribution can't arise until the judgment creating the liability is entered, and this division of eligible costs serves the purposes of the law

Judicial estoppel similarly does not preclude seeking a second round of contributions for a second judgment, as there's no inconsistency.

Arconic, Inc. v. APC Investment Co.

Ninth Circuit: Miguel Reynaga Hernandez v. Derrek Skinner

 

As there was no particular and objective basis for the Terry stop and the arrest of the foreign national was effectuated by handcuffing and placing into the patrol car prior to the contact with federal immigration authorities that gave probable cause for the arrest, S1983 suit against the officer states a claim.

As the actions of the Justice of the Police who called the officer to the courtroom upon leaning from a testifying witness that the plaintiff was in the country illegally were both a but/for cause and a proximate cause of the deprivation of 4A, the JP was a sufficiently integral participant for the purposes of a S1983 claim.

Circuit caselaw was clearly established at time, holding that lack of documentation or other admission of illegal presence was insufficient probable cause for an arrest for illegal entry.

Miguel Reynaga Hernandez v. Derrek Skinner

Ninth Circuit: USA v. Alexander Oriho

 

Court order to repatriate funds is sufficiently final for interlocutory review.

Order to a pretrial detainee to repatriate funds in the amount of the alleged fraud violates 5A privilege against self-incrimination, as the location of many of the funds haven't been established or suggested by the government, and the limited use immunity offered by the prosecuting jurisdiction would not protect against use of information as a link in the chain or against uses by other jurisdictions.

USA v. Alexander Oriho

Ninth Circuit: USA v. Juan Fuentes-Galvez

 

As  ensuring that the plea is knowing and voluntary under FRCrimP. Rule 11 implicates an alien deft's 5A Due Process rights, magistrate judge's plea colloquy that merely asked deft if his plea was voluntary was plain error.

USA v. Juan Fuentes-Galvez

Seventh Circuit: Todd Kurtzhals v. County of Dunn

 

Loss of reasonably expected overtime pay is sufficiently materially adverse to present an issue for trial on an ADA claim by an employee placed on paid leave.

Insufficient evidence of pretext to present an issue for trial where the employee's action facially violated workplace rules, but the employee claims that the supervisor's knowledge of employee's PTSD was a but-for cause of the adverse action.

Subsequent fitness for duty evaluation was not proscribed by statute or inconsistent with business necessity, given responsibilities of police officers.

Todd Kurtzhals v. County of Dunn

Seventh Circuit: USA v. Earl R. Orr

 

Warrant affidavit that didn't include any actual statements of the confidential informant was sufficiently backed by information from investigation, and the good faith exception would save in in any event.

Discretionary rulings during the cross of the deft -- opening the door to evidence of contraband and past convictions -- justify retrial given prior finding of improper ex parte communications between the prosecutor and the judge.

USA v. Earl R. Orr

Sixth Circuit: Todd Courser v. Keith Allard

 

Court appropriately dismissed S1983 & S1985 claims, as the constitutional interests were not pleaded with particularity.

Court appropriately did the same to state constitutional claims, as those are limited to official-capacity claims.

Alleged CFAA violations resulted in no harm, and there is no civil c/a to enforce the criminal elements of the statute.

Defamation claim was time-barred under state SOL.

To state a claim for civil conspiracy, the underlying tort harm needs to be established -- the defts can't be implicated in a tort that requires them to be the tortfeasors by a claim of conspiracy.

Other tort and RICO claims legally or factually insufficient.

Wiretap Act time-barred.

Court appropriately set aside default judgment against one deft on equitable grounds.

Todd Courser v. Keith Allard