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

Petitioner seeks review of the Board's denial of his request to reopen the Board's 1999 benefits determination. The court concluded that the Railroad Retirement Act, 45 U.S.C. 231g, grants the court jurisdiction to review Board decisions denying requests to reopen initial benefits determinations. The court concluded, however, that the Board’s decision to deny petitioner's request to reopen was reasonable where it was reasonable for the Board to conclude that there were no errors in the allocation of petitioner's earnings that, if corrected, would have given him insured status at the time of the decision. Further, petitioner provided little to no explanation of how his initial decision contained a clerical error or an error that appears on the face of the evidence. Accordingly, the court denied the petition for review. View "Stovic v. RRRB" on Justia Law

Defendants Martinez Vega and Cuevas, affiliated with a left-wing guerilla group called FARC, were indicted with more than 50 other individuals for conspiring to commit crimes associated with the importation, manufacture, and distribution of cocaine into the United States. After defendants' extradition to the United States, defendants were convicted for violating 21 U.S.C. 812, 952, 959, 960, and 963. The district court then sentenced Martinez Vega and Cuevas to 330 and 348 months’ imprisonment, respectively. The court concluded that the proffered circumstantial evidence is sufficient to support the jury's guilty verdicts; the district court did not err where the mens rea jury instructions unambiguously and accurately reflected the state of the law; and defendants' failure to show any prejudice, let alone substantial prejudice, is fatal to their prosecutorial misconduct claim. The court vacated Martinez Vega’s sentence and remanded to the district court for resentencing in view of the legally required elements for a “manager or supervisor” enhancement where the district court failed to make the required findings on the second and third elements. The court affirmed in all other respects. View "United States v. Vega" on Justia Law

Relator filed a qui tam action against Phillip Morris, alleging that the company violated the False Claims Act (FCA), 31 U.S.C. 3729-3733, by charging NEXCOM and AAFES prices for cigarettes that violate the terms of their contracts. The district court concluded that it lacked jurisdiction to hear the claim under the FCA's public disclosure bar. The court concluded that the transactions that relator contends create an inference of fraud were publicly disclosed through a statutorily enumerated channel, triggering the jurisdictional bar. The court further concluded that relator does not possess any direct information about the underlying transactions that would allow him to rescue his claim from the jurisdictional bar by qualifying as an original source. Accordingly, the court affirmed the judgment. View "United States v. Philip Morris USA Inc." on Justia Law

Morris Days (a/k/a Jamil Days) held himself out to the public as a civil rights attorney working for a regional chapter of CAIR, when he was not in fact a lawyer. Plaintiffs, individual CAIR clients who were negatively impacted by Days' conduct, filed suit alleging that CAIR is responsible for the bad acts of Days because Days was CAIR’s agent. The district court granted summary judgment for CAIR. The court concluded that, viewing the evidence in the light most favorable to plaintiffs, and drawing all inferences in their favor, it would be reasonable to infer based on these facts that CAIR had the ability to control Days, and in fact exerted that control. Accordingly, the court found that genuine issues of material fact exist as to whether or not Days was the agent of CAIR. The court reversed and remanded for further proceedings. View "Lopez v. Council on American-Islamic Relations Action Network" on Justia Law

The collective bargaining agreement (CBA) between the union and Verizon provided for arbitration of disputes arising out of that agreement. After an arbitration panel interpreted the CBA in Verizon's favor, the union took the matter to the NLRB. After the ALJ ruled in favor of Verizon, the union appealed to the Board. The Board overruled the arbitration decision, determining that the union’s waiver of its members’ right to picket did not waive their right to visibly display pro-union signs in cars on Verizon property. The court concluded that, under the Spielberg-Olin standard, the arbitration panel’s decision in this case was not clearly repugnant to the National Labor Relations Act, 29 U.S.C. 151 et seq. First, the arbitration panel’s decision was susceptible to an interpretation consistent with the Act, because under the Act unions may waive their members’ right to display signs in cars on the employer’s premises. And second, the arbitration panel’s decision was not a “palpably wrong” interpretation of the collective bargaining agreement. Therefore, the court concluded that the Board’s contrary decision was unreasonable. The court granted Verizon's petition for review and denied the Board's cross-application for enforcement. View "Verizon New England Inc. v. NLRB" on Justia Law

Petitioners seek review of the Board's finding that G/M and the Carpenters Union committed unfair labor practices. The court held this case in abeyance pending the Supreme Court’s consideration of the validity of the President’s recess appointments to fill vacancies on the Board in NLRB v. Noel Canning. Member Becker, who was on the Board panel in this case, had been appointed to the Board by the President during a 17-day intra-session recess of the Senate. Following the Supreme Court’s decision, this court held that Becker’s appointment was valid. The court removed the case from abeyance and now hold that the Board’s orders failed to provide a reasoned justification for departing from precedent. In this case, G/M and the Carpenters Union filed a motion for reconsideration, arguing that the Board’s determination had ignored its holding in Coamo Knitting Mills, Inc. The court concluded that the Board’s order denying reconsideration relies solely on the absence of a claim of unlawful surveillance in distinguishing Coamo, not on any factual differences between the cases. Because the Board did not adequately distinguish Coamo and grant the petitions for review on that ground, the court need not reach the remaining arguments. Accordingly, the court granted the petitions for review, vacated the orders, and remanded. View "NLRB v. Southwest Regional Council of Carpenters" on Justia Law

The General Counsel issued a complaint against the union, alleging that the union violated federal labor laws by failing to tell Laura Sands when she began work at Kroger how much less in dues she would have to pay if she did not join the union. The Board dismissed the complaint. Sands petitions for review. The court joined the Second Circuit in holding that an unfair labor practice case is moot when the petitioner lacks an ongoing personal interest in the proceedings. Sands ended her relationship with the union when she quit her job at the grocery store in 2005, and her counsel conceded at oral argument that there is no reason to think she will work there again. Thus, even if posting a notice about the labor violation might affect a current store employee, it cannot redress Sands’ injury. Accordingly, the court dismissed the petition for review as moot and vacated the Board's order under the court's equitable authority. View "Sands v. NLRB" on Justia Law

Petitioners challenge the Commission's 2015 Open Internet Order, which reclassified broadband service as a telecommunications service, subject to common carrier regulation under Title II of the Communications Act, 47 U.S.C. 201. The Commission determined that broadband service satisfies the statutory definition of a telecommunications service: “the offering of telecommunications for a fee directly to the public.” In accordance with Brand X, the Commission's conclusions about consumer perception find extensive support in the record and together justify the Commission’s decision to reclassify broadband as a telecommunications service. See National Cable & Telecommunications Ass’n v. Brand X Internet Services. The court rejected petitioners' numerous challenges to the Commission's decision to reclassify broadband, finding that none have merit. The court concluded that the Commission adequately explained why it reclassified broadband from an information service to a telecommunications service and its decision was not arbitrary and capricious. US Telecom never questions the Commission’s application of the statute’s test for common carriage, and US Telecom cites no case, nor is the court aware of one, holding that when the Commission invokes the statutory test for common carriage, it must also apply the NARUC test. See National Ass’n of Regulatory Utility Commissioners v. FCC. Where the Commission concluded that it could regulate interconnection arrangements under Title II as a component of broadband service, the court rejected US Telecom's two challenges to the Commission's decision. The court rejected mobile petitioners’ arguments and find that the Commission’s reclassification of mobile broadband as a commercial mobile service is reasonable and supported by the record. In the Order, the Commission decided to forbear from numerous provisions of the Communications Act. The court rejected Full Service Network's procedural and substantive challenges to the Commission’s forbearance decision. The Commission promulgated five rules in the Order: rules banning (i) blocking, (ii) throttling, and (iii) paid prioritization; (iv) a General Conduct Rule; and (v) an enhanced transparency rule. The court rejected Alamo's challenge to the anti-paid-prioritization rule as beyond the Commission’s authority and rejected US Telecom's challenge to the General Conduct Rule as unconstitutionally vague. Having upheld the FCC’s reclassification of broadband service as common carriage, the court concluded that the First Amendment poses no bar to the rules and the court rejected Alamo and Berninger's challenges. Accordingly, the court denied the petitions for review. View "United States Telecom Assoc. v. FCC" on Justia Law

The SEC created a new class of securities offerings freed from federal-registration requirements so long as the issuers of these securities comply with certain investor safeguards (Regulation A-Plus). Petitioners, the chief securities regulators for Massachusetts and Montana, seek review of Regulation A-Plus. The court concluded that, because Regulation A-Plus does not conflict with Congress’s unambiguous intent, it does not falter at Chevron Step 1. Furthermore, because the Commission’s qualified-purchaser definition is not “arbitrary, capricious, or manifestly contrary to the statute,” it does not fail Chevron Step 2. By providing a reasoned analysis of how its qualified-purchaser definition strikes the “appropriate balance between mitigating cost and time demands on issuers and providing investor protections,” the court concluded that the Commission has complied with its statutory obligation under the Administrative Procedure Act, 5 U.S.C. 702. Accordingly, the court denied the consolidated petitions for review. View "Lindeen v. SEC" on Justia Law

Plaintiff filed suit against her employer, alleging violations of Title VII of the Civil Rights Act, 42 U.S.C. 2000e et seq., after she was suspended without pay for seven days in 2008 and was terminated in 2010. The district court granted summary judgment against plaintiff's suspension claims and dismissed her termination claims. The court affirmed the district court's dismissal of her termination-based claims because she failed to exhaust her administrative remedies. The court concluded that plaintiff introduced enough evidence for a reasonable jury to concluded that her suspension was motivated by racial discrimination. Accordingly, the court reversed as to this issue. The court affirmed the district court's grant of summary judgment as to the retaliation claim because plaintiff has not introduced evidence sufficient for a reasonable jury to infer that either her supervisors knew of any protected activity. View "Morris v. McCarthy" on Justia Law