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

A criminal forfeiture action does not constitute an "alternate remedy" to a civil qui tam action under the False Claims Act, entitling a relator to intervene in the criminal action and recover a share of the proceeds pursuant to 31 U.S.C. 3730(c)(5). In this case, the Ninth Circuit held that the district court correctly denied relators' motion to intervene in the criminal forfeiture proceeding because the proper remedy was through their FCA civil action. The panel rejected relators' arguments claiming otherwise. Furthermore, the district court did not abuse its discretion in denying an evidentiary hearing or in declining to impose sanctions on the government. Accordingly, the panel affirmed the judgment. View "United States v. Van Dyck" on Justia Law

The Ninth Circuit affirmed the denial of habeas relief to petitioner, who was convicted of two murders and sentenced to death. The panel held, after supplemental briefing regarding the impact of McKinney v. Ryan, 813 F.3d 798 (9th Cir. 2015) (en banc), that neither the Arizona Supreme Court nor the trial court applied an impermissible causal-nexus test to exclude mitigating evidence. In this case, both courts considered all of petitioner's evidence offered in mitigation and found it insufficient to outweigh the serious aggravating factors. Therefore, there was no violation of clearly established federal law. View "Greenway v. Ryan" on Justia Law

In this case, the Ninth Circuit withdrew its previous opinion, denied as moot a petition for rehearing and petition for rehearing en banc; and filed a superseding opinion.Petitioner appealed the district court's denial of all but one of the claims raised in his petition for writ of habeas corpus and the state cross-appealed the district court's grant of relief on petitioner's claim of ineffective assistance of counsel at the penalty phase of his capital murder trial. The panel dismissed as unripe the claim the district court certified for appeal, and denied petitioner's motion to expand the certificate of appealability to include uncertified claims. The panel reversed the district court's grant of relief on the ineffective assistance of counsel claim because, under 28 U.S.C. 2254(d)(1), the California Supreme Court did not unreasonably apply Supreme Court precedent in concluding that petitioner was not prejudiced by any deficient performance by his counsel. View "Andrews v. Davis" on Justia Law

The Ninth Circuit affirmed defendant's convictions for strangling and assaulting his wife, holding that the trial court did not err by compelling defendant's wife from testifying against him. The panel rejected defendant's argument that the Supreme Court in Trammel v. United States, 445 U.S. 40 (1980), dramatically altered the spousal privilege landscape. Rather, Wyatt v. United States's, 362 U.S. 525 (1960), "spouse as victim" holding dictates that the district court correctly compelled the testimony of defendant's wife. View "United States v. Seminole" on Justia Law

The Ninth Circuit took this case en banc to revisit the divisibility of California drug statutes. Defendant was convicted of illegal reentry following deportation in violation of 8 U.S.C. 1326. The en banc court held that California Health and Safety Code 11352 is divisible with regard to both its controlled substance requirement and its actus reus requirement. Therefore, the district court properly applied the modified categorical approach and correctly found that defendant pled guilty to selling cocaine, which qualified as a drug trafficking offense under the federal sentencing guidelines and subjected defendant to a 16-level enhancement to his base offense level. Furthermore, the 77-month sentence, based on a properly calculated guidelines range of 70 to 87 months, was substantively reasonable. View "United States v. Martinez-Lopez" on Justia Law

Plaintiff, an Arizona state prisoner, filed suit pro se in state court that was subsequently removed by defendant to federal court. The district court dismissed the suit as frivolous and denied pending motions without separately considering plaintiff's motion seeking appointment of a representative or guardian ad litem (GAL) to protect his interests. The Ninth Circuit agreed that the suit was frivolous but ordered a limited remand to evaluate plaintiff's competence and to consider the appointment of a GAL. The panel agreed with the district court's conclusion on remand that it was not required to evaluate plaintiff's competence because he had no interest in this case that could have been protected by appointment of a GAL or issuance of another order under Fed. R. Civ. P. 17(c)(2). Because plaintiff had incurred at least three strikes from prior cases, he was already subject to the limitations imposed under 28 U.S.C. 1915(g) and could not be adversely impacted by whatever happened in this case. View "Harris v. Mangum" on Justia Law

The Ninth Circuit reversed the district court's grant of habeas relief and held that petitioner's claim was barred by her failure to exhaust available state court remedies, and was untimely under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 15(c). Even assuming that futility persists as a potential exception to AEDPA's exhaustion requirement, it did not excuse petitioner's failure to exhaust her state court remedies in this instance. Furthermore, the fact that petitioner's claim implicates delay in California's post-conviction process did not excuse her failure to exhaust her present claim. The panel held that neither relation back nor the emergence of new facts rendered petitioner's claim timely. View "Alfaro v. Johnson" on Justia Law

Descamps v. United States, 133 S. Ct. 2276 (2013), and Mathis v. United States, 136 S. Ct. 2243 (2016), did not impliedly abrogate the analytical approach and conclusion in United States v. Becerril-Lopez, 541 F.3d 881 (9th Cir. 2008). The Ninth Circuit affirmed defendant's 57 month sentence after the district court applied a 16-level enhancement based on the ground that defendant's prior conviction for robbery under California Penal Code 211 was categorically a crime of violence. The panel held that, even assuming the district court's failure to accept defendant's guilty plea expressly was error, it provided no ground for reversing his conviction or sentence. The panel also held that the district court properly relied on Becerril-Lopez to impose a 16-level sentencing enhancement in this case. View "United States v. Chavez-Cuevas" on Justia Law

A petitioner is entitled to use the full one-year statute-of-limitations period for the filing of his state and federal habeas petitions and he need not anticipate the occurrence of circumstances that would otherwise deprive him of the full 365 days that Congress afforded him for the preparation and filing of his petitions. The Ninth Circuit reversed the district court's order dismissing the petition for habeas relief in this case and remanded for further proceedings. The panel held that it was improper for the district court to fault the petitioner for filing his state petition for postconviction relief late in the statute-of-limitations period in reliance on his having a full year to file both his state and federal petitions, as promised by the Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act (AEDPA), 28 U.S.C. 2244. It was obvious in this instance that petitioner was diligent after the extraordinary circumstance had ended. Therefore, petitioner was entitled to equitable tolling from the time he requested his prison account certificate until he received that certification. View "Grant v. Swarthout" on Justia Law

The Ninth Circuit affirmed the district court's denial of habeas relief, in which plaintiff sought a custody redetermination as he awaits the outcome of administrative proceedings to determine whether he has a reasonable fear of returning to his native country of El Salvador. The panel held that, because plaintiff's reinstated removal order remains administratively final, he was detained pursuant to 8 U.S.C. 1231(a); section 1226(a) has no application in this case; and thus plaintiff was not entitled to a bond hearing. View "Padilla-Ramirez v. Bible" on Justia Law