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

Plaintiff filed suit under 42 U.S.C. 1983 against a former police officer in his individual capacity, alleging that the officer used excessive force in tasing and shooting her father. The district court denied summary judgment to the officer based on qualified immunity. The district court found that the circumstantial evidence raised questions of fact regarding material aspects of the officer's account of the event. The court concluded that a reasonable juror could find that plaintiff's father had been raising his arms to defend himself from the officer's gunshots rather than attacking the officer as described. These inferences taken together would support a reasonable conclusion that the father was not the threat that the officer described and the officer's use of lethal force against the father was unreasonable. Accordingly, the court concluded that the district court did not err in denying the officer's motion for summary judgment on this claim. The court affirmed.View "Williams v. Holley" on Justia Law

Defendant appealed his conviction and sentence for two counts of theft of government money, one count of Social Security disability fraud, one count of passing a false financial instrument with intent to defraud, and one count of mail fraud. The court concluded that the evidence was sufficient to convict defendant of all charges; the district court did not err in issuing jury instructions concerning judicial notice of the court orders relating to his refusal to provide handwriting samples, or his refusal to comply with those orders; the district court did not err in calculating defendant's advisory guidelines range by imposing an adjustment for obstruction of justice under U.S.S.G. 3C1.1 and in the way it calculated the loss from his offense under U.S.S.G. 2B1.1(b)(1); and the sentence was substantively reasonable. Accordingly, the court affirmed the judgment of the district court.View "United States v. Ko" on Justia Law

Key Medical filed suit alleging that the Agency exceeded its statutory authority when implementing a competitive-bidding system for Medicare's pricing of medical equipment and supplies. Key Medical acknowledges that the governing statute, 42 U.S.C. 1395w-3(b)(11), contains a strongly worded ban on administrative and judicial review. Because the Agency's action was not ultra vires, and because there is an absence of a protected property or liberty interest, Key Medical cannot overcome the bar on review. Accordingly, the court affirmed the district court's dismissal for lack of jurisdiction.View "Key Medical Supply, Inc. v. Sebelius, et al." on Justia Law

The Red River Freethinkers filed suit challenging a Ten Commandments monument in Fargo, North Dakota. On remand, the district court granted summary judgment to the City and Freethinkers appealed. The court concluded that the monument in this case is permissible under Van Orden v. Perry and ACLU Nebraska Found. v. City of Plattsmouth. The City did not adopt a religious point of view, instead citing legal challenges, the City's interest in ending anguished debate, and the importance of embracing and tolerating all people. By adopting the petition, the City did not necessarily endorse the specific meaning that any particular petitioner sees in the monument. Accordingly, the court affirmed the district court's grant of summary judgment for the City, concluding that the monument does not violate the Establishment Clause.View "Red River Freethinkers v. City of Fargo" on Justia Law

Plaintiffs filed suit on behalf of themselves and a class, alleging a miscalculation of their Medicare Part B premium calculations. Plaintiffs conceded that they failed to exhaust administrative remedies. Because this case is not one of the exceptional cases where waiver of exhaustion is appropriate, the court affirmed the district court's determination that it lacked subject matter jurisdiction. The court affirmed the judgment of the district court on this issue and affirmed the district court's denial of mandamus relief where plaintiffs may pursue another avenue of relief, the administrative process.View "Degnan, et al. v. Sebelius, et al." on Justia Law

Petitioner appealed the denial of his petition for habeas corpus under 28 U.S.C. 2254. The court found that the Minnesota state courts' adjudication of petitioner's ineffective assistance claim was not contrary to Supreme Court precedent. Under either Strickland v. Washington or Lafler v. Cooper, petitioner cannot prevail on a habeas ineffective assistance of counsel claim. Petitioner suffered no prejudice and the record supported the finding that petitioner did not turn down a legitimate plea offer due to incompetent advice. Rather, the state courts found that petitioner turned down the plea offer for a host of other personal reasons, including that he did not want to do jail time, and that he was trying to get a better deal for his friend. Accordingly, the court denied relief under section 2254.View "Barnes v. Hammer, et al." on Justia Law

Petitioner, a citizen of Mexico, petitioned for review of the BIA's finding that petitioner did not qualify for cancellation of removal. Petitioner argued that the BIA committed an error of law when it "failed to follow its own precedent" in deciding the hardship issue, and violated his right to due process by failing to adequately examine all the hardship factors he presented. The court concluded that it lacked jurisdiction to consider the first contention where petitioner attempted to create jurisdiction by cloaking an abuse of discretion argument in constitutional legal garb, and the second contention was without merit. Accordingly, the court denied the petition for review. View "Hernandez-Garcia v. Holder, Jr." on Justia Law

Plaintiff filed suit against defendant, an employee of the Center, in state court for battery and under 42 U.S.C. 1983 for deprivation of her substantive due process right to bodily integrity. Plaintiff also filed suit against the Center and the Department, who removed the case to federal court and were subsequently dismissed from the case. The case stemmed from defendant's sexual assault of plaintiff while plaintiff was a resident at the Center. The jury returned a verdict against defendant on both counts and awarded plaintiff $1 million in compensatory damages and $3 million in punitive damages. The court affirmed the district court's denial of defendant's motion for judgment as a matter of law where there was sufficient evidence to find that defendant was acting under color of state law when he assaulted plaintiff. The court affirmed the district court's dismissal of defendant's motion for a new trial where the district court's consent jury instruction was proper; even if the jurors were confused by the instruction, defendant's substantial rights were not affected; the district court did not abuse its discretion in finding the jury's compensatory damages award was sufficiently supported by the evidence presented; and the punitive damages award was not unconstitutionally excessive. Accordingly, the court affirmed the judgment of the district court.View "Lee v. Borders" on Justia Law

This case stemmed from litigation involving long grain rice producers' allegations that Bayer contaminated the United States rice supply. Plaintiff class representatives filed suit for unjust enrichment and quantum meruit against other plaintiff lawyers, alleging that these other lawyers benefited in their state court actions from litigation materials and work product generated in the MDL by the plaintiff class but refused to pay for it. The district court granted defendants' motion to dismiss for lack of personal jurisdiction. The court concluded, however, that each defendant voluntarily entered Missouri more than once to negotiate settlement of their state court cases, a settlement process which ultimately resulted in their receiving compensation as part of a settlement. Their voluntary entry into Missouri for financial benefit was both the transaction of business as that term is used in the Missouri long arm statute and constitutionally sufficient minimum contacts under the Due Process Clause. Accordingly, the court reversed and remanded.View "Downing, et al. v. Goldman Phipps, et al." on Justia Law

This case stemmed from litigation involving long grain rice producers' allegations that Bayer contaminated the United States rice supply. After plaintiffs settled, the district court awarded common benefit fees from a common benefit trust fund to leadership counsel and denied Phipps' request for a common benefit award. Phipps and Phipps' clients raise various challenges to the establishment of the fund and the award of fees, and lead counsel cross-appealed. The court concluded that the Settlement Agreement, by which Phipps agreed to be bound, resolved that a percentage of payments due to clients of Phipps would be allocated to the Fund in accordance with the 2010 Order. Therefore, Phipps waived its challenge to the creation of the Fund and to the order that Phipps and its clients must contribute to the Fund. The court also concluded that the district court did not abuse its discretion by denying Phipps' request for additional procedures before the Fund monies were disbursed; the procedures employed by the district court were not an abuse of discretion; the district court did not abuse its discretion by approving the requested award as substantively reasonable; the district court's rationale for approving the fee request was reasonable when it adopted the Special Master's analysis; and the district court did not abuse its discretion in denying Phipps' request for a benefit award. In regards to the cross-appeal, the court concluded that lead counsel had standing to pursue the cross-appeal but that the district court did not have jurisdiction to order holdbacks from state-court plaintiffs' recoveries. Accordingly, the court affirmed the judgment of the district court.View "The Phipps Group v. Don Downing & Adam Levitt, etc." on Justia Law