Justia Constitutional Law Opinion Summaries

Defendant was convicted of two counts of first-degree murder with a multiple-death special-circumstances finding, two counts of attempted first degree murder, and one count of conspiracy to commit first degree murder. The jury found true allegations that a principal in the commission of the offenses had been armed with a firearm. Defendant was sentenced to prison for 50 years to life plus one year for a firearm enhancement. Defendant filed his first section 1172.6 petition. After issuing an order to show cause, the trial court conducted an evidentiary hearing pursuant to section 1172.6, subdivision (d). Defendant again appealed an order denying his Penal Code section 1172.6 petition for resentencing.   The Second Appellate District affirmed. The court concluded that the trial court’s holding is the law of the case and conclusively established at the prima facie stage that Defendant is not entitled to resentencing based on his second 1172.6 petition. The court explained that Defendant has not shown that, by applying the law of the case doctrine, the court would be shutting our eyes to a manifest misapplication of existing principles resulting in substantial injustice. View "P. v. Medrano" on Justia Law

Plaintiffs are individual physicians based in Arizona, joined by several Arizona medical and advocacy groups. The named Defendants are Arizona Attorney General Kristin Mayes, all Arizona County Attorneys, and various state enforcement agencies. The Attorney General declined to defend this lawsuit, and the district court allowed Warren Petersen, President of the Arizona Senate, and Ben Toma, Speaker of the Arizona House of Representatives, to intervene. This suit by Arizona physicians, medical associations, and advocacy groups claims that an Arizona law criminalizing the performance of certain abortions is unconstitutionally vague. The district court denied a preliminary injunction, finding that Plaintiffs lacked standing.   The Ninth Circuit reversed and remanded. The panel held that the physician plaintiffs had demonstrated both actual and imminent injuries sufficient for standing. Plaintiffs suffered an actual injury—economic losses— because they lost money by complying with the laws, which forbade them from providing medical services they would otherwise provide, and these economic losses were fairly traceable to the statute. A favorable decision would relieve plaintiffs of compliance with the laws and restore the revenue generated by the prohibited procedures. Plaintiffs sufficiently alleged two imminent future injuries that affected interests protected by the Fifth and Fourteenth Amendments: (1) a liberty interest that was imperiled because violating the statute could result in imprisonment; and (2) a property interest that was threatened because a statutory violation could result in revocation of plaintiffs’ licenses, loss of revenue, and monetary damages. Finally, plaintiffs satisfied the causation and redressability requirements with respect to their imminent future injury. View "PAUL ISAACSON, ET AL V. KRISTIN MAYES, ET AL" on Justia Law

Defendant-appellant Kenneth Walker appealed his conviction and sentence for assault resulting in serious bodily injury within Indian country. Walker lived "off and on" with his adult niece, Victoria Dirickson. Walker asked Dirickson for a set of house keys. She declined because “[i]t was [her] only day off, and [she] really didn’t feel like getting out and making a copy” of the keys. Walker became “[r]eally aggravated,” and an argument ensued in the living room, which lead to the assault charges at issue in this case. A grand jury indicted Walker on one count of assault resulting in serious bodily injury within Indian country. The indictment alleged Walker was a non-Indian and Dirickson was Indian. A jury found Walker guilty as charged. On appeal, Walker: (1) challenged the district court's jurisdiction because it erred in admitting Dirickson's Certificate of Degree of Indian Blood (“CDIB”) and tribal registration cards; (2) the district court abused its discretion in admitting the testimony of a medical expert; (3) the district court abused its discretion in failing to give a unanimity-of-means jury instruction; (4) abused its discretion in failing to consider sentencing disparities arising from a possible sentence in a state case; and (5) Plainly erred in imposing an anger management condition of supervised release due to insufficient notice, and improper delegation of authority to the Probation Office. Finding no reversible error, the Tenth Circuit affirmed Walker's conviction and sentence. View "United States v. Walker" on Justia Law

Artists (collectively “plaintiffs”) appealed the district court’s entry of summary judgment in favor of the City of Miami Beach on their First Amendment claim brought against the City under 42 U.S.C. Section 1983. The City contracted with the artists to create and curate a series of artworks that the City would own. The district court entered summary judgment after finding that the City’s removal of one piece of Plaintiffs’ artwork constituted government speech and was immune from First Amendment scrutiny.   The Eleventh Circuit affirmed. The court explained that Plaintiffs argued that “artistic expression” is the type of speech at issue here and concede that it “has sometimes been used to convey government speech.” However, they suggest that the history factor requires the majority of the historical use of a type of speech to have been by the government, as opposed to by private individuals. The court wrote that even assuming, as Plaintiffs contend, that artistic expression has historically been used for private speech more often than government speech, this does not negate the government’s own long historical use of artistic expression to convey messages. The history factor does not require the government to show that it historically commissioned more artwork than private individuals and institutions. The court concluded that just as “governments are not obliged under the First and Fourteenth Amendments to permit the presence of a rebellious army’s battle flag in the pro-veterans parades that they fund and organize,” they are not obliged to display any particular artwork in the art exhibitions that they fund, organize, and promote. View "Jared McGriff, et al. v. City of Miami Beach" on Justia Law

The First Circuit affirmed the judgment of the district court granting Defendants' motions to dismiss the underlying lawsuit seeking money damages pursuant Bivens v. Six Unknown Named Agents of Federal Bureau of Narcotics, 403 U.S. 388 (1971) for alleged unconstitutional searches and seizures, holding that the district court did not err.Plaintiffs claimed three Bivens causes of action for money damages related to the searches and seizures. The district court dismissed the complaint, determining that the claims arose within a new Bivens context and that special factors counseled toward denying relief. The First Circuit affirmed, holding that Plaintiffs' claims arose in a new factual scenario of Bivens and involved special factors. View "Quinones-Pimentel v. Cannon" on Justia Law

While losing in a high-stakes poker game, Defendant allegedly used his cell phone to arrange an armed robbery to reclaim his losses. Because a cell phone was directly tied to the crime, no one disputes that there was probable cause to search that device. But the police went one step further. They secured a warrant to search an iCloud account that backed up the phone twelve hours before the poker game and robbery. The iCloud warrant permitted a search of almost all the account’s data with no time limitation. Based on evidence secured by that warrant, the government prosecuted, and a jury convicted Defendant of being a felon in possession of a firearm. Given the warrant’s breadth and the account’s indirect link to the crime, Defendant argued that the district court should have suppressed the iCloud evidence.   The Eleventh Circuit affirmed. The court found that although Fourth Amendment standards are largely settled, their application to developing areas of technology is not. Like judges, law enforcement officers operating in good faith may struggle to apply existing standards to new circumstances. That is where the exclusionary rule’s good faith exception comes in. The court explained that the government concedes that the iCloud warrant fell short in certain respects, but it argues that reasonable officers could have believed it to be valid. The court wrote that it agreed that the warrant was not so deficient in probable cause, particularity, or otherwise that it would be unreasonable for an officer to rely on it in good faith. View "USA v. Kevin McCall" on Justia Law

In July 2021, Texas Governor Greg Abbott issued an executive order that prohibited private individuals from providing ground transportation to migrants who were previously detained or subject to expulsion. The United States brought a lawsuit against Governor Abbott and the State of Texas, arguing that the executive order was preempted by federal law. Three nonprofit organizations and a retired lawyer also brought a Section 1983 suit against the Governor and the Director of the Texas Department of Public Safety (“DPS”). The defendants moved to dismiss the suit brought by the private plaintiffs, arguing in part that the plaintiffs lacked standing and the suit against the Governor was barred by sovereign immunity. The district court rejected these arguments, and Governor Abbott appealed.   The Fifth Circuit agreed with the Governor that sovereign immunity bars the lawsuit brought by the private plaintiffs. The court explained Section 411.012 does not imbue the Governor with the “particular duty to enforce” the Executive Order. Second, even if the Governor had a particular duty to enforce GA-37 by commandeering DPS, he has not “demonstrated [a] willingness to exercise that duty.” Third, the Governor’s enforcement directive to DPS should have been sufficient to remove the Governor from this suit. Fourth, the court explained that if Plaintiffs want to show that the Governor silently invoked Section 411.012 and implicitly commandeered a state agency, they must plead facts to support that inference. Thus, the court held that sovereign immunity bars the private Plaintiffs’ suit against the Governor. View "USA v. Abbott" on Justia Law

The Supreme Court affirmed the judgment of the district court denying Defendant's motion to correct an illegal sentence, holding that the district court did not err in ruling that res judicata barred Defendant's motion to correct an illegal sentence.Defendant was convicted of second-degree abuse of a minor and soliciting a minor to engage in sexual relations and sentenced to twenty years as to the sexual abuse conviction and to four to five years on the solicitation conviction, to be served consecutively. Defendant later filed a pro se motion to correct an illegal sentence, arguing that the acts underlying his conviction were one continuous act and that his consecutive sentences violated double jeopardy protections. The district court denied relief ruling that res judicata barred the motion. The Supreme Court affirmed, holding (1) a motion to correct an illegal sentence can be subject to res judicata; and (2) the interests of res judictata in finality and avoiding repetitive litigation were served in this case. View "Peterson v. State" on Justia Law

The Supreme Court affirmed the judgment of the district court dismissing Plaintiff's complaint against the Nebraska Department of Correctional Services (DCS) and three of its officials regarding computation of Plaintiff's tentative mandatory release date (TRD), holding that there was no error.Plaintiff, an inmate, filed an action for declaratory judgment alleging that DCS was responsible for actions infringing on her constitutional rights under the Eighth Amendment and the due process clause of the Fourteenth Amendment by concluding that her TRD was consistent with Nebraska statutes and case law. The district court dismissed the case for failing to state a claim upon which relief could be granted. The Supreme Court affirmed, holding (1) Plaintiff did not state a claim upon which relief could be granted under 42 U.S.C. 1983; and (2) the trial court lacked jurisdiction under Neb. Rev. Stat. 84-911 for Plaintiff's claims against DCS. View "Williams v. Frakes" on Justia Law

Plaintiff, a black female, worked at Crestwood Hospital as an emergency department nurse from 2007 to 2018. Plaintiff repeatedly complained about racial discrimination in the months before Crestwood Healthcare terminated her employment. But, also during that period, Crestwood uncovered evidence that Plaintiff engaged in bullying and other misconduct. After Plaintiff sued Crestwood for retaliating against her complaints of discrimination, she argued that circumstantial evidence created a reasonable inference of retaliation under either the McDonnell Douglas framework or a “convincing mosaic” of proof. The district court disagreed and entered summary judgment in favor of Crestwood.   The Eleventh Circuit affirmed. The court held that although an employee may prove retaliation with whatever circumstantial evidence creates a reasonable inference of retaliation, Plaintiff’s evidence falls short. The court wrote that Plaintiff turned to evidence of systematically better treatment of similarly situated employees. She asserts that two employees engaged in similar misconduct but were not terminated. The court explained that nothing in the record suggests that either of those employees engaged in misconduct comparable in degree or kind to Plaintiff’s misconduct. Neither employee was the subject of multiple reports that they were unprofessional, threatening, intimidating, and abusive. The court explained that because Plaintiff cannot prove that other employees engaged in a similar degree of misconduct, she lacks evidence of better treatment of similarly situated employees. View "Daphne Berry v. Crestwood Healthcare LP, et al" on Justia Law