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

Defendant was convicted of two counts of first degree sex abuse and two counts of first degree sodomy. At issue was whether a credible showing of "actual innocence" under Schlup v. Delon excused the statute of limitations period established by the Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act (AEDPA), 28 U.S.C. 2241 et seq. The court held that it did, but that the petitioner failed to present sufficient evidence of actual innocence to permit review of his constitutional claims on the merits. Therefore, the court reversed the judgment of the district court.

Defendant conditionally pleaded guilty pursuant to Federal Rule of Criminal Procedure 11(a)(2) to one count of possession of child pornography. Defendant appealed the denial of his motion to suppress the offending material located during a search of his computer, a search conducted by federal agents pursuant to the alleged consent of his one-time friend and now fiancee. The court held that the totality of the facts and circumstances known to the federal agent at issue at the time of the search satisfied the test in Illinois v. Rodriquez and therefore, the federal agents were justified in relying on the fiancee's consent.

Plaintiff appealed the district court's grant of defendant's motion to dismiss where plaintiff claimed that defendant violated a section of California's Rees-Levering Act (Act), Cal. Civ. Code 2983.2(a), which required a car loan lender to provide certain post-repossession notices to a defaulting borrower prior to selling the repossessed car. At issue was whether the Act's notice requirements were preempted by the National Bank Act (NBA), 12 C.F.R. 7.4008, and its regulations. The court held that because the Act sections at issue were directed toward debt collection and were therefore not preempted by the NBA, the court reversed the judgment of the district court and remanded for further proceedings.

Plaintiff sued defendants, the Bureau of Land Management (BLM), the Alaska Department of Transportation (Alaska), and the Alyeska Pipeline Service Company (Alyeska), in federal court, alleging causes of action for inverse condemnation, injunctive relief, nuisance, breach of fiduciary duties, and civil rights violations. At issue was whether the district court properly dismissed the action against the BLM and Alaska on the basis of sovereign immunity. The court held that federal sovereign immunity barred plaintiff's inverse condemnation, injunctive relief, and civil rights violations claims against the United States, but that the Federal Tort Claims Act, 25 U.S.C. 345, could provide a waiver of the government sovereign immunity for plaintiff's nuisance and breach of fiduciary duties claims. Additionally, the court held that the Eleventh Amendment barred plaintiff's action against Alaska in its entirety. Accordingly, the judgment was affirmed in part and reversed in part and remanded.

The court agreed to rehear this case en banc to clarify under what circumstances the exhaustion requirement of the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA), 20 U.S.C. 1415(l), barred non-IDEA federal or state law claims. Plaintiff, on behalf of herself and her son, appealed the district court's grant of summary judgment to defendants where the district court dismissed her claims for lack of subject matter jurisdiction because plaintiff did not initially seek relief in a due process hearing and therefore, failed to comply with one of the exhaustion-of-remedies requirement of the IDEA. The court held that the IDEA's exhaustion requirement was not jurisdictional and that plaintiff's non-IDEA federal and state-law claims were not subject to the IDEA's exhaustion requirement. Therefore, the court reversed the judgment.

Petitioner was convicted and sentenced to death for murdering a mother and her daughter. Petitioner appealed his denial of federal habeas relief under 28 U.S.C. 2254, raising a number of different claims. The court agreed with the district court that there was no showing of any impropriety or appearance of impropriety from the trial judge. The court affirmed the denial of the claims of ineffective assistance of counsel at sentencing because the court concluded that they lacked merit. The court agreed with the district court that the state courts adequately considered all mitigating evidence in sentencing defendant to death and therefore, affirmed the denial of that claim. The court further held that since defendant was still pursuing his first post-conviction petition when, in accordance with the suggestion of the state supreme court, he sought to amend his first petition, there was no "previous collateral proceeding." Hence, there was no adequate and independent state ground supporting the trial court's refusal to hear the claims of ineffective assistance at trial and on direct appeal. Therefore, the court remanded only those claims for consideration by the district court.

Plaintiff, the mother of Jerry Amaro, filed a 42 U.S.C. 1983 claim against defendants for the use of excessive force, which resulted in injuries that caused Amaro's death. At issue was whether the doctrine of equitable estoppel should apply where a plaintiff believed she had a section 1983 claim but was dissuaded from bringing the claim by affirmative misrepresentations and stonewalling by the police. The court held that equitable estoppel did apply to the circumstances and affirmed the district court's judgment on that issue.

Defendants appealed from their convictions for conspiracy to interfere with commerce by robbery; conspiracy to possess with intent to distribute cocaine; possession of a firearm in furtherance of a drug trafficking crime; and aiding and abetting. Defendants argued that the district court erred in refusing to provide an entrapment instruction to the jury. The court held that there was insufficient evidence presented at trial to support a finding by the jury that defendants were induced by the government to commit the crimes, one of the two necessary elements of entrapment defense. Consequently, the court affirmed and held that the district court did not err by refusing to give the entrapment instruction.

This case stemmed from a so-called bubble ordinance enacted by the Oakland City Council, which made it an offense to knowingly and willfully approach within eight feet of an individual seeking entry to a reproductive health clinic if one's purpose in approaching that person was to engage in conversation, protest, counseling, or various other forms of speech. Plaintiff, a minister who regularly stood outside clinics seeking to engage women in what he called a "friendly conversation" to dissuade them from having an abortion, was convicted on two separate violations of the ordinance and subsequently challenged the ordinance in a 42 U.S.C. 1983 action, contending that the ordinance infringed upon the freedom of speech and violated the federal constitution's Due Process Clause, as well as state and federal guarantees of equal protection of the laws. The court held that the ordinance was facially constitutional. The court also held that Oakland's enforcement policy was a constitutionally invalid, content-based regulation of speech and remanded to the district court in order for that court to craft a remedy that ensured that Oakland would adopt and henceforth apply a policy that enforced the ordinance as written, in an evenhanded, constitutional manner. The court further held that the success of plaintiff's challenge to whether Oakland could apply the ordinance to situations in which doing so would prevent plaintiff from communicating his message depended on Oakland's future enforcement policy and the particular circumstances in which that policy could be applied. Therefore, the court did not reach that challenge but also did not preclude plaintiff from bringing such a challenge in the future. Accordingly, the court affirmed in part and reversed in part, remanding with instructions to grant plaintiff's motion for summary judgment in part and to grant him relief consistent with the opinion.

Appellants appealed the district court's order awarding them attorney fees following settlement of their claims against appellees brought under the Fair Housing Act, 42 U.S.C. 3601-3619, and California law. At issue was whether the district court erred by deducting some of the hours billed and lowered the hourly rates requested by appellants. The court held that the district court did not abuse its discretion either by relying, in part, on its own knowledge and experience, or by setting an hourly rate of $350 for appellants' lawyers. Accordingly, the judgment was affirmed.