Justia U.S. 2nd Circuit Court of Appeals Opinion Summaries

The case revolves around Patrick Dai, a student at Cornell University, who was charged with making interstate threats of violence against Jewish students at the university. The government sought to detain Dai pretrial, citing 18 U.S.C. § 3142(f)(1)(A), which allows for pretrial detention of defendants charged with a crime of violence, a violation of section 1591, or an offense listed in section 2332b(g)(5)(B) for which a maximum term of imprisonment of 10 years or more is prescribed. Dai argued that this provision did not apply to him as his charge, a violation of 18 U.S.C. § 875(c), was punishable by at most five years in prison. He contended that the phrase "for which a maximum term of imprisonment of 10 years or more is prescribed" applied to "crime of violence," thus excluding crimes of violence punishable by less than 10 years.The district court rejected Dai's argument, and he appealed. The United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit affirmed the district court's decision. The appellate court held that § 3142(f)(1)(A) permits the government to seek detention of defendants charged with any crime of violence, not just those punishable by 10 years or more. The court reasoned that the government's interpretation avoided surplusage, made grammatical sense, and was supported by statutory history. The court concluded that the phrase "for which a maximum term of imprisonment of 10 years or more is prescribed" did not modify "crime of violence" in § 3142(f)(1)(A). View "United States v. Dai" on Justia Law

Adis Medunjanin was arrested in 2010 and charged with nine terrorism-related counts, including attempting to commit an act of terrorism and possessing a destructive device in furtherance of crimes of violence. The charges stemmed from a plot to conduct coordinated suicide bombings in the New York City subway system. Medunjanin was convicted on all counts and sentenced to life imprisonment.Medunjanin appealed his conviction, arguing that his convictions under 18 U.S.C. § 924(c) for possessing a destructive device in furtherance of crimes of violence should be vacated. He claimed that the crimes were predicated on invalid "crimes of violence" in light of a Supreme Court decision, Sessions v. Dimaya. The District Court agreed with the government that one of the § 924(c) convictions should be vacated, but upheld the other because it was predicated on attempted terrorism, which remained a crime of violence.In the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit, Medunjanin argued that the attempted terrorism count was an invalid predicate because the jury may have found him guilty of attempted terrorism based on aiding and abetting liability. The court disagreed, holding that the fact that a defendant may have been convicted of an otherwise valid crime of violence based on an aiding and abetting theory of liability has no effect on the crime’s validity as a § 924(c) predicate. The court affirmed the judgment of the District Court. View "Medunjanin v. United States" on Justia Law

Rodger Freeman, convicted of a felony in the United States District Court for the Eastern District of New York, was sentenced to imprisonment followed by a term of supervised release. After completing his federal prison sentence, Freeman was transferred to New York State custody to face a pending indictment. The New York Appellate Division vacated Freeman’s state convictions due to procedural error and ordered a new trial. Freeman was held in state custody for over four years pending retrial. The state eventually dismissed the charges against Freeman and released him from pre-trial detention.The District Court held that Freeman's term of supervised release began only after his release from state custody, not upon his release from federal custody. The court based its decision on United States v. Johnson, which established that a term of federal supervised release does not begin until a defendant’s imprisonment has ended.The United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit affirmed the District Court's decision. The Court of Appeals agreed with the lower court's interpretation of 18 U.S.C. § 3624(e), which states that a term of supervised release commences on the day the person is released from imprisonment. The court held that Freeman's term of supervised release began on the day he was released from state custody, not federal custody. The court did not address the question of whether Freeman’s federal term of supervised release was “tolled” during his years in state custody following the vacatur of his state convictions. View "United States v. Freeman" on Justia Law

The case involves a dispute over the use of the term "Medical Special Operations Conference" and its acronym "MSOC" as a trademark. The plaintiff, the City of New York and the FDNY Foundation, and the defendant, Juan Henriquez, both claimed rights to the term. Henriquez, a rescue paramedic with the FDNY, had been organizing conferences under this name since 2011. The FDNY also used the term for its own events. In 2019, Henriquez applied to the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (P.T.O.) to register the term as a trademark under his name. The P.T.O. initially rejected his application, finding the term merely descriptive of the events Henriquez organized. However, Henriquez successfully amended his application, attesting to his continuous and exclusive use of the mark for the past five years, and the P.T.O. registered the mark under his name.The United States District Court for the Eastern District of New York granted a preliminary injunction in favor of Henriquez, prohibiting the FDNY from using the term for their events. The court found the term to be a suggestive mark, which is entitled to more protection under trademark law than a descriptive mark.On appeal, the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit disagreed with the lower court's classification of the term as a suggestive mark. The appellate court found that the term was descriptive, not suggestive, and therefore merited less protection under trademark law. The court vacated the preliminary injunction and remanded the case for further proceedings. View "City of New York v. Henriquez" on Justia Law

The case revolves around Dycom Industries, Inc. ("Dycom") and its predecessor, Midtown Express, LLC ("Midtown"), a cable contractor that installed, serviced, and disconnected telecommunications cables for Time Warner Cable Company customers in New York City and Bergen County, New Jersey. Midtown had collective bargaining agreements with Local Union No. 3 of the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers, which required contributions to the Pension, Hospitalization & Benefit Plan of the Electrical Industry (the "Fund"), a multiemployer pension plan under ERISA. In 2016, Midtown ceased operations and contributions to the Fund, leading the Fund to assess withdrawal liability against Midtown and its successor, Dycom, under ERISA.Midtown demanded arbitration, arguing that its employees were performing work in the building and construction industry, and thus it was exempt from withdrawal liability under ERISA. The arbitrator determined that Midtown did not qualify for the exemption, concluding that Midtown's employees did not perform work in the building and construction industry. Dycom then filed a lawsuit to vacate the arbitrator's award, and the Fund filed a cross-motion to confirm the award. The district court adopted the magistrate judge's report and recommendation, denied Dycom's motion to vacate the award, and granted the Fund's cross-motion to confirm the award.The United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit affirmed the district court's judgment. The court concluded that the cable installation services at issue did not involve work in the "building and construction industry" under ERISA, and thus Dycom was not exempt from withdrawal liability. The court found that the arbitrator correctly determined that the work performed by Midtown was not work within the building and construction industry under ERISA, and thus the exemption did not apply. View "Dycom Indus., Inc. v. Pension, Hosp'n & Benefit Plan of the Elec. Indus." on Justia Law

A group of citizens and a civic organization, Citizens United To Protect Our Neighborhoods (CUPON), filed a lawsuit against the Village of Chestnut Ridge, New York, alleging that the village violated the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment by enacting a new zoning law related to places of worship in 2019. The plaintiffs claimed that the new law favored religious uses over secular uses, thus violating the constitutional separation of church and state.The case was initially heard in the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York, where it was dismissed. The district court found that none of the plaintiffs had constitutional standing to pursue the claim. The court determined that the individual plaintiffs lacked municipal-taxpayer, direct-harm, or denial-of-benefits standing, and that CUPON lacked associational or organizational standing.The case was then appealed to the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit. The appellate court agreed with the lower court's decision, affirming that neither the individual plaintiffs nor CUPON had any form of standing. The court found that the plaintiffs failed to demonstrate a measurable appropriation or loss of revenue attributable to the challenged activities, a personal constraint or control under the challenged law, or a denial of benefits. The court also found that CUPON failed to show that it had suffered an injury in fact that was distinct and palpable. Therefore, the court affirmed the district court's judgment, dismissing the plaintiffs' complaint for lack of standing. View "Citizens United To Protect Our Neighborhoods v. Village of Chestnut Ridge" on Justia Law

The case involves Indemnity Insurance Company of North America ("Indemnity") and Unitrans International Corporation ("Unitrans"). Indemnity, as the insurer of Amgen, a pharmaceutical company, paid for the loss of a pallet of pharmaceutical drugs that was damaged while being unloaded from a truck at an airport. The pallet was being transported from Amgen's facility in Dublin, Ireland to Philadelphia, and Unitrans, a logistics company, had been engaged to arrange the transportation. Indemnity, as Amgen's subrogee, sued Unitrans for breach of contract, negligence, and breach of bailment.The United States District Court for the Eastern District of New York granted Unitrans's motion for summary judgment, ruling that Unitrans qualified as a contracting carrier under the Montreal Convention, and therefore, Indemnity's action was time-barred by the Convention's statute of limitations.The United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit agreed that contracting carriers are subject to the Montreal Convention, but found that there was a genuine dispute of material fact as to whether Unitrans was a contracting carrier. The court vacated the judgment and remanded the case for further proceedings. The court held that a contracting carrier, as defined by Article 39 of the Montreal Convention, is a person that, as a principal, makes a contract of carriage governed by the Montreal Convention with a consignor, and an actual carrier performs the whole or part of the carriage by virtue of authority from the contracting carrier. The court found that there was enough evidence cutting both ways to create a genuine question as to whether Unitrans qualifies as a contracting carrier. View "Indemnity Inssurance Co. of North America v. Unitrans International Corp." on Justia Law

In this case handled by the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit, the plaintiff, Alexis Marquez, an attorney who represented herself, claimed that an Acting New York State Supreme Court Justice harassed her and subjected her to inappropriate behavior during her service as his court attorney. Marquez challenged two interlocutory rulings that dismissed the complaint as to one defendant and denied reconsideration. However, the district court dismissed the case as a penalty for Marquez's failure to comply with discovery orders, which Marquez did not challenge in this appeal.The Court of Appeals held that it lacked jurisdiction to consider Marquez's challenge to the interlocutory orders as it was not an appeal from a final decision of the district court. The Court explained that the merger rule, which allows an interlocutory order to merge into the final judgment, does not apply when a district court enters a dismissal as a sanction. If Marquez successfully challenges the sanction dismissal, she would then have the opportunity to challenge the interlocutory orders as part of any appeal from a final judgment on the merits. In this situation, however, the Court dismissed the appeal without prejudice due to lack of jurisdiction. View "Marquez v. Silver" on Justia Law

Elaine Bart, a former supermarket manager, brought a lawsuit against her former employer, Golub Corporation, alleging gender discrimination under Title VII and state law. She was fired for falsifying food logs, a violation she admitted to but argued was not the sole reason for her termination. Bart claimed that her supervisor made several remarks indicating that women were not fit for managerial roles, suggesting a gender bias.The United States District Court for the District of Connecticut granted summary judgment to Golub, reasoning that Bart's admission of the violation, which was the company's stated reason for her termination, resolved the pretext inquiry, defeating her claims. Bart appealed this decision.The United States Court of Appeals For the Second Circuit disagreed with the lower court's ruling. The Appeals Court held that a plaintiff need not necessarily show at the third stage of the McDonnell Douglas burden-shifting test that the employer’s stated justification for its adverse action was a pretext for discrimination. A plaintiff may also satisfy this burden by providing evidence that even if the employer had mixed motives, the plaintiff’s membership in a protected class was at least one motivating factor in the employer’s adverse action. Given Bart's testimony about her supervisor's remarks indicating gender bias, the court concluded that Bart met this burden, thus precluding summary judgment.Therefore, the Court of Appeals vacated the district court’s judgment and remanded the case for further proceedings consistent with its opinion. View "Bart v. Golub Corp." on Justia Law

The case was a lawsuit filed by Janet and Joseph Harvey against the Permanent Mission of the Republic of Sierra Leone to the United Nations. The Harveys alleged that they were harmed by faulty renovations at the Mission's headquarters, which is located next door to their home in Manhattan. The Mission sought to dismiss the complaint, arguing that the district court lacked subject-matter jurisdiction under the Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act (FSIA). The district court, however, denied the Mission's motion to dismiss, holding that two exceptions to the Mission's immunity applied: the commercial activity exception and the tortious activity exception.The United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit affirmed the district court's decision. The Appeals Court held that the commercial activity exception applied because the Harveys' claims were based upon the Mission's allegedly faulty contractual renovations, which is an activity that a private party can, and often does, do. The court did not need to address the tortious activity exception as the commercial activity exception was sufficient to affirm the district court's decision. The Mission, therefore, was not immune from the lawsuit under the FSIA. View "Harvey v. Permanent Mission of the Republic of Sierra Leone" on Justia Law