LEGAL NEWS

Case Summaries

Constitutional Law

[09/07] Hamdi v. Napolitano
In a severely disabled minor child's action under the Declaratory Judgment Act (DJA) and the Administrative Procedure Act (APA) to prohibit the Department of Homeland Security from removing his mother on the ground that the mother's removal violated his own constitutional rights as an American citizen, dismissal of the complaint for lack of jurisdiction is affirmed where: 1) the jurisdictional bar of 8 U.S.C. section 1252(g) does not apply to independent actions brought by a citizen child raising distinct constitutional rights; 2) the APA does not provide subject matter jurisdiction in this case; 3) a citizen child raising distinct constitutional rights may assert federal question subject matter jurisdiction; and 4) dismissal was proper because petitioner failed to state a constitutional claim upon which relief may be granted.

[09/07] Wilson v. Rees
District court's dismissal, as untimely, of an inmate's 42 U.S.C. section 1983 suit challenging Kentucky's lethal injection protocol under the Eighth and Fourteenth Amendments is affirmed as Bowling v. Ky. Dept. of Corrections, 301 S.W.3d 478, (Ky. 2009), and its aftermath do not disrupt the district court's holding that defendant's complaint is barred by the statute of limitations.

[09/03] Sheffield v. City of Fort Thomas
In plaintiff's suit against a city and various city officials in their official and individual capacities, claiming that several of the city's ordinances related to controlling deer population, violate the United States and Kentucky Constitutions and that the ordinances are preempted by Kentucky state statutes and administrative regulations, district court's judgment in affirmed in part, reversed in part and remanded where: 1) the Bow-and-Arrow Ordinance is not preempted; 2) the Field-Dressing Ordinance is not preempted by Chapter 150; 3) although 301 Ky. Admin. Regs. 2:-015 has preemptive force and the Deer-Feeding Ordinance is preempted insofar as it purports to ban deer-feeding within the curtilage of Fort Thomas homes, the ordinance is not preempted in its entirety, as it is a legitimate exercise of municipal authority as applied to deer-feeding outside the curtilage of the home; 4) plaintiff's substantive due process challenge to the Bow-and-Arrow Ordinance is rejected; and 5) the Deer-Feeding Ordinance is not unconstitutionally vague.

[09/03] Wilson v. O'Brien
In plaintiff's 42 U.S.C. section 1983 suit against the City of Chicago and persons associated with his prosecution for attempted murder, brought after a state court set aside the conviction, plaintiff's and a witness's interlocutory appeal is dismissed for lack of jurisdiction as the collateral-order doctrine does not support an interlocutory appeal by a party to the litigation who contends that the district judge erred in resolving a dispute about an evidentiary privilege. Here, the privilege belonged to the plaintiff, not the witness, who was a law student at the time he interviewed plaintiff for the acts of which he had been convicted, and Mohawk Industries holds that the district court's resolution of the question of whether defendants may use the witness's deposition that they now possess is to be reviewed on appeal from the final decision.

[09/03] Chapin v. Fort-Rohr Motors, Inc.
In plaintiff's suit against his former employer claiming discrimination because of his race and retaliation under Title VII, jury's verdict for plaintiff on a retaliation claim is reversed and remanded as the employer was entitled to judgment as a matter of law because plaintiff did not produce sufficient evidence to find an actual or constructive discharge.

[09/03] US v. Yancey
Conviction of defendant for possessing a firearm as an unlawful user of marijuana is affirmed as Congress acted within constitutional bounds by prohibiting illegal drug users from firearm possession because it is substantially related to the important governmental interest in preventing violent crime.

[09/02] Carlson v. Bukovic
In plaintiff's civil rights action under 42 U.S.C. section 1983 against an officer for excessive force and the city for failure to train the officer, district court's judgment in favor of the defendants is affirmed where: 1) mere physical contact by an officer, although significant factor, does not automatically qualify an encounter as a Fourth Amendment seizure; 2) district court correctly submitted the question of whether a seizure took place to the jury; 3) the jury was entitled to determine that, at the time the officer touched plaintiff's arm, officer's action was more exhortatory than commanding; 4) because plaintiff's section 1983 Fourth Amendment excessive force claim failed, her failure-to-train claim against the city fails as well; and 5) plaintiff's claim that the district judge was biased need not be addressed as recusal was unnecessary in this case.

[09/02] Goldhamer v. Nagode
In plaintiffs' 42 U.S.C. section 1983 suit alleging violations of their rights under the First, Fourth, and Fourteenth Amendments and under state law, challenging a city ordinance's failure-to-disperse provision of section 8-4-010(d), district court's judgment permanently enjoining the city from enforcing the provision on the ground that it imposes too great a burden on protected free speech and is unconstitutionally vague is vacated and remanded as, plaintiffs lack standing to challenge the facial validity of the ordinance at issue as they were not even arguably violating the failure-to-disperse provision when they were arrested for demonstrating against military recruitment, and plaintiffs have not shown a reasonable prospect of future arrest for again violating that same provision.

[09/01] Warf v. Bd of Elections of Green County
In plaintiffs' 42 U.S.C. section 1983 action claiming unconstitutional disenfranchisement against a county elections board and individuals, alleging that their voting rights under the Fourteenth Amendment were violated by a Kentucky state trial court judgment that declared void all 542 votes cast by absentee ballot in the 2006 General Election for the office of Green County Clerk, grant of summary judgment in favor of the defendants is affirmed as the Green Circuit Court's decision to void the absentee ballots does not rise to a level of fundamental unfairness in violation of Due Process as it is evident that the decision to void all absentee ballots cast in the election reasonably applied applicable Kentucky case law, and the court appropriately looked to analogous state cases and applied the careful scrutiny to incumbent clerks described therein.

[09/01] Badger Catholic, Inc. v. Walsh
In a Catholic student group's 42 U.S.C. section 1983 suit against University of Wisconsin for refusing to reimburse any of the group's expenses, district court's declaratory judgment in favor of plaintiff in concluding that reimbursing the expenses of religious speakers, through a program equally available to secular speakers, does not violate the Establishment Clause, and that, having established a public forum, the University must not exclude speakers who want to use the forum for worship, is affirmed as underwriting a religious speaker's costs, as part of a neutral program justified by the program's secular benefits, does not violate the Establishment Clause even if the religious speaker uses some of the money for prayer or sectarian instruction.

[09/01] Nader v. Cronin
In an action by independent candidates for president, including Ralph Nader, who were denied access to Hawaii's ballot for the 2004 election, summary judgment for defendants is affirmed where the relevant provisions governing ballot access did not violate the Equal Protection Clause or the First and Fourteenth Amendments because plaintiffs failed to show that Hawaii's election scheme imposed a severe burden on independent candidates for president even in light of an examination of Hawaii's regulatory scheme as a whole.

[08/31] Roberts v. Doyle
An order of the Second Circuit enjoining the Secretary of State from placing Amendment 3 on the November 2010 general election ballot is affirmed where: 1) the ballot title and summary are confusing to the average voter as the lack of an effective date renders it impossible for a voter to know which homeowners would qualify for the exemption; 2) the ballot title and summary fail to mention that a married person could fail to qualify for the exemption because his or her spouse previously owned a residence; and 3) a voter reading the title and summary could easily conclude that in order to be eligible for the additional homestead, a property owner would have to meet two conditions.

[08/31] Florida Dep't of State v. Florida State Conference of NAACP Branches
Judgment of the circuit court striking a legislatively proposed constitutional amendment from the November 2010 general election ballot is affirmed as, based upon the provisions of section 101.161(1), Florida Statutes, article XI, section 5, of the Florida Constitution, the ballot language setting forth the substance of Amendment 7, related to legislative and congressional redistricting, does not inform the voter of the true purpose and effect of the amendment on existing constitutional provisions and, is misleading.

[08/31] Forrest v. Prine
In plaintiff's excessive force claim against an officer under 42 U.S.C. section 1983, summary judgment for defendant is affirmed where: 1) a reading of the record reveals that the officer's use of the taser was a reasonable, good faith effort to maintain or restore discipline within the jail; 2) there is no genuine issue of triable fact as to whether the officer's decision to employ the taser amounted to a violation of the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment; and 3) no reasonable jury would conclude that the officer fired his taser with a malicious or sadistic intent.

[08/31] Faculty Senate of Fla. Int'l. Univ. v. Winn
In a Supremacy Clause challenge to Florida's restriction on the use of state money for travel by state employees to countries that the federal government listed as "State Sponsors of Terrorism," partial summary judgment and a preliminary injunction in favor of plaintiffs is vacated where no federal law says that states cannot differentiate among foreign nations when it came to spending for academic travel.

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