Justia Constitutional Law Opinion Summaries

Plaintiff filed suit under 42 U.S.C. 1983 against the superintendent, in his official capacity, alleging that schools would not hire plaintiff while he was a teacher under investigation. The Seventh Circuit affirmed the district court's dismissal of the complaint, holding that section 1983 does not authorize awards of damages against states and a state official in his official capacity; plaintiff's complaint failed to allege the deprivation of any liberty or property interest; the Constitution does not require a hearing before public notice that a charge is under investigation; probable cause was required to support custody but not to support a public charge of crime; and administrative investigations precede hearings. View "Fritz v. Evers" on Justia Law

Four Chicago police officers received an emergency call about a “male with a gun,” and arrived on scene at about 3:35 a.m. An unidentified man on the porch directed them to the first floor apartment, stating only, “He’s in there.” Upon entering, they encountered approximately 10 people milling around; one stated, “The man with the gun is in the back. He pointed it at my face.” When Officer Gentile looked up, a man saw him and fled into the first floor bedroom, slamming the door. After announcing their presence and knocking, the officers opened the bedroom door and saw Lindsey sitting on a mattress next to a woman. Gentile found a gun on the bedroom floor, about two feet in front of Lindsey. None of the officers saw the gun on Lindsey’s person. The state dismissed criminal charges against Lindsey for unlawful possession of a weapon. Lindsey filed suit, claiming false arrest, excessive force, false imprisonment, and malicious prosecution under 42 U.S.C. 1983. The Seventh Circuit affirmed a verdict rejecting all of his claims. The district court was within its discretion in denying the jurors’ request for a copy of a potentially impeaching interrogatory answer and in refusing to modify its jury instruction on “possession” to stress that “mere proximity” to a gun is insufficient. View "Lindsey v. Macias" on Justia Law

A six month delay between a property inspection and notice of a municipal ordinance citation does not violate due process. The Seventh Circuit affirmed the district court's dismissal of plaintiff's amended complaint for failure to state a procedural due process claim under 42 U.S.C. 1983. The court held that the administrative and judicial proceedings available for plaintiff to challenge her citation for growing weeds greater than 10 inches tall in her garden satisfied due process, and the accuracy of the city's interpretation of its ordinance did not implicate the U.S. Constitution. Therefore, plaintiff failed to allege facts supporting a plausible violation of her due process rights. The court rejected plaintiff's alternative theory that the city misinterpreted the ordinance's plain text. View "Tucker v. City of Chicago" on Justia Law

The Seventh Circuit affirmed the district court's grant of summary judgment for Shellpoint in an action alleging that Shellpoint discriminated against plaintiffs based on race when it prohibited them from assuming the loan of a home that they had purchased. The court held that no reasonable jury could find that Shellpoint discriminated against plaintiffs based on their race where their only evidence was vague and speculative. Furthermore, the requirement that plaintiffs satisfy the outstanding loan payment was consistent with the loan agreement, which conditions assumption on Shellpoint's determination that its security would not be impaired. The court also held that plaintiffs did not point to evidence countering the Shellpoint representative's statement that they never produced a complete application. View "Sims v. New Penn Financial LLC" on Justia Law

The Seventh Circuit affirmed the district court's denial of a petition for writ of habeas corpus under 28 U.S.C. 2254. Petitioner claimed that the prosecutor made improper statements during closing arguments. The court held that the prosecutor's comment on petitioner's failure to testify was not an invitation for the jury to consider petitioner's decision as evidence of his guilty. To the extent that any prejudice arose from the comment, the clear jury instructions cured it. The court also held that the prosecutor's argument concerning the Gangster Disciples did not prejudice petitioner. View "Clark v. Lashbrook" on Justia Law

The Seventh Circuit reversed the district court's grant of summary judgment for Stryker in an action filed by plaintiff, a former employee, alleging a claim of retaliation under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. The court, giving plaintiff as the non-moving party the benefit of conflicts in the evidence and any reasonable inferences in her favor, held that there was a genuine issue of material fact about the reason Stryker fired her. In this case, a reasonable jury could interpret the suspicious timing of her firing as evidence that one or both decision‐makers initially found plaintiff's actions in the Vail incident to be tolerable, and that they decided only later, after she had filed her internal complaint, to use that incident as a pretext to fire her for retaliatory reasons. Accordingly, the court remanded for further proceedings. View "Donley v. Stryker Corporation" on Justia Law

Plaintiff filed suit against her former employer, Pearson, alleging claims of Title VII sex discrimination and other claims, after she allegedly did not get the same chance to resign with severance pay that three male employees received. Plaintiff also claimed that Pearson lost a key email exchange.The Seventh Circuit affirmed the district court's overruling of plaintiff's objection about the emails and the district court's cure -- barring plaintiff from disputing her description of the emails but declining to grant further sanctions -- was sufficient. The court also affirmed the district court's grant of summary judgment on the severance-pay discrimination claim where the three proposed comparators were not similarly situated to plaintiff. The court held that there was no evidence of pretext and the misstatement of the standard of review was harmless because the court's review was de novo. View "Barbera v. Pearson Education, Inc." on Justia Law

Plaintiff, an Illinois state prisoner, filed suit under 42 U.S.C. 1983, alleging that prison officials conspired to and did violate his First and Eighth Amendment rights while he was incarcerated at the Menard Correctional Center. The Seventh Circuit affirmed in part the district court's grant of defendants' motion for summary judgment, holding that no reasonable jury could conclude that plaintiff's grievances and complaints about the conditions of his confinement were a motivating factor in—or even factored into—Defendant Harrington's approval of placing him in segregation after a May 2012 incident. The court also held that no reasonable jury could find that Defendants Harrington or Page acted with deliberate indifference towards plaintiff or otherwise disregarded or failed to act on knowledge of a substantial risk to plaintiff's health and safety. Finally, plaintiff failed to identify any evidence, circumstantial or otherwise, of an agreement to deprive him of his constitutional rights. View "Daugherty v. Harrington" on Justia Law

The Seventh Circuit affirmed the district court's grant of defendants' motion for summary judgment in an action alleging claims under the Age Discrimination in Employment Act (ADEA), 42 U.S.C. 1983, and Illinois law. Plaintiff filed suit on behalf of himself and a certified class of similarly situated part-time and adjunct faculty, challenging Oakton Community College's change in hiring practices such that the college would no longer employ retired state employees if they were also beneficiaries of the State University Retirement System.In regard to the ADEA claim, the court held that the district court applied the appropriate burden of proof where the ADEA and the cases interpreting it make clear that a policy may have a disparate impact on older workers as long as the employer shows that the policy was based on a reasonable factor other than age (RFOA); the district court correctly concluded that a reasonable jury would be compelled to find that Oakton's reason was an RFOA; and the district court properly required defendants to prove that Oakton's policy was, in fact, based on reasonable factors other than age. Likewise, the section 1983 claim failed because there was no ADEA violation. Finally, plaintiff's retaliatory discharge claim lacked merit. View "Dayton v. Oakton Community College" on Justia Law

The Seventh Circuit affirmed the district court's grant of summary judgment for defendants after defendants refused to provide school transportation (or equivalent cash benefits) to plaintiffs' children. The court held that the record did not establish that the Superintendent or the school district furnished or withheld public benefits on the basis of non-neutral religious criteria; nor did the evidence support the claim that public officials impermissibly determined the school's affiliation on the basis of theology, ecclesiology, or ritual; but, rather, it showed that public officials applied a secular statute that limits benefits to a single school affiliated with any sponsoring group. In this case, St. Augustine declared itself to be Catholic. View "St. Augustine School v. Evers" on Justia Law