Justia Government & Administrative Law Opinion Summaries

In 2006, Shearson, the executive director of the Cleveland chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations, was stopped by U.S. Customs and Borders Protection as she and her daughter were returning from Canada, removed her from her car, handcuffed her, and detained her for about 2-1/2 hours. Shearson claims that an officer swiped her passport and an “armed and dangerous” warning came up. After being allowed to enter the U.S., Shearson filed a request under the Freedom of Information Act for documents related to her detention. Following a suit, she obtained documents indicating that her name returned “an Armed and Dangerous” designation in Customs’ terrorist database and was a positive match to the FBI’s Violent Gang and Terrorist Organization File. The FBI declined to discuss the matter and recommended that Shearson use an administrative remedy, the Department of Homeland Security’s Traveler Redress Inquiry Program, 49 U.S.C. 44926. Shearson did not seek redress through that Program, but filed suit claiming due process, First Amendment, Privacy Act, Administrative Procedures Act, and equal protection violations. The district court dismissed, based on failure to exhaust administrative remedies. The Sixth Circuit affirmed. View "Shearson v. Holder" on Justia Law

A Juvenile Court standing order provided that social workers had authority to remove and provide temporary emergency care for children at imminent risk of serious physical or emotional harm and to request assistance by law enforcement officers. At a 2002 meeting, social workers determined that exigent circumstances required immediate removal of the children from Nancy’s home. A Temporary Emergency Care Order was completed in consultation with an assistant prosecuting attorney and a supervisor. A social worker, accompanied by police, went to Nancy’s home and took the children into temporary custody, and, the next day, filed a complaint for abuse, neglect, and temporary custody, with a notarized document detailing supporting reasons. A magistrate found that probable cause existed to support removal. In November 2005, Nancy and the children sued the Cuyahoga County Department of Children and Family Services, the social workers, and others. In 2010, the district court granted in part and denied in part the social workers’ motion for summary judgment on the basis of absolute immunity, denied the social workers’ motion for summary judgment on the basis of qualified immunity, and granted the children partial summary judgment on Fourth and Fourteenth Amendment claims. On interlocutory appeal, the Sixth Circuit affirmed with respect to both absolute and qualified immunity. View "Kovacic v. Cuyahoga Cnty. Dep't of Children & Family Servs." on Justia Law

Carpenter sued Flint, a councilwoman and the mayor, based on Carpenter’s termination from his position as Director of Transportation, asserting age and political discrimination, breach of contract, wrongful discharge, gross negligence, defamation, and invasion of privacy. Defendants argued that the complaint failed to identify which claims were alleged against which defendants, and that the allegations were “excessively esoteric, compound and argumentative.” Carpenter did not respond by the court’s deadline, and about five weeks later, a stipulated order entered, permitting Carpenter to file an amended complaint by April 21, 2011. Counsel manually filed an amended complaint on May 20, 2011, violating a local rule requiring electronic filing. The clerk accepted the filing, but issued a warning. Carpenter failed to timely respond to a renewed motion to strike. Carpenter responded to a resulting show-cause order, but failed to abide by local rules. Another warning issued. Carpenter’s response to a second show-cause order was noncompliant. The court warned that “future failure to comply … will not be tolerated.” After more than five months without docket activity, the court dismissed. The Sixth Circuit reversed. Defendants bore some responsibility for delays and the length of delay does not establish the kind of conduct or clear record warranting dismissal; lesser sanctions were appropriate. View "Carpenter v. City of Flint" on Justia Law

The Authority was formed under Ga. Code 46-4-82(a) to provide member municipalities with natural gas. It operates as a non-profit, distributing profits and losses to member municipalities: 64 in Georgia, two in Tennessee, 12 in other states. It pays its own operating expenses and judgments; it is exempt from state laws on financing and investment for state entities and has discretion over accumulation, investment, and management of its funds. It sets its governance rules; members elect leaders from among member municipalities. Smyrna, Tennessee has obtained gas from the Authority since 2000, using a pipeline that does not run through Georgia. The Authority entered a multi-year “hedge” contract for gas acquisition, setting price and volume through 2014, and passed the costs on. The market price of natural gas then fell due to increased hydraulic fracturing (fracking), but Smyrna was still paying the higher price. Smyrna sued for breach of contract, violations of the Tennessee Consumer Protection Act, breach of fiduciary duty, and unjust enrichment. The district court denied the Authority’s motion to dismiss based on sovereign immunity under Georgia law and the Eleventh Amendment. The Sixth Circuit affirmed, stating that the Authority’s claim that any entity referred to as a state “instrumentality” in a Georgia statute is entitled to state-law sovereign immunity “requires quite a stretch of the imagination.” View "Town of Smyrna, TN v. Mun. Gas Auth. of GA" on Justia Law

Harkness, a reserve Commander in the Navy Chaplain Corps, was denied a promotion to the rank of Captain by an annual selection board. The Secretary of the Navy denied his request to convene a special selection board (SSB) to review that decision. Harkness filed suit, claiming that promotion policies and procedures for chaplains violated the Establishment Clause. The district court dismissed, citing failure to exhaust administrative remedies required by 10 U.S.C. 14502(g). The Sixth Circuit affirmed, holding that non-promoted officers must first petition the Secretary to convene an SSB. The Secretary must weigh certain factors, including whether an administrative error caused the original selection board not actually to consider the officer, or whether a material error caused the original board to mistakenly fail to recommend promotion. If the Secretary determines that an SSB is not warranted, the officer can seek review of that denial in federal court. The language of Harkness’s request apparently challenged only the composition of the board and fell short of giving the Secretary a meaningful opportunity to respond to Harkness’s constitutional contention. View "Harkness v. United States" on Justia Law

Triple A, a Michigan corporation, has offices in Dearborn, Michigan, the Congo (previously known as Zaire), and Sierra Leone. In 1993, Zaire ordered military equipment worth $14,070,000 from Triple A. A South Korean manufacturer shipped the equipment to Zaire at Triple A’s request. For 17 years, Triple A sought payment from Zaire and then the Congo without success. In 2010, Triple A sued the Congo for breach of contract. The district court dismissed the case, citing lack of jurisdiction under the Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act, 28 U.S.C. 1602. The Sixth Circuit affirmed, citing the language of the Act, under which federal courts have jurisdiction “in any case in which the action is based upon” the following: [1] a commercial activity carried on in the United States by the foreign state; or [2] upon an act performed in the United States in connection with a commercial activity of the foreign state elsewhere; or [3] upon an act outside the territory of the United States in connection with a commercial activity of the foreign state elsewhere and that act causes a direct effect in the United States. View "Triple A Int'l, Inc. v. Democratic Republic of the Congo" on Justia Law

Cleveland has had an age-65 mandatory retirement policy for police and fire department personnel since 1960. The policy allowed the chief of police or the fire department to allow a person to continue on active duty on a year to year basis, subject to approval of the Director of Public Safety, following independent medical evaluation. Extensions were routinely granted until 2010, when budget cuts caused lay-offs and the police chief denied all requests. The fire department continued to grant extensions. Former officers, forced into retirement, alleged violation of the Age Discrimination in Employment Act, 29 U.S.C. 621., Ohio’s age discrimination statute, Ohio Rev. Code 4112, and the Equal Protection Clause. The district court granted the city summary judgment. The Sixth Circuit affirmed. Federal law includes an exception that allows state and local governments to set mandatory retirement ages for firefighters and law enforcement officers; the city established that its retirement plan exists for the efficiency of the police department and is not a subterfuge to evade the Act. View "Sadie v. City of Cleveland" on Justia Law

Janosek owns a business that makes welded ring products. The business uses water to cool hydraulics used in the process. In or before 1999 Janosek installed closed loop water chillers that he hoped would recapture the water and significantly decrease water consumption. Instead of seeing a decrease in his water bills, Janosek continued to pay in excess of $150,000 a year until 2002, when the bills dropped to between $10,000 and $25,000 a year. Janosek suspected that he had been over-charged based on the Cleveland Water Department practice of estimating water consumption. Cleveland’s Moral Claims Commission, established to consider monetary claims that Cleveland is not legally obligated to pay, held a hearing, without notifying Janosek, and denied the claim. The district court dismissed Janosek’s case, finding that claims of unjust enrichment, taking without just compensation, and negligence were barred by the statute of limitations, and that a due process claim concerning the lack of notice failed because Janosek had not identified a valid property interest. The Sixth Circuit affirmed. Any legitimate property interest that Janosek had in the overpayments lapsed with the running of the limitations period. View "Janosek v. City of Cleveland" on Justia Law

In 2008, Washburn was seriously injured when the door of an airplane hangar, T-hangar 12, blew off and hit her in the face and torso during a storm at an airpark owned by Lawrence County and operated by Attitude Aviation. Watson had leased T-hangar 12 for more than 20 years at the time of the accident; his lease made him responsible for the condition of the hangar. Attitude was never included in any of the hangar lease negotiations or lease renewals. Rejecting Washburn’s suit on summary judgment, the district court held that the County and Attitude owed no duty of care to Washburn because they had no control over the hangar. The Sixth Circuit affirmed. View "Washburn v. Lawrence Cnty. Bd. of Comm'rs" on Justia Law

Plaintiffs receive subsidies from Michigan’s Child Development and Care Program for providing home childcare services for low-income families. Following creation of the Home Based Child Care Council, a union was established and authorized to bargain on their behalf, based on submission of 22,180 valid provider-signed authorization cards out of a possible 40,532 eligible providers. The union and the Council entered into a collective bargaining agreement and the state began deducting union dues and fees from the subsidy payments. Plaintiffs sought to file a class-action lawsuit for the return of the money, collected allegedly in violation of their First Amendment rights. The district court denied certification of plaintiffs’ proposed class (all home childcare providers in Michigan) based on conflict of interest: some members voted for union representation and others voted against representation. Plaintiffs attempted to cure by proposing a subclass of only providers who did not participate in any election related to union representation. The district court rejected the proposal, finding that it could not assume that all members of the subclass opposed representation and that, even if all members of the proposed subclass did oppose representation, their reasons for opposition were different enough to create conflict within the class. The Sixth Circuit affirmed. View "Schlaud v. Snyder" on Justia Law