Category Archives: General Litigation & Trial Practice
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Collective Bargaining Agreements Must Be Interpreted Under Ordinary Principles of Contract Law
In a per curiam opinion in CNH Industrial N.V. v. Reese, the Court reversed the Sixth Circuit’s decision to apply its precedent to render a collective bargaining agreement ambiguous as a matter of law. In a previous case, M&G Polymers USA, LLC v. Tackett, 574 U.S. ___ (2015), the Court required the Sixth Circuit to interpret such agreements using ... Read More
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Prisoner’s Attorneys’ Fee Award Must First Come From The Judgment
Murphy v. Smith Under 42 U.S.C. sec. 1997e(d)(2), a prisoner who prevails in a civil rights suit, and receives an attorneys’ fee award, has a portion of his judgment, not to exceed 25 percent, applied to that award. When Charles Murphy won his suit against two prison guards, the district court ordered that Murphy pay ten percent of his attorney’s ... Read More
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Court Restricts Collections Efforts Under Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act
In Rubin v. Islamic Republic of Iran, certain parties obtained a judgment against Iran under the state sponsors of terrorism exception to the Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act. They then sought to enforce that judgment against Iranian historical artifacts housed at the University of Chicago. The district court declined to permit the attachment, and the Seventh Circuit affirmed. The Court, ... Read More
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Guilty Plea Does Not Bar A Constitutional Challenge To Conviction
Class v. United States When Rodney Class was indicted for possessing firearms in his locked vehicle parked at the U.S. Capitol, he moved to dismiss on the basis that the law violated his Second Amendment and Due Process rights under the Constitution. The district court declined Class’ motion, and he entered into a written plea agreement, which did not expressly ... Read More
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Court Reads Dodd-Frank Whistleblower Law Narrowly, Excludes Internal Whistleblower
Digital Realty Trust, Inc. v. Somers In 2014, Paul Somers, a vice president for a real estate investment trust, reported to senior management several suspected securities-law violations by the trust. He was subsequently terminated. He brought suit claiming protection as a whistleblower as defined under the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act of 2010, which defines whistleblowers as ... Read More
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United States Permitted To Intervene In Water Dispute Between States
In an original action concerning water rights agreed to between several states under the Rio Grande Compact, Texas argued that New Mexico was permitting its users to siphon off more water than the Compact permitted. The United States sought to intervene, making the same claims as Texas, in part because New Mexico’s actions depleted a reservoir through which the Government ... Read More
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Insider Status In Bankruptcy Reviewed For Clear Error, Not De Novo
In U.S. Bank, N.A. v. Village at Lakeridge, LLC, the Village petitioned for Chapter 11 bankruptcy with two primary creditors, U.S. Bank and an insider owner. It needed consent to enter into a “cramdown” reorganization plan, but U.S. Bank refused to consent, and the insider was statutorily unable to provide consent. To fix the problem, the insider owner transferred ... Read More
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Challenges to EPA “Waters of the United States” Rule Must Be Filed In Federal District Court
The Clean Water Act limits the discharge of pollutants into “navigable waters,” which is defined by Congress as “the waters of the United States.” The EPA issued a Rule to define that term. While most agency rules are properly challenged in the federal district courts, the Act required challenges to rules issuing “any effluent limitation” or “issuing or denying any ... Read More
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Court Holds That Tolling Statute “Stopped The Clock” On State Law Claims, Instead Of Providing A “Grace Period”
In Artis v. District of Columbia, Artis filed a suit against D.C. in federal court with a federal discrimination claim and some state claims. Two and a half years later, the district court dismissed the federal claim, and with it dismissed the state claims for lack of jurisdiction. Under 28 USC sec. 1367(d), the “period of limitations” for re-filing the ... Read More
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Court Finds Probable Cause To Arrest Partygoers For Unlawful Entry
When police officers busted a raucous party being held in a vacant house, some of the partygoers said that “Peaches” owned the house and allowed the party. On the phone, though, Peaches admitted she had no such authority, and the true owner told police he had never given anyone permission to be there. The officers arrested the partygoers for violating ... Read More
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Supreme Court Clarifies Which Deadlines Are Jurisdictional
In Hamer v. Neighborhood Housing Services of Chicago, the Court, in a unanimous opinion by Justice Ginsburg, set forth a clear and easy way to tell whether a deadline is jurisdictional, and cannot be waived or extended, or is merely a “claim-processing rule” that can be extended: deadlines provided by statute are jurisdictional, while deadlines provided by court rules are ... Read More
Congratulations to our Best Lawyers in America © 2018!
Jackson & Campbell would like to congratulate our Best Lawyers in America © for 2018 Arthur D. Burger, Ethics and Professional Responsibility Law David H. Cox Litigation - Real Estate; Real Estate Law William E. Davis, Litigation - Trusts & Estates; Trusts & Estates Roy L. Kaufmann, Real Estate Law James P. Schaller, Commercial Litigation; Ethics and Professional Responsibility Law ... Read More
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Court Applies Five-Year Limitations Period to SEC Disgorgement Actions
In Kokesh v. Securities and Exchange Commission, the SEC sought to force Kokesh to disgorge millions he had misappropriated from various businesses from 1995 to 2009. While the Supreme Court had long held that a five-year limitations period applied to any SEC “action, suit or proceeding for the enforcement of any civil fine, penalty, or forfeiture,” the district court held ... Read More
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Supreme Court Limits Government’s Power to Seize Personal Property
The Comprehensive Forfeiture Act mandates forfeiture of “any property constituting, or derived from, any proceeds the person obtained, directly or indirectly, as the result of” certain drug crimes. After brothers Tony and Terry Honeycutt were indicted for such drug crimes for selling a particular chemical through a hardware store Tony owned, Tony pled guilty and agreed to forfeit the bulk ... Read More
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An ERISA Church Pension Plan Need Not Be Established by a Church
Originally, the Employee Retirement Income Security Act exempted “church plans” from a variety of rules designed to ensure solvency, and defined those plans as having been “established and maintained . . . for its employees . . . by a church.” Later, Congress amended this exception to include “a plan maintained by an organization . . . the principal purpose ... Read More
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Court Affirms Virginia Court’s Application Of Juvenile Punishment Standards
In Graham v. Florida, 560 U.S. 48 (2010), the Court held that juvenile defendants convicted of nonhomicide offenses could not be sentenced to life without parole. Virginia had already abolished parole and instead replaced it with a “geriatric release” program which allowed older inmates to receive conditional release. In Virginia v. LeBlanc, LeBlanc was sentenced to life in prison for ... Read More
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Patent Holders May Not Use Federal Law To Issue Injunctions Against Applicants For Biosimilar Products
The Biologics Price Competition and Innovation Act of 2009 provides an abbreviated process for the FDA to approve drugs that are biosimilar to already licensed biological products. The Act, in part, requires an applicant for a biosimilar product to provide its application and manufacturing information to the patent holder within 20 days of the date the FDA notifies the applicant ... Read More
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Court Again Limits Ability To Appeal Denial Of Class Certification
Consumers who purchased Xbox 360s sued Microsoft both individually and as a class. The district court struck the class allegations, refusing to certify the class. The Ninth Circuit refused to hear the appeal of that ruling under Fed. R. Civ. P. 23(f), which allows such interlocutory appeals only by permission of the court of appeals. Instead of pursuing their individual ... Read More
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Court Again Limits Forum-Shopping In Suits Against Nationwide Companies
In Bristol-Myers Squibb Co. v. Superior Court of Cal., San Francisco City, a number of users of the drug Plavix sued the maker in California for alleged health problems caused by the drug, despite the fact that hardly any of the users lived in that state, and Bristol-Myers being incorporated in Delaware and headquartered in New York. None of the ... Read More
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Supreme Court: Posting To Facebook Is A First Amendment Right
A North Carolina law made it a felony for a registered sex offender “to access a commercial social networking Web site where the sex offender knows that the site permits minor children to become members or to create or maintain personal Web pages.” When a sex offender posted on Facebook about getting a traffic ticket dismissed, he was convicted and ... Read More
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September 11 Detainees Denied A Bivens Action For Their Detention
In Ziglar v. Abbasi, the Court was asked to extend the implied cause of action theories under Bivens v. Six Unknown Fed. Narcotics Agents, 403 U.S. 388 (1971) to alleged constitutional violations six men claimed to have suffered during detention shortly after the September 11 terrorist attacks. The Second Circuit permitted the claims to go forward against certain executive officials, ... Read More
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Supreme Court Clarifies Expert Psychiatric Assistance In Indigent Defendant Cases
The Court had previously held in Ake v. Oklahoma, 470 U.S. 68 (1985), that when an indigent defendant’s mental condition is relevant to his criminal culpability, the State must provide that defendant with access to a mental health expert who is sufficiently available to the defense, and independent from the prosecution, to conduct a psychiatric examination and “assist in evaluation, ... Read More
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SCOTUS: Disparaging Trademarks Have First Amendment Protection
The Lanham Act has a provision prohibiting the registration of trademarks that “disparage . . . or bring . . . into contemp[t] or disrepute” and “persons, living or dead.” Simon Tam, lead singer of the Japanese rock band “The Slants” sued when the band’s name was denied registration. The Federal Circuit held that the disparagement clause was facially unconstitutional ... Read More
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Justice Gorsuch’s First Majority Opinion Is A Win For Debt Purchasers
In Henson v. Santander Consumer USA, Inc., Justice Gorsuch authored the unanimous decision in a decidedly conversational tone, holding that an entity that purchases another’s debt and then seeks to collect that debt is not a “debt collector” under the Fair Debt Collection Practices Act, and thus is not beholden to that Act’s strictures for debt collection. The Act defines ... Read More
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