Justia U.S. 8th Circuit Court of Appeals Opinion Summaries

Plaintiff sued defendant under the Minnesota Human Rights Act ("MHRA"), Chapter 363A, alleging that defendant terminated her and took other adverse employment actions against her because she made complaints of discrimination. At issue was whether the district court properly granted summary judgment in favor of defendant on plaintiff's retaliation claims. The court affirmed summary judgment and held that plaintiff failed to create a triable issue of fact regarding whether defendant retaliated against her for reporting alleged discrimination where defendant articulated a non-discriminatory ground for plaintiff's termination, violation of a work rule, in which plaintiff failed to show pretext for retaliation.

Claimant appealed the district court's judgment upholding the Commissioner of Social Security's denial of her application for disability insurance. Appellant raised several issues of error on appeal. The court held that a certain physician's post-hearing letter did not contain any additional information and was not relied upon in the decision making process, and its receipt did not violate claimant's due process rights; that the ALJ did not err in finding claimant retained the residual functional capacity to perform certain kinds of low-stress work; that there was no error in the decision not to order a consultative examination regarding claimant's mental impairments; and that a hypothetical question posed to the Vocation Expert adequately addressed impairments supported by the record. Accordingly, the court affirmed the judgment where substantial evidence on the record as a whole supported the ALJ's decision.

Appellant brought an action against three law enforcement officers pursuant to 42 U.S.C. 1983 alleging that the officers violated his rights under the Fourth Amendment by using excessive force against him during and shortly after his arrest. At issue was whether the district court properly concluded that appellant's failure to show greater than de minimus injury was fatal to his claim and dismissed his complaint. The court affirmed the district court's summary judgment motion and held that a citizen could prove an unreasonable seizure based on an excessive use of force without necessarily showing more than de minimus injury. The court held, however, that the officers were entitled to qualified immunity because their alleged actions did not violate clearly established law in August 2005. The court further held that the district court did not abuse its discretion in denying appellant's motions for sanctions and motion for appointment of counsel.

Appellants, David Torgerson and Jami Mundell, sued the City of Rochester ("city") alleging, respectively, disparate-treatment discrimination based on national origin and based on gender when the city decided not to hire them as firefighters. Appellants claimed that the city violated Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, 42 U.S.C. 2000e-2000e-17, and the Minnesota Human Rights Act ("MHRA"), Minn. Stat. 363A.01-.41. Torgerson also sued under 42 U.S.C. 1981. At issue was whether the district court properly granted summary judgment in favor of the city. As a preliminary matter, the court held that summary judgment was not disfavored, was designed for every action, and there was no employment discrimination case exception. The court affirmed summary judgment and held that appellants failed to present direct evidence of gender or national origin discrimination against them in violation of Title VII; appellants made a prima facie case of discrimination but the city advanced nondiscriminatory grounds for its hiring decisions and appellants failed to show the grounds were pretexts for discrimination; the fact that appellants and hired candidates had relatively similar qualifications did not create a material issue of fact as to pretext. The court also held that Torgerson's section 1981 claim was properly dismissed where he alleged he was discriminated against based on national origin, not race.

Appellant brought a 42 U.S.C. 1983 action against appellees, the captain of a detention center and two officers of the county sheriff's department, alleging use of excessive force. At issue was whether the district court erred in finding appellant's version of events incredible; whether the captain violated appellant's Fourth Amendment rights when attempting to use an arm-bar maneuver to subdue appellant; and whether the officers violated appellant's constitutional rights by failing to intervene when the captain attempted the arm-bar maneuver. The court affirmed the district court's factual findings and proceeded to analyze the court's legal conclusions. The court held that the captain did not violate appellant's Fourth Amendment rights where it was reasonable for him to believe that appellant constituted a threat to his safety and his efforts to subdue appellant were a reasonable use of force. Therefore, because the captain did not use excessive force, appellant's claims regarding the officers also failed.

Plaintiff filed a 42 U.S.C. 1983 action against defendants alleging that defendants violated plaintiff's rights under the First Amendment and the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment by refusing plaintiff equal access to defendant's "Backpack Flyers for Students" program. At issue was whether the district court erred in denying plaintiff's claims for injunctive relief and damages on the merits. The court held that the district court did not err in finding that plaintiff's First Amendment rights were not violated; that a limited public forum could be limited to use by certain groups or dedicated solely to the discussion of certain subjects and a public entity could impose reasonable and viewpoint neutral restrictions on speech in the forum; that restrictions on plaintiff's access to the program was viewpoint neutral and did not impose a substantial restriction on plaintiff's access to the forum; and that the school official did not exercise unbridled discretion in managing the program.

Appellant sued defendants, the City of Minneapolis ("city") and an off-duty city police officer, alleging excessive force claims pursuant to 42 U.S.C. 1983 and assault and batter claims under Minnesota Law. At issue was whether the district court properly granted the city's motion for summary judgment with respect to the vicarious liability claims against the city. The court held that the district court properly granted summary judgment where appellant failed to show that the officer's assault occurred within work-related limits of time and place.

Plaintiff, a former Senior Investigator for the St. Louis office of the Department of Labor's ("DOL") Employee Benefits Security Administration, filed an equal employment opportunity ("EEO") complaint alleging hostile work environment and discrimination on account of her sex and age. At issue was whether the district court properly dismissed the complaint on the ground that the Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit had exclusive subject matter jurisdiction. The court held that the district court properly ruled that the Federal Circuit had exclusive jurisdiction to review the Merit Systems Protection Board's ("MSPB") dismissal where the MSPB had not reached the merits of plaintiff's discrimination claims in dismissing her mixed case appeal as untimely.

Appellant, a pediatric urologist, sued appellees alleging that appellees engaged in a "sham peer review" when they suspended his hospital privileges and reported the suspension to the national practitioner data bank ("NPDB") without a required hearing. At issue was whether the district court properly declined to exercise supplemental jurisdiction, and dismissed appellant's remaining causes of actions without prejudice, where it found that only appellant's state claims remained. The court affirmed the district court's judgment and held that the district court correctly dismissed appellant's Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, 42 U.S.C. 2000e, claim where the parties had previously agreed to settlement; the district court properly dismissed appellant's 42 U.S.C. 1981 claim where section 1981 did not apply to his claims based on his Egyptian national origins and where there was no evidence that appellees' legitimate race-neutral reasons for the suspension of his privileges were pretextual; the district court correctly dismissed appellant's Title VI claim, 42 U.S.C. 2000d, where appellant failed to present sufficient evidence to allow a reasonable jury to find any of appellees' acts were a pretext for national origin discrimination; and the district court committed no error in dismissing appellant's state claims where he agreed to a settlement.

Plaintiff sued his former employer for alleged violations of state and federal discrimination claims after he was terminated by the former employer when he was 57-years-old. The district court granted summary judgment in favor of the former employer on plaintiff's federal claim under the Age Discrimination in Employment Act ("ADEA"), 29 U.S.C. 623 (a)(1), but the court remanded and instructed the district court to dismiss without prejudice plaintiff's claim under the Missouri Human Rights Act ("MHRA"), Mo. Ann. Stat. 213.055(1). Plaintiff petitioned for a panel or en banc rehearing to have the court's disposition of the MHRA claim reconsidered where diversity of citizenship jurisdiction existed over plaintiff's MHRA claim. At issue was whether the district court erred in granting summary judgment in favor of the former employer on plaintiff's MHRA claim. The court agreed that diversity of citizenship jurisprudence existed over plaintiff's claim which required it to revisit its prior disposition and granted the former employer's petition for a panel rehearing. The court also held that the district court erred in granting summary judgment where it would not be unreasonable for a jury to conclude that plaintiff's age played a part in producing the adverse employment actions he alleged.