Justia U.S. D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals Opinion Summaries

After the Board charged petitioner and found that he violated the Board's rules and auditing standards, he petitioned to vacate the orders and sanctions against him. The D.C. Circuit held that the Board infringed plaintiff's right to counsel by unreasonably barring an accounting expert from assisting his counsel at the Board interview. Therefore, the court granted the petition for review, vacated the order of the SEC, and remanded with directions that the Commission vacate the Board's underlying orders and sanctions. View "Laccetti v. SEC" on Justia Law

The D.C. Circuit affirmed defendant's 20-month sentence for failing to remove asbestos-containing material prior to renovation. The court did not reach the merits of defendant's claims because he waived his ability to appeal on those grounds as part of his plea agreement. Furthermore, the court held that defendant forfeited his ineffective assistance of counsel claim by failing to assert it until his reply brief. View "United States v. Powers" on Justia Law

The D.C. Circuit affirmed defendant's 20-month sentence for failing to remove asbestos-containing material prior to renovation. The court did not reach the merits of defendant's claims because he waived his ability to appeal on those grounds as part of his plea agreement. Furthermore, the court held that defendant forfeited his ineffective assistance of counsel claim by failing to assert it until his reply brief. View "United States v. Powers" on Justia Law

Conservation petitioners challenged the portion of the EPA's Final Rule, which implemented Congress's effort to restore air quality and visibility in certain national parks and wilderness areas (Class I areas), allowing states to treat Cross-State Air Pollution Rule (CSAPR) compliance as a better-than-BART (Best Available Retrofit Technology) alternative. State and Industry petitioners challenged EPA's disapproval of State Implementation Plans (SIPs) relying on the Clean Air Interstate Rule (CAIR) as a better-than-BART alternative. The DC Circuit held that conservation petitioners' first main challenge was moot; the attack on EPA's use of presumptive BART was jurisdictionally foreclosed; EPA's rule requires aggregate average improvement, and its comparison of the CSAPR-region Class I areas as well as all Class I areas nationwide was reasonable; and the remaining claims failed. Because the court found no merit in the conservation petitioners' arguments and could afford no relief to the state and industry petitioners, the court denied the petitions. View "Utility Air Regulatory Group v. EPA" on Justia Law

The FDA counted both the sale to a minor and the failure to verify age as two separate violations on Orton's second failed inspection and assessed the maximum penalty of $500 for three violations within a 24-month period under the civil money penalty schedule. The DC Circuit denied Orton's petition for review, finding no merit in Orton's contention that the Tobacco Control Act precludes the FDA's methodology of charging multiple violations in a single inspection, and that the FDA violates the law by failing to provide a process for retailers to challenge first violations before the issuance of a warning letter. The court held that the statute was easily understood to permit multiple violations where multiple regulations were breached, and the FDA interpreted the statute consistently. The court also held that the FDA's adjudication of the subsequent violation provided a meaningful opportunity for a retailer to be heard regarding the underlying first violation, at the time that the first violation carried legally significant effects. In this case, due process required nothing more. View "Orton Motor, Inc. v. HHS" on Justia Law

Sierra Club challenged EPA's reconsideration of rules under the Clean Air Act that govern emissions to toxic pollutants from industrial boilers. The DC Circuit held that EPA did not adequately justify its change of direction on the carbon monoxide limits because it failed to explain how the revised limits would minimize the targeted pollutants to the extent the Act required. The court held, however, that EPA's startup and shutdown work practice standards were permissible because, consistent with the Act, they reasonably approximated what the best performing boilers could achieve. View "Sierra Club v. EPA" on Justia Law

NorthWestern challenged FERC's determination that its proposed rate was not just and reasonable. The DC Circuit held that FERC's decision in this case was reasonable and reasonably explained where FERC reasonably modified NorthWestern's proposed cost-calculation ratio by excluding the megawatts associated with "regulation down" from the numerator; FERC did not arbitrarily increase the denominator of NorthWestern's proposed cost-calculation ratio; FERC's decision on fuel costs was reasonable and reasonably explained; and FERC acted reasonably by requiring NorthWestern to make separate Section 205 filings. The court also held that FERC properly decided to treat this case like an ordinary over-collection case and ordered a refund. Therefore, the court denied the petition for review. View "NorthWestern Corp. v. FERC" on Justia Law

Numerous regulated entities petitioned for review of a 2015 order in which the Commission sought to clarify various aspects of the Telephone Consumer Protection Act's (TCPA) general bar against using automated dialing devices to make uninvited calls. The DC Circuit upheld the Commission's approach to revocation of consent, under which a party may revoke her consent through any reasonable means clearly expressing a desire to receive no further messages from the caller; sustained the scope of the agency's exemption for time-sensitive healthcare calls; set aside the Commission's effort to clarify the types of calling equipment that fell within the TCPA's restrictions; vacated the agency's approach to calls made to a phone number previously assigned to a person who had given consent but since reassigned to another (nonconsenting) person; and determined that the agency's one-call safe harbor, at least as defended in the order, was arbitrary and capricious. Accordingly, the court granted the petitions for review in part and denied in part. View "ACA International v. FCC" on Justia Law

In Fourstar v. Garden City Grp., Inc., 875 F.3d 1147 (D.C. Cir. 2017), the district court decided that under the Prison Litigation Reform Act (PLRA), a district court's decision to decline to exercise supplemental jurisdiction over state law claims does not count as a strike against a prisoner seeking in forma pauperis (IFP) privileges in later litigation. In light of Fourstar, the court held that it was not a strike under the PLRA when a district court in effect, though not in its exact terms, declines to hear state law claims in situations where 28 U.S.C. 1367 would authorize it to resolve. Accordingly, the court granted plaintiff's petition to proceed IFP in this court and remanded with instructions for the district court to do the same. View "Ladeairous v. Sessions" on Justia Law

After Torres Advanced terminated Plaintiffs Elliott and Sickle's contracts when Elliott sought workers' compensation benefits under the Defense Base Act, 42 U.S.C. 1651, and Sickle medically documented Elliott's claim, plaintiffs filed suit for breach of contract and common law torts. The DC Circuit held that the Act preempted Elliott's tort claims because they derived from his efforts to obtain Defense Base Act benefits. The court held, however, that the Act did not preempt Sickle's claims or Elliott's contract claim because those injuries arose independently of any claim for workers' compensation benefits. Accordingly, the court affirmed in part, reversed in part, and remanded for further proceedings. View "Sickle v. Torres Advanced Enterprise Solutions, LLC" on Justia Law