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Government Law
[09/09]
Baseload Energy, Inc. v. Roberts
In plaintiff's action seeking a declaratory judgment that defendant's patent related to a flying wind turbine was invalid and unenforceable, district court's grant of defendant's motion for summary judgment in holding that the terms of the parties' 2008 settlement agreement barred all claims between the parties is reversed as the language of the settlement agreement did not release either claims of infringement of the patent or the accompanying defenses of invalidity or unenforceability.
[09/09]
Byrum v. Office of Pers. Mgmt.
In deceased federal employee's daughter's claim to death benefits, which were assigned to the daughter after the employee's husband was found civilly liable for the employee's death, the Merit Systems Protection Board's affirmance of the Office of Personnel Management's (OPM) denial of the claim on the ground that petitioner was not the spouse of the deceased is vacated and remanded where: 1) petitioner is seeking all available death benefits attributable to her mother's services, and specifically including both the lump sum and the annuity provided under section 8442(b); 2) pursuant to a Texas court's turnover order, the employee's husband assigned to petitioner all available death benefits to which he may have had a claim under FERS, including both the lump sum and the annuity in section 8442(b); and 3) by not deciding the claim for benefits as submitted, OPM failed to carry out its statutory duty to petitioner and her deceased mother and the Board compounded the problem by affirming the OPM's reconsideration decision on narrow grounds and declining to address the issues raised by petitioner.
[09/09]
Lozano v. City of Hazleton
In plaintiffs' suit against the City of Hazleton to enjoin enforcement of ordinances that attempt to regulate employment of, and provision of rental housing to, certain aliens, district court's entry of permanent injunction against the city is affirmed in part, vacated in part and remanded where: 1) district court erred in reaching the merits of the challenge to the private cause of action provision because no plaintiff has standing to challenge that provision; 2) the employment provisions of the ordinances stand as an obstacle to the accomplishment and execution of IRCA's objective, and thus are preempted; and 3) the housing provisions of the city's ordinances are preempted regulations of immigration, and both field and conflict preempted by the INA.
[09/09]
Spine Solutions, Inc. v. Medtronic Sofamor Danek USA, Inc.
In a suit for infringement of a patent related to intervertebral implants used to replace discs between vertebrae in the spinal column that have degenerated or become diseased, judgment of the district court is affirmed in part, reversed in part, vacated in part and remanded where: 1) district court's denial of defendant's motion for JMOL that the asserted claims of the '071 patent are invalid for obviousness is affirmed; 2) district court's denial of defendant's motion for summary judgment of invalidity for failure to comply with the written description requirement is affirmed; 3) district court's grant of plaintiff's motion for partial summary judgment dismissing defendant's 35 U.S.C. section 112 defenses is affirmed; 4) district court's construction of the term "operative engagement" is affirmed; 5) district court's denial of defendant's motion for summary judgment of noninfringement and its grant of summary judgment of infringement with respect to O-Maverick is reversed and remanded for the court to enter judgment of noninfringement with respect to O-Maverick; 6) district court's denial of defendant's motion for JMOL of lost profits is reversed and jury's award of lost profits damages is vacated and remanded for the court to determine any additional reasonable royalty to which plaintiff might be entitled; 7) district court's denial of defendant's motion for JMOL of no willfulness is reversed and the enhanced damages and attorney fee awards vacated; and 8) the matter is remanded for the district court to modify the terms of the permanent injunction by deleting the extraterritorial portion.
[09/09]
Chiang v. MBNA
In plaintiff's suit against his credit card company claiming that the company, as a furnisher of credit information, violated section 1681s-2(b)(1) by failing to follow up on disputed delinquent payments with a further investigation, district court's grant of defendant's motion for summary judgment is affirmed as there is no evidence that a credit reporting agency, rather than just plaintiff himself, had ever contacted defendant concerning his objections.
[09/09]
Delia v. City of Rialto
In an action by a firefighter against the City of Rialto and the Rialto Fire Department, alleging violations of his constitutional rights arising during a departmental internal affairs investigation, summary judgment for defendants is affirmed in part where plaintiff's constitutional right under the Fourth Amendment to be protected from a warrantless unreasonable compelled search of his home was violated, but this right, under these or similar facts, was not clearly established at the time of this constitutional violation. However, the order is reversed in part where one defendant was not entitled to qualified immunity as a private attorney.
[09/09]
Anderson v. City of Hermosa Beach
In a First Amendment challenge to a city's ban on tattoo parlors, summary judgment for defendant is reversed where tattooing is purely expressive activity fully protected by the First Amendment, and the city's total ban on such activity was not a reasonable "time, place, or manner" restriction.
[09/09]
Kurns v. A.W. Chesterton Inc.
[09/09]
Vilela v. Holder
A Brazilian citizen's petition for review of a BIA's final order of removal is denied as substantial evidence supported the IJ's and BIA's conclusions that petitioner failed to establish a nexus between the harm he had suffered and any protected ground, and failed to establish that what he suffered rose to the level of persecution.
[09/08]
Adrian v. Yorktown
In an action alleging that defendant-town, through its town supervisor and other policy-making officials, maintained an official policy under which the plaintiffs were denied the right to develop their property, and subsequently retaliated against for their exercise of their First Amendment rights, a district court's order denying post-verdict interest is vacated where, if a mandate reinstating a jury verdict does not order entry of a judgment in a specific dollar amount, and also makes no mention of interest, the district court retains the power to award post-verdict interest on remand.
[09/08]
Mohamed v. Jeppesen Dataplan, Inc.
In an action alleging that the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), working in concert with other government agencies and officials of foreign governments, operated an extraordinary rendition program to gather intelligence by apprehending foreign nationals suspected of involvement in terrorist activities and transferring them in secret to foreign countries for detention and interrogation by U.S. or foreign officials, dismissal of the action is affirmed where: 1) the Reynolds state secret privilege may be asserted at any time, even at the pleading stage; and 2) at least some of the matters the government sought to protect from disclosure in the litigation were valid state secrets, which, in the interest of national security, should not be divulged.
[09/08]
Ad Hoc Shrimp Trade Action Comm. v. US
In a complaint filed by a committee of domestic producers and processors of warmwater shrimp challenging the U.S. Department of Commerce's final results of its antidumping duties on certain frozen warmwater shrimp from the Socialist Republic of Vietnam, the Court of International Trade's dismissal of the complaint is reversed and remanded as the court erred by dismissing the case without reaching the merits of the committee's claims, as substantial evidence supports Commerce's decisions to calculate the surrogate shrimp value based on the NACA Survey data and to exclude Bionic's financial statements in calculating the surrogate expenses.
[09/08]
Brown v. Auto. Components Holdings, LLC
In plaintiff's suit against her former employer for interference with her rights under the Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA), district court's entry of summary judgment in favor of the defendant is affirmed as defendant's termination of plaintiff's employment based on her noncompliance with its internal leave procedures did not violate the FMLA because the undisputed facts establish that plaintiff was absent without leave after failing to give proper FMLA notice for an extension of a previously requested leave period.
[09/08]
US v. Santana-Perez
Defendants' convictions for violating 18 U.S.C. section 2237(a)(1), which makes it a crime for the master, operator, or person in charge of vessel of the United States, or a vessel subject to the jurisdiction of the United States to knowingly fail to obey an order by an authorize Federal law enforcement officer to heave to that vessel, are affirmed where: 1) district court did not err in denying a motion for acquittal as there was sufficient evidence that the defendants heard and understood the Coast Guard's order to heave-to; 2) defendant's challenge to the district court's ruling that evidence relating to a prior conviction could be admitted to impeach defendant if he testified at trial is rejected; 3) the government did not improperly vouch for its own witnesses during closing argument; 4) the district court did not abuse its discretion in refusing to give a missing evidence instruction; and 5) the district court did not engage in improper questioning during defendant's testimony.
[09/08]
U.S. ex rel. Poteet v. Bahler Med., Inc.
In plaintiff's qui tam action against 120 spine surgeons and eighteen medical device distributors claiming that defendants defrauded the federal government by unlawfully promoting the medical products of plaintiff's former employer and its parent company, dismissal of the action is affirmed where: 1) the district court did not err in holding that the False Claims Act's (FCA) public disclosure provision barred her claims against the doctor defendants; 2) as used in the statute, "hearing" is synonymous with "proceeding," and because a disclosure in a civil complaint is a disclosure in a civil proceeding, the disclosures emanate from a statutorily listed source; 3) plaintiff's qui tam action is "based upon" the prior disclosures of fraud; 4) district court did not abuse its discretion in dismissing the action with prejudice; and 5) district court did not err in denying plaintiff's motion to file a second amended complaint.
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