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

The Ninth Circuit affirmed the district court's dismissal of HomeAway.com and Airbnb Inc.'s (the Platforms) lawsuits challenging the City of Santa Monica’s Ordinance 2535, which imposes various obligations on companies that host online platforms for short-term vacation rentals. The panel held that the district court properly dismissed the Platforms' complaints for failure to state a claim and dismissed as moot the appeals from the denial of preliminary injunctive relief.The panel rejected the Platforms' claim that the ordinance was preempted by the Communications Decency Act (CDA) because it required them to monitor and remove third-party content, and held that neither express preemption nor obstacle preemption applied to the ordinance. The panel also rejected the Platforms' contention that the ordinance impermissibly infringed upon their First Amendment rights, and held that the ordinance regulated nonexpressive conduct, specifically booking transactions, not free speech. The panel held that, even assuming the ordinance would lead the Platforms to voluntarily remove some advertisements for lawful rentals, there would not be a severe limitation on the public's access to lawful advertisements, especially considering the existence of alternative channels like Craigslist. The panel reasoned that such an incidental burden was far from a substantial restriction on the freedom of speech. View "HomeAway.com v. City of Santa Monica" on Justia Law

The Ninth Circuit affirmed the district court's denial of summary judgment to a former employee of the California State Board of Equalization, based on qualified immunity, in an action alleging that the employee violated clearly established law by participating in a search of plaintiff's business following an altercation between the parties. The altercation led to the execution of a search warrant at Advanced Building by CHP officers.The panel held that the employee violated clearly established law by participating in the search. Even assuming that state law permitted warrantless inspections of business records, the panel held that the intrusive search here would not withstand scrutiny under the Fourth Amendment. In this case, no analogously pervasive regulation or special governmental interest justified a diminished expectation of privacy. The panel held that the administrative search exception did not apply and the employee's presence was not necessary to aid in the officers' execution of the warrant. View "Advanced Building & Fabrication, Inc. v. California Highway Patrol" on Justia Law

The Ninth Circuit reversed the district court's denial of habeas corpus relief to petitioner, who was convicted of first degree murder and sentenced to death. Petitioner argued that the Arizona Supreme Court unconstitutionally affirmed his death sentence by failing to consider mitigating evidence of his longstanding alcohol and substance abuse.The panel held that the Arizona Supreme Court's decision was contrary to clearly established Supreme Court precedent. The panel held that the Arizona Supreme Court violated Eddings v. Oklahoma, 455 U.S. 104 (1982), by impermissibly requiring that petitioner establish a causal connection between his longstanding substance abuse and the murder before considering and weighing the evidence as a nonstatutory mitigating factor. Because the error was not harmless, the panel reversed the district court's judgment with respect to petitioner's death sentence. View "Spreitz v. Ryan" on Justia Law

Plaintiff, individually and on behalf of others similarly situated, filed suit under 42 U.S.C. 1983 and Guam law, alleging procedural due process and equal protection violations in connection with plaintiff's attempts to be compensated for ancestral land taken by the government of Guam for the operation of A.B. Won Pat International Airport. As a preliminary matter, the Ninth Circuit held that the GIAA Defendants were not a proper party in this appeal and must be dismissed, because the GIAA was not named in either count that was at issue in this appeal.On the merits, the panel held that none of the Guam Public Laws raised by plaintiff, individually, read together, or read together with Chapter 80 of the Guam Code Annotated, gave rise to a protected property interest for purposes of a due process analysis. In regard to plaintiff's Fourteenth Amendment equal protection claims, the panel held that the classifications established in the Chapter 80 statutory scheme survived rational basis review. In this case, the Guam legislature's Chapter 80 statutory scheme focused on the additional issues presented by the claims of the In-Use Class and related rationally to legislative facts considered at the time to be true. View "Crawford v. Antonio B. Won Pat International Airport Authority, Guam" on Justia Law

The Ninth Circuit vacated the district court's denial of petitioner's pro se 28 U.S.C. 2254 habeas corpus petition based on claims of ineffective assistance of counsel (IAC). The panel held that petitioner need only show that his IAC claims were substantial in order to excuse the procedural default of the claims under Martinez v. Ryan, 566 U.S. 1 (2012). Furthermore, because the district court failed to conduct a Martinez analysis, it did not make any findings on the issue. In this case, the panel could not conclude on the record that petitioner's IAC claims were meritless under the deficient performance prong of Strickland v. Washington, 466 U.S.C. 668 (1984). Therefore, the panel remanded for the district court to conduct an analysis of the substantiality of the IAC claims. View "Rodney v. Filson" on Justia Law

Plaintiffs, three Muslim residents of California, filed a putative class action against Government Defendants and Agent Defendants, alleging that the FBI paid a confidential informant to conduct a covert surveillance program that gathered information about Muslims based solely on their religious identity. Plaintiffs argued that the investigation involved unlawful searches and anti-Muslim discrimination, in violation of eleven constitutional and statutory causes of action.The Ninth Circuit held that some of the claims dismissed on state secrets grounds should not have been dismissed outright. Rather, the district court should have reviewed any state secrets evidence necessary for a determination of whether the alleged surveillance was unlawful following the secrecy protective procedure in the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA). The panel held that the Fourth Amendment injunctive relief claim against the official-capacity defendants should not have been dismissed, because expungement relief was available under the Constitution to remedy the alleged constitutional violations. The panel declined to address whether plaintiffs' Bivens claim remained available after the Supreme Court's decision in Ziglar v. Abbasi, 137 S. Ct. 1843 (2017), and thus remanded for the district court to determine whether a Bivens remedy was appropriate for any Fourth Amendment claim against the Agent Defendants. The panel addressed defendants' remaining claims supporting the dismissal of plaintiffs' claims and held that some of plaintiffs' allegations stated a claim while others did not. Accordingly, the panel affirmed in part and reversed in part, remanding for further proceedings. View "Fazaga v. FBI" on Justia Law

Plaintiff, a Washington State childcare provider, filed a 42 U.S.C. 1983 action alleging that Washington's authorization for the Service Employees International Union Local 925 (SEIU) to act as the exclusive collective bargaining representative for Washington's publicly subsidized childcare providers violated plaintiff's First Amendment rights.The Ninth Circuit affirmed the district court's grant of summary judgment for the state, holding that the SEIU's authorized position as the childcare providers' exclusive representative is constitutionally permissible. The court held that Minnesota State Board for Community Colleges v. Knight, 465 U.S. 271 (1984), was the most appropriate guide in this case. Even if the panel assumed that Knight was not applicable, the panel would reach the same result. View "Miller v. Inslee" on Justia Law

The common-law agency test is the most appropriate test for determining whether an entity is a joint employer under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. The EEOC brought an enforcement action under Title VII on behalf of Thai workers alleging discrimination charges against Green Acre Farms and Valley Fruit Orchards. The Ninth Circuit reversed the district court's dismissal of the EEOC's allegations regarding non-orchard-related matters, which in turn affected each of the other decisions under review.The panel held, under the common-law agency test, that the EEOC plausibly alleged that defendants were also joint employers with respect to non-orchard-related matters; the EEOC's allegations stated a plausible basis for holding Green Acre liable for discrimination relating to non-orchard-related matters; and the district court should have granted the EEOC leave to amend its complaint regarding Valley Fruit's liability with respect to such matters. View "EEOC v. Global Horizons, Inc." on Justia Law

The Ninth Circuit granted a petition for panel rehearing, withdrew its prior opinion, and filed a superseding opinion with its order.Entertainment Studios, along with NAAAOM, filed suit alleging that Charter's refusal to enter into a carriage contract was racially motivated and in violation of 42 U.S.C. 1981. The panel held that, although the Supreme Court's decisions in Gross v. FBL Fin. Servs., Inc., 557 U.S. 167 (2009), and Univ. of Tex. Sw. Med. Ctr. v. Nassar, 570 U.S. 338 (2013), necessitated reconsideration of its section 1981 approach, the panel explained that a plaintiff in a section 1981 action need only prove that discriminatory intent was a factor in, and not necessarily the but-for cause of, a defendant's refusal to contract. In this case, the panel held that plaintiffs' allegations regarding Charter's treatment of Entertainment Studios, and its differing treatment of white-owned companies, were sufficient to state a viable claim pursuant to section 1981.Finally, the panel held that the First Amendment did not bar plaintiffs' section 1981 claim. The fact that cable operators engage in expressive conduct when they select which networks to carry does not automatically require the application of strict scrutiny in this case. The panel held that section 1981 would satisfy intermediate scrutiny because it was a content-neutral statute and was narrowly tailored to serve a significant government interest in preventing racial discrimination. View "National Association of African American-Owned Media v. Charter Communications, Inc." on Justia Law

Plaintiff filed suit under 42 U.S.C. 1983 and California law, alleging that the city, the police department, and individual officers violated his Fourteenth Amendment right to be safeguarded from injury and his state law right to medical care while in custody. Plaintiff tried to commit suicide while he was a pretrial detainee and now suffers permanent and severe brain damage.The Ninth Circuit reversed the district court's denial of qualified immunity on the section 1983 claims as to Officer Andrew Brice, because it was not clearly established at the time that a reasonable officer would perceive a substantial risk that plaintiff would imminently attempt suicide. The panel held that it lacked jurisdiction to review the denial of summary judgment on the section 1983 claims as to the municipal defendants, because the pendent Monell claim was not inextricably intertwined with a properly reviewable collateral appeal, as the panel's resolution of Officer Brice's appeal from the denial of summary judgment on qualified immunity did not "necessarily" resolve plaintiff's Monell claim. Finally, the panel affirmed the district court's denial of summary judgment on the state law claims, because a reasonable jury could conclude that Officer Brice had reason to know that plaintiff had a serious medical condition and required immediate medical care and he failed timely to summon such care. The panel remanded for further proceedings. View "Horton v. City of Santa Maria" on Justia Law