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

Plaintiff, a minor, brought federal civil rights claims under 42 U.S.C. 1983 and state negligence claims against the County and its employee social workers (collectively, defendants). Plaintiff, sexually assaulted by his 17-year-old foster brother while living in a foster family home, contended that defendants failed to intervene prior to his sexual assault, despite their knowledge of the escalating threats and violence against him. The district court dismissed with prejudice all claims against the County. The court concluded that the district court abused its discretion because the district court denied leave to amend where plaintiff was denied the opportunity to allege additional facts supporting the claim that defendant's constitutional violations were carried out pursuant to County policy or custom and where the County's derivative liability was tied directly to the negligence of, or successful assertion of immunity by, its employees. Accordingly, the court reversed the district court's decision and vacated the judgment.

The district court affirmed a bankruptcy court's confirmation of a Chapter 11 plan of reorganization under 11 U.S.C. 524(g), a special provision for the reorganization of companies facing substantial asbestos-related liability. Appellants were several insurance companies that did not reach settlements with Thorpe and Pacific, together with Debtors in bankruptcy court, and who were denied standing to challenge the reorganization plan. The court affirmed the district court's conclusion that the plan preempted appellants' state law contract rights; disagreed with the position of Debtors that the appeal was equitably moot; and in reaching the merits, reversed the district court's conclusion that appellants lacked standing. The court remanded to the district court with instructions that it return the case to the bankruptcy court to give appellants the opportunity to present their proof and argument.

This case involved an Oregon statute which adopted a special statute of limitations for abuse victims. Under the statute, an action must be commenced before the person reached age 40 or within five years of discovery of the causal connection between the abuse and the injury. At issue was the effect of this statute on plaintiff's federal civil rights claim under 42 U.S.C. 1983 that he was beaten by teachers at his elementary school from 1986-1988. The court concluded that Oregon's general statute of limitations, rather than the specialized abuse statute, governed plaintiff's claims and that federal, not state law, governed accrual of his claims.

Plaintiff commenced this action against Burger King, raising claims under Oregon law for product liability, negligence, and vicarious liability after plaintiff discovered that a Burger King employee had spit into his Whopper. Plaintiff subsequently appealed from a final judgment on the pleadings dismissing his diversity action against defendants. This order certified to the Supreme Court of Washington the dispositive and unsettled question of Washington state law at issue in this appeal, namely, whether the Washington Products Liability Act (WPLA), Wash. Rev. Code 7.72.010, permitted relief for emotional distress damages, in the absence of physical injury to the plaintiff purchaser, caused by being served and touching, but not consuming a contaminated food product.

After his unsuccessful cataract surgery, plaintiff brought a claim for battery against the United States government and his United States Navy surgeon. The United States invoked the Gonzalez Act, 10 U.S.C. 1089, immunizing individual military medical personnel from malpractice liability. At issue was whether section 1089(e) waived the government's sovereign immunity for common law battery claims. The court held that it did not and affirmed the district court's dismissal of plaintiff's complaint for lack of subject-matter jurisdiction. The court did not address plaintiff's remaining claims.

Plaintiff appealed from the judgment of the district court dismissing his action against the State of Arizona and individual officials employed by the Arizona Department of Corrections for alleged negligence and alleged violations of his civil rights where plaintiff spent just over three years in prison pursuant to an erroneous sentence. The district court held that plaintiff failed to state a claim for which relief could be granted and plaintiff appealed. The court held that the district court properly dismissed plaintiff's negligence claim where the court did not believe that the Arizona Supreme Court would hold that the Department - an agency within Arizona's executive department - had the authority, much less the duty, to ensure that judicial orders complied with the law. Because plaintiff did not allege a violation of his Eight or Fourteenth Amendment rights by defendants, they were immune from action. Accordingly, the judgment was affirmed.

Plaintiff filed a Federal Employee Compensation Act (FECA), 5 U.S.C. 8131, 8132, claim after he was injured in a helicopter crash and received benefits totaling $409,838.11. Plaintiff then filed a civil suit against the helicopter operator and eventually the lawsuit settled for $2.3 million. At issue was whether plaintiff could deduct his litigation costs from a refund to the United States under FECA. The court held that no reading of section 8132 allowed for a FECA beneficiary to obtain a civil award and then deduct the costs of obtaining that award from a refund of benefits owed to the United States. The only plausible reading of section 8132 was to the contrary: A beneficiary could deduct his litigation costs only from his gross recovery to determine the amount, if any, of the surplus he must credit to the United States for future benefits.

Plaintiff, the former General Counsel of McAfee, alleged that McAfee maliciously prosecuted and defamed him in an attempt to deflect attention from large-scale backdating of stock options within the company. McAfee moved to strike plaintiff's claims pursuant to California's anti-Strategic Litigation Against Public Participation (anti-SLAPP) statute, Code Civ. Proc., 425.16. The district court denied the motion as to plaintiff's malicious prosecution claims, but granted it as to his claims for defamation and false light invasion of privacy. Both sides appealed. The court held that plaintiff had not demonstrated that his claims have the requisite degree of merit to survive McAfee's anti-SLAPP motion: McAfee had probable cause to believe plaintiff was guilty of a crime and plaintiff's claims for defamation and false light invasion of privacy were time-barred. Accordingly, the court affirmed in No. 10-15670 and reversed in 10-15561.

Appellee pled guilty to one count of conspiracy to engage in human trafficking, and admitted that between 2001 and December 22, 2003, he conspired with others to provide controlled substances to several minors and recruited them to engage in sexual activity. Appellant alleged that she was one of the victims identified in appellee's plea agreement and sought compensatory and punitive damages under the Trafficking Victims Protection Act (TVPA), 18 U.S.C. 1589 et seq. The district court certified an interlocutory appeal on two questions: (1) whether the TVPA permitted recovery of punitive damages, and (2) whether the TVPA's civil action provision, 18 U.S.C. 1595, applied retroactively to conduct occurring before its effective date, particularly when the perpetrator could have engaged in sex trafficking after the statute's effective date. The court held that the TVPA permitted recovery of punitive damages because it created a cause of action that sounded in tort and punitive damages were available in tort actions under the common law. The court also held that section 1595 could not be applied retroactively to conduct that occurred before its effective date.

Plaintiffs, four citizens of Iran who came to the United States at various times due to their long-standing opposition to that nation's theocratic regime, sued defendants, raising a number of claims including unlawful detention, inhumane conditions, witness intimidation, and the intentional infliction of emotional distress. The court declined to extend Bivens to allow plaintiffs to sue federal agents for wrongful detention pending deportation given the extensively remedial procedures available to and invoked by them and the unique foreign policy considerations implicated in the immigration context. The court rejected plaintiffs' argument regarding the dismissal of their claim against one agent for witness intimidation and against two agents for conspiracy to intimidate a witness because plaintiffs could not have been prejudiced by any alleged wrongdoing. The court also rejected plaintiffs' claims against the United States under the Federal Tort Claims Act (FTCA), 28 U.S.C. 1346, because the decision to detain an alien pending resolution of immigration proceedings was explicitly committed to the discretion of the Attorney General and implicated issues of foreign policy, falling within an exception to the FTCA. The court affirmed the district court's denial of plaintiffs' motion to amend their complaint where plaintiffs' woes were not caused by insufficient allegations of factual content and no potential amendments would change the outcome. Accordingly, the judgment was affirmed.