Justia U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals Opinion Summaries

Westwood Apex, a subsidiary entity of Westwood College, filed a breach of contract action against defendant to recover an unpaid student loan in San Bernardino County Superior Court. Defendant, a former Westwood College student, filed a class action counterclaim alleging that Westwood Apex and Westwood College committed fraud and engaged in unfair and deceptive business practices in connection with their operation of the college. Westwood College subsequently filed a notice of removal in the Central District of California. At issue was whether section 5 of the Class Action Fairness Act of 2005 ("CAFA"), 28 U.S.C. 1453(b), allowed a party joined to an action as a defendant to a counterclaim, an additional counterclaim defendant, to remove the case to federal court. The court held that section 1453(b) did not permit additional counterclaim defendants to remove an action to federal court and therefore, affirmed the district court's decision to remand the case to state courts.

Defendants, in consolidated appeals, appealed their convictions for violations of 8 U.S.C. 1325(a)(1) for attempting to travel by boat from Saipan in the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands ("CNMI") to the Territory of Guam by boat. At issue was whether defendants violated section 1325(a)(1) for being aliens who knowingly and willingly attempted to enter the United States at a time and place other than as designated by immigration officers on or about January 5, 2010, a date within Title VII of the Consolidated Natural Resources Act of 2008's ("CNRA"), 48 U.S.C. 1806-1808, transition period. The court held that defendants did not violate section 1325(a)(1) by attempting to travel by boat from the CNMI to Guam where the CNMI and Guam were parts of the United States and an alien did not enter or attempt to enter the United States for purposes of section 1325(a)(1) when traveling from one part of the United States to another, even if when doing so they passed through international waters.

Plaintiffs, operators of a business that promoted gun shows throughout California, sued the County of Alameda and county officials alleging that a county ordinance, which made it a misdemeanor to bring onto or to possess a firearm or ammunition on county property, violated their Constitutional rights. At issue was whether the Second Amendment prohibited a local government from banning gun shows. Also at issue was whether the district court properly granted summary judgment on plaintiffs' First Amendment and Equal Protection claims. The court initially held that only regulations which substantially burden the right to keep and to bear arms triggered heightened scrutiny under the Second Amendment. Therefore, the court held that to the extent the district court's leave to amend was with prejudice, it must be vacated where plaintiffs could still be able to allege sufficient facts to state that the ordinance substantially burdened their right to keep and to bear arms under the Second Amendment. The court also held that summary judgment was properly granted on plaintiffs' First Amendment claim where the ordinance passed the United States v. O'Brien test. The court further held that summary judgment was properly granted on plaintiffs' Equal Protection claim where plaintiffs' claim would fail so long as the ordinance's distinction between military reenactments and gun shows were rational.