Justia Government & Administrative Law Opinion Summaries

Plaintiff filed suit claiming that the OCC’s enforcement action against him was trumped-up and retaliatory. On appeal, plaintiff challenged the district court's dismissal of the case on the pleadings. At issue is whether the Constitution places any limit on the governmental policy-making discretion immunized by the discretionary-function exception to the Federal Tort Claims Act (FTCA), 28 U.S.C. 2671 et seq. The court concluded, in line with the majority of its sister circuits to have considered the question, that the discretionary-function exception does not categorically bar FTCA tort claims where the challenged exercise of discretion allegedly exceeded the government’s constitutional authority to act. The court also concluded that plaintiff's Bivens v. Six Unknown Named Agents of Federal Bureau of Narcotics claims are not time-barred because the continuing-violations doctrine applies to extend the applicable statute of limitations where, as here, a plaintiff alleges continuing conduct causing cumulative harm. Accordingly, the court reversed and remanded for further proceedings. View "Loumiet v. United States" on Justia Law

This case centered around Petitioner’s written request under Maryland Public Information Act (MPIA) for information regarding the value of unclaimed property accounts in the custody of the Comptroller of Maryland. The Comptroller decided that the requested information was prohibited under the MPIA. The circuit court ordered the Comptroller to disclose the requested records in value order. The Court of Appeals affirmed in part and reversed in part, concluding that Petitioner was entitled to a list of claims but not sorted by value. On remand, the circuit court ordered the Comptroller to submit a modified MPIA request limited to certain accounts without sorting any by value. The Court of Special Appeals affirmed. The Court of Appeals affirmed, holding that the MPIA prohibited disclosure of the comparative value of accounts in the Comptroller’s custody. View "Immanuel v. Comptroller" on Justia Law

Plaintiff Planned Parenthood Association of Utah (PPAU) filed this 42 U.S.C. 1983 action claiming that defendant Gary Herbert, the Governor of Utah, violated PPAU’s constitutional rights by directing defendant Joseph Miner, the Executive Director of the Utah Department of Health (UDOH), to stop UDOH from acting as an intermediary for “pass-through” federal funds that PPAU used to carry out certain programs within the State of Utah. PPAU also filed a motion seeking a temporary restraining order (TRO) and a preliminary injunction. Although the district court initially issued a TRO, it ultimately withdrew it and denied PPAU’s request for a preliminary injunction. PPAU filed this interlocutory appeal challenging the denial of its motion for preliminary injunction. The Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals granted a stay in favor of PPAU to prevent the cessation of funding during the pendency of this appeal, and expedited the briefing and oral argument schedule. After that briefing and oral argument, the Tenth Circuit reversed the decision of the district court and remanded with instructions to grant PPAU’s motion for preliminary injunction. View "Planned Parenthood v. Herbert" on Justia Law

A clinical review panel authorized the forced medication of Petitioner, a resident of a facility operated by the Department of Health and Mental Hygiene. An administrative law judge (ALJ) affirmed. Petitioner sought judicial review, arguing that, on its face, Md. Code Ann. Health-Gen. (HG) 10-708(g) violates the Maryland Declaration of Rights by permitting forced medication without a showing that an individual is dangerous to himself or others. The circuit court affirmed the ALJ’s decision. The Court of Appeals affirmed, holding (1) HG 10-708(g) is not unconstitutional on its face; but (2) the authorization for involuntary medication may only be constitutionally carried out when an overriding justification exists. View "Allmond v. Dep’t of Health & Mental Hygiene" on Justia Law

Mohamed Tawid Al-Saffy, an Egyptian-American Muslim employed by the Foreign Agricultural Service, filed suit under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act, 42 U.S.C. 2000e et seq., alleging that the Agriculture and State Departments each discriminated against him based on religion and national origin, and retaliated against him for filing an EEO complaint. The district court granted summary judgment to the government. The court concluded that, because Title VII requires final agency action to notify the employee of his right to appeal and the governing time limitation, the order dismissing the 2012 Complaint did not trigger the ninety-day deadline for Al-Saffy to file suit. Instead, given the lack of timely final action by the agency, Al-Saffy could have and did file a civil action more than 180 days after the filing of the 2012 Complaint with the agency. Therefore, Al-Saffy’s October 10, 2013 filing in district court thus preserved his claims from the 2012 Complaint. The court also concluded that the district court erred in granting summary judgment for the government on Al-Saffy's claims against the State Department because there are genuine issues of material fact regarding whether Al-Saffy had an employment relationship with the State Department within the meaning of Title VII, and whether Al-Saffy knew about the State Department’s alleged role in discrimination against him prior to 2013. Accordingly, the court reversed and remanded for further proceedings. View "Al-Saffy v. Vilsack" on Justia Law

Plaintiff filed suit against FRBR, alleging claims for interference and retaliation in violation of the Family Medical Leave Act (FMLA), 29 U.S.C. 2601 et seq., and failure to accommodate and discriminatory discharge in violation of the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA), 42 U.S.C. 12101 et seq. The court affirmed the district court's grant of summary judgment on the FMLA retaliation claim and the ADA claims. The court concluded, however, that there are genuine issues of material fact as to whether FRBR interfered with plaintiff’s FMLA rights by providing him defective notice that omitted his right to reinstatement at the conclusion of the medical leave term. Accordingly, the court held that the district court's grant of summary judgment as to that claim was not warranted. The court affirmed in part, vacated in part, and remanded for further proceedings. View "Vannoy v. Federal Reserve Bank" on Justia Law

People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, Inc. (Plaintiff) submitted a freedom of information request to the University of Connecticut Health Center (Defendant) for correspondence between Defendant and the National Institutes of Health regarding potential noncompliance with federal animal welfare guidelines. Defendant provided sixty-one pages of redacted records. The redactions were names of individuals who had violated federal protocols and federal grant identification numbers that could be used to identify those individuals. Plaintiff filed a complaint against Defendant with the Freedom of Information Commission (Commission). While the complaint was pending, the Commissioner of the Department of Administrative Services (Department) determined that there were reasonable grounds to believe that the disclosure of the redacted material could result in a safety risk. The Commission upheld the determination. The trial court sustained Plaintiff’s appeal, concluding that the Commission applied the wrong standard of review when it sustained Plaintiff’s appeal. The Supreme Court reversed, holding that the Commission applied the proper standard of review and properly upheld the Department’s determination. View "People for Ethical Treatment of Animals, Inc. v. Freedom of Info. Comm’n" on Justia Law

Plaintiffs filed a 42 U.S.C. 1983 action in which they raised various claims relating to their arrests and now-vacated convictions for prostitution. The district court, with a magistrate judge presiding by consent of the parties, dismissed most of Plaintiffs’ claims as barred by the statute of limitations and granted Defendants’ motion for summary judgment on Plaintiffs’ surviving claims of malicious prosecution. Plaintiffs appealed only the grant of summary judgment on their malicious prosecution claims against one Defendant, David Young. Young was employed by the City of Albuquerque as a civilian fleet manager for the police department. He also served as a voluntary reserve officer for the police department. In separate incidents occurring in 2007 and 2008, Plaintiffs were each arrested by Young on charges of prostitution after a brief conversation in his unmarked vehicle. Young then filed criminal complaints and prosecuted misdemeanor prostitution cases against Plaintiffs in municipal court. Each Plaintiff pled guilty to the charges against her. In 2011, an attorney filed a petition for relief from judgment on behalf of Plaintiffs and nine other women who had pled guilty to prostitution after being arrested and prosecuted by Young, arguing he abused and misrepresented his position and authority as an agent of the City of Albuquerque when making the arrests. Instead of filing a response to the petition, the city entered into a stipulation with the petitioners agreeing that the requested relief should be granted. The state district court entered a set aside petitioners’ guilty pleas, vacating and dismissing with prejudice their judgments and sentences. Plaintiffs then filed this federal 1983 action in which they alleged, among other claims, that Young subjected them to malicious prosecution in violation of the Fourth and Fourteenth Amendments of the U.S. Constitution. After dismissing Plaintiffs’ other claims as barred by the statute of limitations, the federal district court determined Young was entitled to summary judgment on Plaintiffs’ malicious prosecution claims because they had not met their burden of demonstrating that their criminal cases were terminated in a way that indicated their actual innocence of the charges against them. "Although we sympathize with Plaintiffs’ concerns about possible abuses of police power and authority, we are not persuaded that these concerns require (or permit) us to vary from our settled law on malicious prosecution." The Tenth Circuit affirmed the district court's decision. View "M.G. v. Young" on Justia Law

Petitioner, an inmate, was disciplined for violating K.A.R. 44-12-301, the regulatory prohibition on fighting. Petitioner filed a Kan. Stat. Ann. 60-1501 petition against the warden of the correctional facility where Petitioner was incarcerated, arguing that his due process rights were violated because the finding by the hearing officer that Petitioner violated K.A.R. 44-12-301 was unsupported by the evidence. The district court reversed the disciplinary hearing panel’s findings, ruling that the hearing officer could not have reasonably found Petitioner guilty. The court of appeals reversed. The Supreme Court reversed the judgment of the court of appeals and affirmed the district court’s ruling, holding that Petitioner was not accorded due process when he was found to have violated K.A.R. 44-12-301, as there was a complete failure of proof of one of the elements of the offense. View "May v. Cline" on Justia Law

Petitioners challenge the Commission's 2015 Open Internet Order, which reclassified broadband service as a telecommunications service, subject to common carrier regulation under Title II of the Communications Act, 47 U.S.C. 201. The Commission determined that broadband service satisfies the statutory definition of a telecommunications service: “the offering of telecommunications for a fee directly to the public.” In accordance with Brand X, the Commission's conclusions about consumer perception find extensive support in the record and together justify the Commission’s decision to reclassify broadband as a telecommunications service. See National Cable & Telecommunications Ass’n v. Brand X Internet Services. The court rejected petitioners' numerous challenges to the Commission's decision to reclassify broadband, finding that none have merit. The court concluded that the Commission adequately explained why it reclassified broadband from an information service to a telecommunications service and its decision was not arbitrary and capricious. US Telecom never questions the Commission’s application of the statute’s test for common carriage, and US Telecom cites no case, nor is the court aware of one, holding that when the Commission invokes the statutory test for common carriage, it must also apply the NARUC test. See National Ass’n of Regulatory Utility Commissioners v. FCC. Where the Commission concluded that it could regulate interconnection arrangements under Title II as a component of broadband service, the court rejected US Telecom's two challenges to the Commission's decision. The court rejected mobile petitioners’ arguments and find that the Commission’s reclassification of mobile broadband as a commercial mobile service is reasonable and supported by the record. In the Order, the Commission decided to forbear from numerous provisions of the Communications Act. The court rejected Full Service Network's procedural and substantive challenges to the Commission’s forbearance decision. The Commission promulgated five rules in the Order: rules banning (i) blocking, (ii) throttling, and (iii) paid prioritization; (iv) a General Conduct Rule; and (v) an enhanced transparency rule. The court rejected Alamo's challenge to the anti-paid-prioritization rule as beyond the Commission’s authority and rejected US Telecom's challenge to the General Conduct Rule as unconstitutionally vague. Having upheld the FCC’s reclassification of broadband service as common carriage, the court concluded that the First Amendment poses no bar to the rules and the court rejected Alamo and Berninger's challenges. Accordingly, the court denied the petitions for review. View "United States Telecom Assoc. v. FCC" on Justia Law