Justia Government & Administrative Law Opinion Summaries

A Vermont statute requires all "health insurers" to file with the State reports containing claims data and other "information relating to health care." Liberty Mutual sought a declaration that the Employee Retirement Income Security Act of 1974 (ERISA), 29 U.S.C. 1001 et seq., preempted the Vermont statute and regulation. The district court granted summary judgment in favor of Vermont. The court held that the reporting requirements of the Vermont statute and regulation have a "connection with" ERISA plans and were therefore preempted as applied. The court's holding was supported by the principle that "reporting" is a core ERISA function shielded from potentially inconsistent and burdensome state regulation. Accordingly, the court reversed and remanded with instructions to enter judgment for Liberty Mutual. View "Liberty Mutual Ins. Co. v. Donegan" on Justia Law

Starr, AIG's former principal shareholder, filed suit against the FRBNY for breach of fiduciary duty in its rescue of AIG during the fall 2008 financial crisis. The district court dismissed Starr's claims and Starr appealed. The suit challenged the extraordinary measures taken by FRBNY to rescue AIG from bankruptcy at the height of the direst financial crisis in modern times. In light of the direct conflict these measures created between the private duties imposed by Delaware fiduciary duty law and the public duties imposed by FRBNY's governing statutes and regulations, the court held that, in this suit, state fiduciary duty law was preempted by federal common law. Accordingly, the court affirmed the judgment of the district court. View "Starr Int'l Co. v. Federal Reserve Bank of New York" on Justia Law

The City appealed the district court's grant of plaintiffs' motion for a preliminary injunction enjoining Local Law 17. Local Law 17, inter alia, requires pregnancy services centers to make certain disclosures regarding the services that the centers provide. The court concluded that the law was not impermissibly vague; plaintiffs failed to demonstrate a likelihood of success on the merits with respect to one of the challenged disclosures, which requires pregnancy services centers to disclose if they have a licensed medical provider on staff; plaintiffs have demonstrated a likelihood of success on the merits with respect to other provisions challenged by plaintiffs that require other forms of disclosure and impermissibly compel speech; and because the provisions are severable, the court severed the enjoined provisions from the rest of Local Law 17. Accordingly, the court affirmed in part, vacated in part, and remanded for further proceedings. View "The Evergreen Association, Inc v. City of New York" on Justia Law

Plaintiffs appealed from the district court's order denying their Rule 60(b) motion to reopen the district court's judgment dismissing sovereign defendants under the Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act (FSIA), 28 U.S.C. 1330 1602 et seq. Plaintiffs moved for relief from judgment in order to appeal the district court's alternative ground for finding sovereign immunity - a ground that the court declined to reach in its prior opinion. The district court denied the motion under the impression that the court would be able to consider that unreviewed issue on appeal from the denial. But the court could not. Accordingly, the court concluded that this was an error of law and that "extraordinary circumstances" existed warranting relief under Rule 60(b). The court reversed and remanded for further proceedings. View "In Re: Terrorist Attacks on September 11, 2001" on Justia Law

Plaintiffs appealed from the district court's grant of summary judgment in favor of the NYPD on plaintiffs' Fourth Amendment challenge to NYPD Interim Order 52 (IO-52). IO-52 requires the administration of a breathalyzer test to any officer whose discharge of his firearm within New York City resulted in death or injury to any person. The court concluded that the immediate objectives of IO-52 testing were personnel management of, and public confidence in, the NYPD; the identified objectives qualified as "special needs" for purposes of Fourth Amendment reasonableness review because they were distinct from normal law enforcement concerns and incompatible with the warrant and probable cause requirements for law enforcement searches; and the special needs greatly outweighed officers' reduced expectation of privacy with respect to alcohol testing at the time of any firearms discharge causing death or personal injury, thereby rendering warrantless, suspicionless IO-52 testing constitutionally reasonable as a matter of law. Accordingly, the court affirmed the district court's award of summary judgment to the NYPD on plaintiffs' Fourth Amendment challenge to IO-52. View "Lynch v. City of New York" on Justia Law

Plaintiff appealed the district court's dismissal of this qui tam action and disqualifying plaintiff, its individual members - including a former general counsel to defendant - and its outside counsel from bringing a subsequent qui tam action on the basis that the suit was brought in violation of the general counsel's ethical obligations under the New York Rules of Professional Conduct. The court concluded that the attorney, through his conduct in this qui tam action, did violate N.Y. Rule 1.9(c) which prohibited lawyers from using confidential information of a former client protected by Rule 1.6 to the disadvantage of the former client. The court held that the district court did not err by dismissing the complaint as to all defendants, and disqualifying plaintiff, its individual relators, and its outside counsel on the basis that such measures were necessary to avoid prejudicing defendants in any subsequent litigation on these facts. View "Fair Labor Practices Assocs. v. Quest Diagnostics, Inc." on Justia Law

Claimant appealed the district court's grant of summary judgment for the government in a civil forfeiture proceeding. Although several claims of error asserted by claimant were without merit, the court acted nostra sponte in holding that the district court's application of legal standards antedating adoption of the Civil Asset Forfeiture Reform Act of 2000 (CAFRA), 18 U.S.C. 983, constituted plain error and affected claimant's substantial rights. Accordingly, the court vacated the judgment and remanded for further proceedings. View "United States v. Pellegrino" on Justia Law

Press intervenors appealed the district court's decision denying them access to court proceedings and a sealed internal police document (Report) and continuing to redact parts of hearing transcripts. The court concluded that the district court erred by declining to order release of the full transcript of the contempt hearing, but that given the minimal relevance of portions of the Report that were not testified to at the contempt hearing to the substance of that proceeding, the Report did not become a judicial document to which the First Amendment right applied. Accordingly, the court affirmed as to the Report, reversed as to the hearing transcript; and remanded for further proceedings. View "Newsday v. County of Nassau" on Justia Law

Plaintiffs filed suit to contest a wage freeze imposed in 2011 on Nassau County employees by the Nassau Interim Finance Authority (NIFA). The police unions contended that the wage freeze was imposed in violation of the Contracts Clause, Article I, Section 10 of the Constitution, and that the authority conferred on NIFA to impose such a freeze had expired under the terms of the applicable statute, N.Y. Pub. Auth. Law 3669(3). The district court granted summary judgment to the police unions on their state law claim without reaching the constitutional question. The court vacated and remanded, concluding that the district judge should have declined to reach the pendant state law claim, which required it to interpret, as a matter of first impression, an important state legislative scheme to prevent the fiscal demise of Nassau County. View "Carver v. Nassau County Interim Finance" on Justia Law

Plaintiff, representative of the estate of her deceased son, filed suit against the City of New York, police officers, and others, alleging that they were liable for her son's death. A jury found in favor of defendants. The court held that, where a municipality acted in a governmental capacity, a plaintiff could not recover without proving that the municipality owed a "special duty" to the injured party. The plaintiff bears the burden of proving a special relationship, and where the plaintiff failed to meet this burden, the analysis ended and liability could not be imputed to the municipality that acted in a governmental capacity. The distinction between nonfeasance and misfeasance was irrelevant to the analysis and the existence of a special relationship was a question of law that could be properly submitted to the jury. In this instance, the court found no error entitling plaintiff to a new trial and affirmed the judgment of the district court. View "Velez v. City of New York" on Justia Law