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

This appeal concerned a dispute over attorney's fees related to a settlement of numerous civil rights lawsuits against the City and others. The court held that several important principles bear on the district court's determination of a reasonable fee amount: (1) the court must compute the fee award using an hourly rate that is based on the "prevailing market rates in the relevant community;" (2) when a district court reduces either the number of hours or the lodestar by a certain percentage greater than 10%, it must provide a clear and concise explanation for why it chose the specific percentage to apply; and (3) it was not per se unreasonable for the prevailing party in a civil rights case to be awarded an amount of attorney's fees that exceeds the amount of money recovered by his or her client. In this instance, the court vacated and remanded because the district court did not apply these principles when determining the amount of plaintiffs' attorney's fee award. View "Gonzalez v. City of Maywood" on Justia Law

Plaintiff, former President of the United Steel Workers Local 12-369, filed suit against defendants alleging claims of discrimination on the basis of race and gender, and retaliation for having engaged in protected speech under the Labor-Management Reporting and Disclosure Act (LMRDA), 29 U.S.C. 401 et seq. The court concluded that, because the alleged retaliatory actions directed toward plaintiff impinged only upon her status as a union officer, she could not seek redress for these actions under section 609. The court held that the district court did not clearly err in finding defendants did not discriminate or retaliate against plaintiff given the district court's analysis of plaintiff's allegations, both as discrete incidents and as part of a broader course of conduct. Accordingly, the court affirmed the judgment of the district court. View "USW Local 12-369 v. USW Int'l" on Justia Law

Donald and Kristi Gravelet-Blondin filed suit under 42 U.S.C. 1983 against the City and Sgt. Shelton for excessive force and unlawful arrest, as well as malicious prosecution for the tasing and arrest of Donald. Kristi also filed suit under state law for the harm she suffered watching her husband's tasing and being threatened with tasing herself. The district court granted summary judgment to defendants on all claims. The court concluded, inter alia, that Sgt. Shelton was not entitled to qualified immunity where it was clearly established as of 2008 that the use of a taser in dart mode against a passive bystander such as Donald amounted to unconstitutionally excessive force in violation of the Fourth Amendment. Accordingly, the court reversed the grant of qualified immunity to Sgt. Shelton and the grant of summary judgment to the City on plaintiffs' excessive force claim; reversed the district court's grant of summary judgment based on the determination that probable cause existed for Donald's arrest; remanded for further proceedings on the unlawful arrest claim; and reversed the grant of summary judgment on plaintiffs' common law claims. View "Gravelet-Blondin v. Shelton" on Justia Law

The Secretary appealed the district court's order certifying a nationwide class of Medicare beneficiaries and granting summary judgment in the beneficiaries' favor. The beneficiaries raised two claims: (1) the Secretary's practice of demand "up front" reimbursement for secondary payments from beneficiaries who have appealed a reimbursement determination or sought waiver of the reimbursement obligation was inconsistent with the secondary payer provisions of the Medicare statutory scheme; and (2) the Secretary's practice violated their due process rights. The court concluded that Patricia Haro had Article III standing on behalf of the class; John Balentine, as counsel for Haro, had Article III standing on his individual claim; and the beneficiaries' claims for injunctive relief were not moot and Article III's justiciability requirements were satisfied. The court concluded, however, that the beneficiaries' claim was not adequately presented to the agency at the administrative level and therefore the district court lacked subject matter jurisdiction under 42 U.S.C. 405(g). On the merits of Balentine's claim, the court concluded that the Secretary's interpretation of the secondary payer provisions was reasonable. Therefore, the court vacated the district court's injunctions, reversed the district court's summary judgment order, and remanded for consideration of the beneficiaries' due process claim. View "Haro v. Sebelius" on Justia Law

The district court found that the Secretary violated the Indian Self Determination and Education Assistance Act (ISDA), 25 U.S.C. 450 et seq., the Administrative Procedure Act (APA), 5 U.S.C. 500 et seq., and the Fifth Amendment's guarantee of equal protection when the Secretary declined to enter into a self-determination contract with the Tribe to fund law enforcement on the Los Coyotes Reservation. The court concluded that no reading of the ISDA authorized federal courts to grant relief when the Secretary properly denied a contract; the Tribe's argument that the BIA's failure to fund law enforcement on the Los Coyotes Reservation was a violation of the APA was foreclosed by Supreme Court precedent; there was a meaningful distinction between Public Law 280 states and non-Public Law 280 states and such a distinction provided a rational basis for prioritizing law enforcement funding in non-Public Law 280 states; and the BIA's funding policy did not violate the Fifth Amendment's equal protection guarantee. Accordingly, the court reversed the judgment of the district court. View "Los Coyotes Band of Cahuilla v. Jewell" on Justia Law

Plaintiff, a professor, filed suit alleging that university administrators retaliated against him in violation of the First Amendment for distributing a short pamphlet and drafts from an in-progress book. The court held that there was an exception to Garcetti v. Ceballos for teaching and academic writing. Pickering v. Board of Education governed such teaching and writing by publicly employed teachers. The court affirmed the district court's determination that plaintiff prepared and circulated his pamphlet pursuant to official duties; reversed its determination that the pamphlet did not address matters of public concern; concluded that there was insufficient evidence to show that the in-progress book triggered retaliation; and held that defendants were entitled to qualified immunity given the uncertain state of the law in the wake of Garcetti. The court remanded for further proceedings. View "Demers v. Austin" on Justia Law

Plaintiffs, foie gras producers and sellers, appealed the district court's denial of their motion to preliminarily enjoin the State of California from enforcing California Health & Safety Code 25982. Section 25982 banned the sale of products that were the result of force feeding birds to enlarge their livers beyond normal size. The court affirmed the district court's denial of Eleventh Amendment immunity to the Attorney General. The court dismissed the State of California and Governor Brown from the lawsuit because they were immune from suit. The court concluded that the only product covered by section 25982 at issue in this appeal was foie gras; plaintiffs' Due Process Clause challenge failed because section 25982's definition for force feeding was not vague and the statute gave fair notice of prohibited conduct; and section 25982 did not violate the Commerce Clause because it was not discriminatory, did not directly regulate interstate commerce, and did not substantially burden interstate commerce. Accordingly, the court affirmed the denial of plaintiffs' motion for a preliminary injunction because plaintiffs failed to raise a serious question that they were likely to succeed on the merits. View "Ass'n des Eleveurs de Canards v. Harris" on Justia Law

Landon Wynar, a sophomore high school student, was suspended from school after he made a string of increasingly violent and threatening instant messages sent from home to his friends. Landon and his father sued the school district and others (collectively, "Douglas County") for violations of Landon's constitutional rights under 42 U.S.C. 1983, as well as for negligence and negligent infliction of emotional distress. The court held that, when faced with an identifiable threat of school violence, schools could take disciplinary action in response to off-campus speech that met the requirements of Tinker v. DesMoines. In this instance, the court concluded that it was reasonable for Douglas County to interpret the messages as a real risk and to forecast a substantial disruption. Further, Landon's messages threatening the student body as a whole, and targeted specific students by name, impinged on the rights of the students to be secure and to be let alone. Accordingly, the court held that Douglas County's actions did not violate the First Amendment. The court also held that Landon received adequate due process before both his 10-day suspension and his 90-day expulsion. The court rejected plaintiffs' remaining claims and affirmed the district court's grant of summary judgment for the school district. View "Wynar v. Douglas Cnty. Sch. Dist." on Justia Law

Plaintiffs sought to enjoin enforcement of Senate Bill 1172, which banned state-licensed mental health providers from engaging in "sexual orientation change efforts" ("SOCE") with patients under 18 years of age, because it violated the First Amendment and infringed on several other constitutional rights. Undertaking plenary review, the court held that SB 1172 was a regulation of professional conduct and, therefore, did not violate the free speech rights of SOCE practitioners or minor patients under rational basis review. The court also held that the statute was neither vague nor overbroad and did not violate parents' fundamental rights. Accordingly, the court reversed the order granting preliminary relief in Case No. 13-15023 and affirmed the denial of preliminary relief in Case No. 12-17681. View "Pickup, et al. v. Brown, Jr., et al." on Justia Law

Applicants sought a four-month exemption from the per page Public Access to Court Electronic Records (PACER) system fee. At issue was whether the court had jurisdiction to review the district court's administrative order denying the exemption. The court held that 28 U.S.C. 1291 necessarily refers to final decisions of a judicial character, not to administrative actions outside the scope of the litigative function. Because the order denying applicants a PACER fee exemption came before the court strictly in an administrative context, the court could not review under section 1291. Accordingly, the court dismissed the appeal for lack of appellate jurisdiction. View "In re: Application for Exemption from Electronic Public Access Fees" on Justia Law