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8th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals Digest: Aug. 31, 2022
Minnesota Lawyer//September 1, 2022
Administrative Law
Social Security
Denial Of Benefits; Residual Functional Capacity
Where a claimant appealed an order affirming the denial of disability insurance benefits and supplemental security income, substantial evidence supported the denial of benefits, and the administrative law judge properly evaluated the subjective complaints and determined the residual functional capacity.
Judgment is affirmed.
Civil Practice
Arbitration
Motion To Compel; Minnesota Law
Where three elderly people who invested in collectable coins that turned out to be priced far above market value sued the seller for violating Minnesota law, and the defendant sought to compel arbitration, the record showed genuine issues of material fact on whether the parties formed contracts that included an arbitration provision, and the issues must be resolved at trial, so the judgment is reversed and remanded for trial on the arbitration issues.
Judgment is reversed.
Arbitration
Motion To Compel; Third-Party Beneficiary
Where a woman, who worked as an independent contractor for an insurer claimed that she was sexually assaulted at a work conference by an employee of the same insurer, sued the employee for battery, assault, false imprisonment and loss of consortium, and the employee sought to compel arbitration of the claims, arguing that he was a third-party beneficiary of the independent contractors’ arbitration agreement with the insurer, the district court did not err in denying the motion to compel since the claims did not arise under or fall within the scope of the arbitration agreements.
Judgment is affirmed.
Conversion
Celebrity Photographs; Costs
Where a celebrity photographer sued his former collaborators and a potential investor claiming they kept and used his photos of Prince without his permission, the plaintiff failed to prove his theories that the photos were converted or his copyright was violated, and the district court did not err in granting the defendants’ motion for summary judgment, and the court also did not err by granting costs to an individual defendant.
Judgment is affirmed.
Employment Discrimination
Adverse Summary Judgment
Where appellant challenged the adverse grant of summary judgment in an employment discrimination action, the judgment was proper for the reasons stated by the district court.
Judgment is affirmed.
ERISA
Fiduciary Duty; Distribution Of Benefits
Where decedent failed to comply with a requirement on her change-of-beneficiary form following her divorce and the employer paid the benefits from her 401(k) plan to her ex-husband rather than her three siblings, the employer did not breach its fiduciary duties under ERISA because the employer acted in accordance with the plan documents when it rejected the defective change-of-beneficiary form, and the employer also did not abuse its discretion by distributing the death benefits to the ex-husband, who was the sole beneficiary under the only valid form designation, so summary judgment for the employer is affirmed, and the claims against the ex-husband were not preempted by ERISA, and the decedent’s administrator had standing to bring a breach of contract claim, but a reasonable jury could find that the parties’ dissolution agreement intended to waive the ex-husband’s beneficiary interest in the 401(k), and the district court must consider whether equity requires him to give up the benefits on an unjust enrichment theory, so summary judgment for the ex-husband on the claims of breach of contract and unjust enrichment is reversed.
Judgment is affirmed.
Civil Rights
§1983
Involuntary Civil Commitment; Sex Offender Treatment
Plaintiff, an involuntarily committed patient at defendants’ sex offender treatment center, appealed from the district court’s grant of summary judgment for defendants.
Where the evidence supported finding that the center’s policy did not violate clearly established law, plaintiff’s §1983 claim failed.
Judgment is affirmed.
§1983
Involuntary Civil Commitment; substantial Risk of Harm
Plaintiff, an involuntarily committed patient at a sex offender treatment center, appealed from the district court’s dismissal of his §1983 action.
Where plaintiff failed to allege sufficient facts to show that defendants knew of a substantial risk of serious harm to plaintiff or how defendants failed to respond to such risk, the district court properly dismissed the action.
Judgment is affirmed.
Gender Transition
Services for Minors; Equal Protection Claim
The state defendants appealed from the district court’s grant of injunctive relief to plaintiffs, a transgender youth, their parents, and two healthcare professionals. Plaintiffs sought to enjoin enforcement of an Arkansas state law that prohibited healthcare professionals from providing gender transition services to minors or referring minors to such care.
Minor plaintiff had standing to sue because their sex at birth determined whether they could receive certain medical care, and the court found that the state law discriminated on the basis of sex and failed to meet the enhanced scrutiny standard because there was substantial medical evidence that the prohibited medical treatment would conform with the accepted standard of care for adolescent gender dysphoria and the purpose of the law was to ban outcomes the state deemed unacceptable rather than to protect children from experimental treatment.
Judgment is affirmed.
Inmate Action
Arkansas Law
Where an Arkansas inmate appealed after an adverse grant of summary judgment in his civil rights action, summary judgment was proper for the reasons stated by the district court.
Judgment is affirmed.
Civil Rights
Juvenile Offenders
Parole Review Process; Mandatory Life Sentence
Where juvenile offenders sued state officials responsible for administering a parole review process, the review process was not a sham, and the judgment is reversed because the district court erred in determining that the process was constitutionally deficient since the process complied with U.S. Supreme Court dictates and did not violate the offenders’ Eight Amendment rights.
Eighth Amendment
Dissenting opinion by Kelly, J.: “Missouri’s parole policies and practices, when considered in combination as implemented, work to deprive Plaintiffs of their Eighth Amendment right to a meaningful opportunity to obtain release based upon demonstrated maturity and rehabilitation. See Miller, 567 U.S. at 479. The Supreme Court has clearly stated that juvenile offenders are ‘constitutionally different’ than adult offenders, id. at 471, and ‘should not be deprived of the opportunity to achieve maturity of judgment and self-recognition of human worth and potential,’ Graham, 560 U.S. at 79. Because the parole review process in place under SB 590 fails to adequately ‘ensure[] that juveniles whose crimes reflect[] only transient immaturity — and who have since matured — will not be forced to serve a disproportionate sentence,’ Montgomery, 577 U.S. at 212, it violates the Eighth Amendment.”
Judgment is reversed.
Consumer Law
Product Liability
Defective Vehicle Design; Evidentiary Rulings
Plaintiff estate appealed from the jury’s verdict in favor of defendant in plaintiff’s product liability action, which alleged that decedent’s truck accident was caused by the defective design of the truck decedent was operating, manufactured by defendant. On appeal, plaintiff challenged several evidentiary rulings of the district court.
Where plaintiff’s expert report was untimely filed, the district court did not err in excluding it, nor did the district court abuse its discretion in not modifying the scheduling order following a mistrial, and plaintiff’s failure to object to other evidentiary rulings by the district court meant that those rulings were upheld under the plain error standard as they were unlikely to have a significant influence on the verdict.
Judgment is affirmed.
Products Liability
Medical Devices; Sufficiency of Evidence
Defendant appealed from the jury verdict in favor of plaintiff in plaintiff’s products liability action involving defendant’s hip replacement device. Defendant challenged the jury’s verdict and award of punitive damages, challenging the sufficiency of the evidence and multiple evidentiary rulings by the district court. Defendant also challenged the jury instructions.
Where plaintiff’s expert testimony and post-operative data were properly admitted, there was sufficient evidence for the jury to find causation under plaintiff’s defective design theory and thus defendant was not entitled to judgment as a matter of law, and there was also sufficient evidence to support the jury’s decision to award punitive damages.
Judgment is affirmed.
Contracts
Water Authority
Sewer Pipe Failure; Private Rights
Where a water authority sued a pipeline contractor for allegedly defective construction after a series of pipeline failures, the district court did not err in determining that the rights that the authority sought to enforce were private rather than public rights, and the authority could not invoke the doctrine of nullum tempus to avoid the statutes of limitations or repose.
Judgment is affirmed.
Criminal Law
Child Pornography
Sufficiency Of Evidence; Sentencing
Where a defendant challenged his conviction for possessing child pornography, the evidence was sufficient to support the conviction, and the district court did not impose a substantively unreasonable sentence.
Judgment is affirmed.
Cocaine Distribution
First Step Act; Guidelines Range
Defendant appealed from the sentence imposed by the district court after it granted defendant’s motion for a sentence reduction under the First Step Act. Defendant had been convicted of distribution of cocaine base and was sentenced to life imprisonment. Upon the grant of his motion, defendant was resentenced to the maximum statutory penalty of 480 months. On appeal, defendant argued that the district court erred in recalculating the guidelines range and in imposing the statutory maximum.
Where the district court could only apply retroactive guidelines changes in recalculating defendant’s range, it did not abuse its discretion in imposing the statutory maximum sentence by citing defendant’s leading role in the drug trafficking operation, evasion of authorities after skipping bond, and institutional infractions.
Judgment is affirmed.
Continuance
Jail Phone Calls
Where a defendant challenged his conviction in a drug conspiracy case, the district court did not abuse its discretion by denying the defendant’s last-minute request for a continuance since the attorneys had adequate time to prepare and the attorneys acknowledged that they were ready for trial, and there was no speedy trial violation, so the judgment is affirmed since the court also did not abuse its discretion by admitting excerpts of defendant’s jail phone calls where the remainder of the calls contained hearsay, unfair prejudice and irrelevant or confusing statements.
Judgment is affirmed.
Revocation of Supervised Release
First Step Act; Motion for Sentence Reduction
Defendant appealed from the denial of his motion for sentence reduction under the First Step Act. Defendant’s sentence was imposed following the revocation of his supervised release, ordered as part of his sentence for conspiracy to distribute drugs. On appeal, defendant argued that the district court abused its discretion by misunderstanding the scope of its discretion under the First Step Act.
Where defendant was released during the pendency of the appeal and his sentence included no further supervised release, his challenge to his sentence became moot.
Appeal is dismissed.
Sentencing
Career Offender; Crimes Of Violence
Where a defendant challenged his sentence in a drug conspiracy case, the district court did not err in sentencing him as a career offender since his two Iowa convictions for terrorism and assaulting a police officer qualified as crimes of violence.
Judgment is affirmed.
Distribution of Controlled Substances
Denial of Downward Variance; Substantive Reasonableness
Defendant appealed from the judgment of sentence imposed following his conviction for possession with intent to distribute and distribution of controlled substances near a protected location. Defendant challenged the denial of his motion for a downward variance and argued that the district court imposed a substantively unreasonable sentence.
Where the district court considered all the sentencing factors and did not base the sentence on an improper or irrelevant factor, the court declined to disturb the district court’s weighing of the factors.
Judgment is affirmed.
Murder
Death Penalty; Habeas Petition
The parties cross-appealed from the district court’s partial grant of relief on petitioner’s habeas petition. Petitioner was convicted on two counts of capital murder and sentenced to death. On remand from the denial of his habeas petition, the district court denied relief as to petitioner’s conviction, rejecting his claims of violation of his Sixth Amendment rights and Brady violations by the prosecution, but granted him relief from his death sentence.
Where restricting the scope of cross-examination of a government witness did not contravene the Sixth Amendment and where petitioner procedurally defaulted on his Brady claim, the court concluded that petitioner was entitled to no relief and reversed the reduction of his sentence to life imprisonment.
Judgment is affirmed in part and reversed in part.
Possession of Firearm by Felon
Pre-Sentence Report; Base Offense Level Calculation
Defendant appealed from the sentence imposed following his guilty plea to possession of a firearm as a felon. The district court overruled defendant’s objection to the pre-sentence report, in which defendant argued that the PSR improperly calculated his base offense level because defendant did not know that the rifle contained a high-capacity magazine.
Where the sentencing guidelines did not include knowledge of the characteristics of the firearm or magazine as a requirement, defendant’s lack of knowledge of the high-capacity magazine was irrelevant, and defendant waived his claim that the government breached the plea agreement when he withdrew when provided the express opportunity to raise such an objection.
Judgment is affirmed.
Possession with Intent to Distribute
Substantive Reasonableness of Sentence
Defendant appealed from the judgment of sentence imposed following his conviction for possession with intent to distribute, challenging the substantive reasonableness of his sentence.
Where the district court sufficiently considered the sentencing factors, the court found the sentence reasonable.
Judgment is affirmed.
Sentencing
Mitigating Role Reduction
Where a defendant challenged his sentence after pleading guilty in a drug conspiracy, the district court did not err in denying a mitigating role reduction, and the judgment is affirmed.
Judgment is affirmed.
Sentencing
Substantive Reasonableness
Where a defendant challenged the sentence imposed after he pled guilty to a firearm offense, the district court properly considered the relevant statutory sentencing factors and did not overlook a relevant factor, or give weight to an improper factor, or err in weighing the factors, and the sentence was not substantively unreasonable.
Judgment is affirmed.
Sentencing
Substantive Reasonableness
Where a defendant challenged his sentence after pleading guilty to being a felon in possession of a firearm, the sentence was substantively reasonable.
Judgment is affirmed.
Sexual Abuse of Minor
Procedural Reasonableness; Substantive Reasonableness
Defendant appealed from the judgment of sentence imposed by the district court following defendant’s guilty plea to sexual abuse of his minor granddaughter. Defendant challenged the procedural and substantive reasonableness of his sentence, arguing that the district court improperly placed a substantial emphasis on defendant’s care and custody of the victim.
Where the district court based its sentence on the seriousness of the offense and on the goals of providing just punishment, promoting respect for the law, and protecting the public, there was no procedural or substantive error in defendant’s sentencing.
Judgment is affirmed.
Employer-Employee
Failure to Pay Minimum Wage
Employee Status; Recovery Program
Defendants appealed from the grant of summary judgment in favor of plaintiffs, who filed a class action under the Arkansas Minimum Wage Act. Plaintiffs were participants in a court-ordered drug and alcohol recovery program where they performed work on behalf of defendants. The district court concluded that plaintiffs and the class should have been classified as employees and granted summary judgment in their favor.
Where plaintiffs were the primary beneficiaries of the work arrangement with defendants since they avoided criminal penalties by doing so and had been ordered perform the work by a criminal court, the district court erroneously determined that plaintiffs and the class qualified as employees.
Judgment is reversed.
Torts
Federal Tort Claims Act
Medical Negligence
Where the wife of a man, who died of lung cancer after seeking treatment at a veterans’ hospital, sued the federal government alleging that the hospital staff was medically negligent, the plaintiffs failed to serve the government with a certificate of merit and an affidavit signed by an expert witness, and the district court did not err in granting summary judgment to the government based on the failure to serve the certificate within the allocated time.
Judgment is affirmed.
Slip and Fall
Diversity Jurisdiction; ‘Massachusetts’ Rule
Plaintiffs appealed from the denial of their motion for remand and the adverse grant of summary judgment in their slip and fall action against defendant. Plaintiff James Cleek had slipped on a patch of ice on an exterior walkway near the entrance of defendant’s premises. Although a winter weather advisory had been issued for the area, defendant had not treated the walkway where Mr. Cleek fell.
Where the only member of defendant was a Nevada corporation, the district court did not err in finding complete diversity, nor did the district court err in applying the “Massachusetts” rule in finding that defendant owed no duty to remove naturally accumulating snow and ice.
Judgment is affirmed.
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