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

Plaintiff, an inmate, sought enforcement of his Freedom of Information Act (FOIA or Act), 5 U.S.C. 552, request to the DEA for records pertaining to a certain confidential informant. In response, the DEA submitted a Glomar response, refusing to confirm or deny the existence of any responsive records pertaining to the informant, citing exemptions 6 and 7(C), (D), and (F) of the Act. The court held that because the government officially confirmed the informant's status as an informant in open court in the course of official proceedings, the government could not continue to "neither admit nor deny" his informant status in response to a FOIA request. Therefore, the court held that the government must provide an index of the documents it has and make whatever additional objections to disclosure it deemed appropriate. Accordingly, the district court's grant of summary judgment was reversed and the case remanded for further proceedings.

Plaintiff brought a 42 U.S.C. 1983 action for damages resulting from a violent attack he allegedly suffered while he was an inmate in the Los Angeles County Jail. At issue was whether the district court properly dismissed plaintiff's supervisory liability claim for deliberate indifference against Sheriff Leroy Baca in his individual capacity under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 12(b)(6). The court held that the Supreme Court's decision in Ashcroft v. Iqbal did not alter the substantive requirements for supervisory liability claims in an unconstitutional conditions of confinement case under the Eighth and Fourteenth Amendments where deliberate indifference was alleged. The court further held that plaintiff had sufficiently alleged under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 8(a) a supervisory liability claim of deliberate indifference against Sheriff Baca. Accordingly, the court reversed the district court's dismissal of plaintiff's claim and remanded for further proceedings.

Plaintiffs, raisin producers, appealed an administrative decision by the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA), which imposed civil penalties and assessments for their failure to comply with the reserve pool requirements for raisins, among other regulatory infractions. At issue was the interpretation and constitutionality of a food product reserve program authorized by the Agricultural Marketing Agreement Act of 1937 (AMAA), 7 U.S.C. 601 et seq., and implemented by the Marketing Order Regulating the Handling of Raisins Produced from Grapes Grown in California (Marketing Order), 7 C.F.R. Part 989, first adopted in 1949, which contained the reserve pool requirements. The court held that applying the Marketing Order to plaintiffs in their capacity as handlers was not contrary to the AMAA. The court also held that plaintiffs have suffered no compensable physical taking of any portion of their crops and therefore, the Fifth Amendment posed no obstacle to the enforcement of the Marketing Order under the Takings Clause. The court further held that the district court did not err in finding that the penalties were consistent with the Eighth Amendment and were not excessive fines. Accordingly, the court affirmed the judgment.

Each of the defendants in these consolidated appeals sought safety-valve relief where they were serving a state probationary sentence when they committed and pleaded guilty to the charge of smuggling methamphetamine into the United States. At issue was whether, given the California state courts' wide latitude to modify ongoing probationary terms under California state law, the federal district courts in calculating criminal history points for purposes of safety valve eligibility must credit state orders terminating probationary sentences. The court held that, in applying the sentencing safety valve, federal courts must credit the California state orders under the California Penal Code 1203.3 modifying or terminating ongoing probationary terms. Accordingly, the court affirmed Audenago Acosta-Montes's sentence and vacated David Yepez's sentence and remanded Yepez's case for resentencing.

Defendant was charged with crimes stemming from conduct involving her live-in nanny and housekeeper where defendant arranged for her to travel from her native Peru to the United States in 2006 by entering under a fraudulently-obtained visa to serve as a nanny and housekeeper. Defendant appealed her convictions for forced labor, related offenses of document servitude, and harboring an alien for financial gain. Defendant also appealed three sentencing enhancements and the restitution order. The court affirmed the convictions on all counts as supported by sufficient evidence. With respect to sentencing, the court declined to reach the merits of the first enhancement for visa fraud because it did not affect the guidelines offense level; affirmed the second enhancement holding defendant in forced labor for over one year; and affirmed the third enhancement for committing a felony "in connection with" forced labor. As for the restitution order which presented a question of first impression regarding whether child support arrearages belonged to a criminal defendant such that they could be assigned to a victim by restitution order while defendant's children were still minors, the court held that the minor child was the real party in interest to the accrued support. Therefore, any money that defendant received for child support did not belong to her but rather her children and it could not be assigned to the nanny/housekeeper. Accordingly, the judgment was affirmed in part and reversed in part.

Defendant appealed the denial of his federal habeas petition where his charges stemmed from a home-invasion robbery. At issue was the California Court of Appeals' rulings that he had no absolute Sixth Amendment right to the reappointment of counsel after waiving his right to counsel under Faretta v. California and whether the trial court's abuse of discretion in failing to reappoint counsel was harmless beyond a reasonable doubt. Also at issue was whether the California court violated his rights under Apprendi v. New Jersey when it used a prior juvenile conviction as a strike to enhance his sentence. The court held that because neither of these decisions "was contrary to, or involved an unreasonable application of, clearly established Federal law, as determined by the Supreme Court," the district court's denial of defendant's habeas petition was affirmed.

Petitioner, a native and citizen of Mexico, petitioned for review of the BIA's decision dismissing his appeal from an IJ's order finding him removable and denying his application for cancellation of removal. Petitioner challenged the BIA's finding that his six convictions for "willfully manufacturing, intentionally selling, and knowingly possessing for sale more than 1,000 articles bearing a counterfeit trademark," in violation of California Penal Code 350(a)(2), constituted an aggravated felony as an "offense relating to... counterfeiting." Petitioner also maintained that the generic offense of counterfeiting referred only to the imitation of currency and that this conviction under section 350 did not require proof of his intent. The court held that the definition of aggravated felony extended to convictions for the unauthorized imitation of trademarks. The court also rejected petitioner's remaining argument that section 350 did not incorporate "an intent to defraud" as an essential element of the offense because "[t]he commission of the crime necessarily defrauds the owner of the mark, or an innocent purchaser of the counterfeit items, or both," and the court had "difficulty distinguishing such intent from a general intent to defraud[.]" Accordingly, the petition for review was denied.

Petitioner sought a writ of habeas corpus arguing that the California Supreme Court's delay in resolving the direct appeal from his murder conviction and death sentence denied him his right to due process under the Fourteenth Amendment. The court held that the district court erred when it placed the burden on petitioner to prove his incompetence. The court held, however, that the court need not reverse and remand because, even if assuming petitioner's incompetence, it would not affect the outcome of the appeal. The court further held that petitioner's habeas corpus petition must be denied because no Supreme Court case clearly established a due process right to a speedy trial. Accordingly, the judgment was dismissed in part and affirmed in part.

In 1974, African American and Mexican American students sued the Tucson, Arizona, school system alleging intentional segregation and unconstitutional discrimination on the basis of race and national origin. For some 30 years after the parties settled, Tucson's schools operated subject to a federally enforced desegregation decree. At issue was whether the school district had achieved unitary status and whether oversight of the school district's operations could terminate. The court reversed and ordered the district court to maintain jurisdiction until it was satisfied that the school district had met its burden by demonstrating, not merely promising, its "good-faith compliance... with the [Settlement Agreement] over a reasonable period of time." The court also held that the district court must be convinced that the district had eliminated "the vestiges of past discrimination... to the extent practicable" with regard to all of the Green v. Cnty. Sch. Bd. of New Kent Cnty. factors. The court further held that the district court retained discretion to order an incremental or partial withdrawal of its supervision and control. Accordingly, the case was remanded for further proceedings.

In consolidated appeals, defendants appealed the denial of their motions for judgment on the pleadings where plaintiffs brought a diversity suit to enforce California Civil Code 2527 and 2528, which required defendants to supply the results of bi-annual studies of California's pharmacies' retail drug pricing for private uninsured customers to their clients, who were third-party payors such as insurance companies and self-insured employer groups. At issue was whether the court was bound by the Erie doctrine to follow the state appellate court decisions striking down section 2527 and if not, whether section 2527 violated the First Amendment or the California Constitution's free speech provision. The court held that the Erie doctrine did not require it to follow the state appellate court decisions and that section 2527 did not unconstitutionally compel speech under either the United States or California Constitutions. Accordingly, the court affirmed the judgment.