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

Defendant, a native and citizen of Mexico, appealed his conviction for attempting to enter the United States without consent after having been previously removed. In regards to defendant's collateral attack of the underlying removal order, the court held that defendant was not denied due process because the IJ's determination that he had been convicted of an aggravated felony was not contrary to the court's precedent at the time the removal order was issued and was the product of a reasonable reading of the statute; because defendant had been convicted of an aggravated felony, he was statutorily ineligible for voluntary departure, and the IJ was under no obligation to inform him of the existence of such relief for the proceedings to comport with due process; even if the IJ should have informed defendant of his apparent eligibility for voluntary departure, the failure to do so did not render the removal proceedings "fundamentally unfair" under 8 U.S.C. 1326(d)(3) because he was no prejudiced by the alleged error; and, therefore, the underlying removal order was a valid predicate to a conviction for attempted illegal reentry. The court also held that ample record evidence corroborated defendant's confession to the gravamen of the offense and establishes the trustworthiness of his statement to the DHS officer. Accordingly, the conviction based on defendant's videotaped confession does not run afoul of the corpus delicti doctrine. The court affirmed the judgment of the district court. View "United States v. Valdez-Novoa" on Justia Law

Petitioner, convicted of murder and robbery charges, appealed the district court's denial of his 28 U.S.C. 2254 habeas corpus petition. Petitioner argued that the Arizona courts unreasonably rejected his claim under Napue v. Illinois that, during his trial, the prosecution also knowingly elicited and used the false testimony of a detective regarding when petitioner became a suspect in this case in order to secure his conviction. Petitioner also argued that the Arizona courts unreasonably rejected his ineffective assistance of counsel claim where counsel was ineffective for calling a state informant as a witness when the informant otherwise would not have testified at petitioner's trial. The court concluded that the Arizona courts did not engage in an unreasonable determination of the facts or an unreasonable application of controlling federal law when denying petitioner's prosecutorial misconduct claim or petitioner's ineffective assistance of counsel claim. Accordingly, the court affirmed the denial of petitioner's habeas petition. View "Fong v. Ryan" on Justia Law

Petitioners, convicted of first degree murder, appealed their separate district court judgments denying their 28 U.S.C. 2254 habeas petitions. At issue was petitioners' Batson v. Kentucky argument that the prosecutor excluded African-American jurors based on race during jury selection. The court held that the CCA did not unreasonably apply Batson when it did not sua sponte augment the record so as to allow for comprehensive comparative juror analysis; the court could only review the CCA's decision under 28 U.S.C. 2254(d)(2) in light of the evidence before it, and because it was undisputed that the first day of voir dire and the questionnaires were not in the record, the court could not include them in its analysis of whether the CCA made unreasonable factual findings; and, in regards to the partial voir dire and Batson hearing transcript, petitioners have not demonstrated that the CCA made an unreasonable determination of fact in light of the evidence before it. Accordingly, the court affirmed the district court's denial of the habeas corpus petitions. View "McDaniels v. Kirkland" on Justia Law

Plaintiff, who is disabled and uses a wheelchair for mobility, filed suit against the District, contending that he could not fully enjoy football games because of the unavailability of wheelchair accessible seating. The court concluded that Title II of the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA), 42 U.S.C. 12131-12165, does not a require a public entity to structurally alter public seating at a high school football field, where the seating was constructed prior to the ADA's enactment, and the school district provides program access to individuals who use wheelchairs. In this case, the District provided plaintiff with program access to the football games and plaintiff failed to establish that the District excluded him from a public program. Accordingly, plaintiff's claim failed under Title II of the ADA and the court affirmed the district court's grant of summary judgment to the District. View "Daubert v. Lindsay USD" on Justia Law

Defendant appealed his sentence after pleading guilty to one count of receiving child pornography. Defendant challenged the constitutionality of U.S.S.G. 2G2.2 and the five-year mandatory minimum sentence. The court concluded that section 2G2.2 neither violates the separation of powers doctrine nor conflicts with 18 U.S.C. 3553; the court joined its sister circuits and held that the district court's application of a two-level enhancement for the use of a computer under section 2G2.2(b)(6) does not result in impermissible double counting; and because the district court properly applied section 2G2.2, defendant lacked standing to challenge the constitutionality of the five-year mandatory minimum as it did not affect his sentence. Accordingly, the court affirmed the judgment of the district court. View "United States v. Kiefer" on Justia Law

Petitioner pled guilty to attempted possession of a dangerous drug, in violation of Arizona Revised Statute 13-3407(A)(1), and was found removable as an alien convicted of a violation of state law relating to a controlled substance. The court concluded that it was jurisdictionally barred from reaching the merits of petitioner's claim that the Arizona definition of attempt is categorically broader than the federal generic definition because he failed to exhaust this argument before the BIA. The court rejected petitioner's argument that the controlled substance at issue in his Arizona conviction cannot be established by applying the modified categorical approach. The court was confident based on circumstantial evidence that, although it could not consider the indictment because the original count as originally charged was dismissed and he had pled to a lesser charge in a modified count, a page describing the substance of methamphetamine was specifically incorporated into the plea agreement as the factual basis for petitioner's guilty plea. Accordingly, the court denied in part and dismissed in part. View "Alvarado v. Holder, Jr." on Justia Law

Defendant appealed his sentence after revocation of supervised release. The court concluded that the district court committed plain error when it violated Federal Rule of Criminal Procedure 32.1(b)(2)(E) when it did not affirmatively offer defendant an opportunity to speak before imposing its sentence. Accordingly, the court vacated and remanded for resentencing. View "United States v. Daniels" on Justia Law

Petitioner appealed the district court's denial of his motion for relief from judgment under Rule 60(b), motion for a stay of execution, and motion to amend or alter judgment under Rule 59(e). The court concluded that the district court did not abuse its discretion in denying the Rule 60(b) motion substantially for the reasons stated in the district court opinion; the district court did not abuse its discretion in denying petitioner's claim regarding the denial of his motion for evidentiary development; the district court did not abuse its discretion in denying petitioner's Rule 59(e) motion to alter or amend its judgment denying Rule 60(b) relief; and the court denied petitioner's request for a stay of execution where he has failed to show a significant possibility of success on the merits. Accordingly, the court affirmed the judgment of the district court. View "Wood, III v. Ryan, et al." on Justia Law

Plaintiff filed suit against Planned Parenthood under the False Claims Act, 31 U.S.C. 3729-3733, alleging that Planned Parenthood knowingly and falsely overbilled state and federal governments for contraceptives supplied to low-income individuals. The court affirmed the district court's dismissal of the complaint on the alternative ground that the complaint did not state plausible claims for relief. Even assuming that the third amended complaint sufficiently alleged falsity, it did not satisfy Rule 8(a), which requires a plausible claim that Planned Parenthood knowingly made false claims, with the statutory scienter. Because plaintiff's own complaint attachments defeated the plausibility of his allegations, and because he had already amended his complaint several times, the district court did not abuse its discretion in denying him further leave to amend. The district court also correctly concluded that plaintiff's claims under state law were time-barred. Accordingly, the court affirmed the judgment of the district court. View "Gonzalez v. Planned Parenthood" on Justia Law

Defendant appealed his convictions stemming from his involvement in a scheme to kidnap for ransom Franklin Aguilar-Avila. The court held that the district court's admission of a government agent's testimony recounting Franklin's mother's description of a telephone call with human traffickers did not violate the Confrontation Clause because the challenged statements from the telephone call were nontestimonial and their introduction at trial did not violate defendant's Confrontation Clause rights. Further, even if the principle underlying the Rule of Completeness (Rule 106) extended to the statements at issue here, the district court did not abuse its discretion in refusing to admit portions of the interview. Accordingly, the court affirmed the judgment of the district court. View "United States v. Liera-Morales" on Justia Law