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

Defendant paid a general contractor for costs associated with the cleanup of a contaminated parcel of land that defendant owned. After the general contractor failed to remit those payments to plaintiff, a subcontractor who performed the work, plaintiff sought payment directly from defendant. The court concluded that the Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act (CERCLA), 42 U.S.C. 9607, did not grant the subcontractor a right to recovery against defendant in these circumstances where defendant would effectively be required to pay twice for the same work performed. Accordingly, the court reversed the district court's grant of partial summary judgment to plaintiff and remanded with instructions to grant summary judgment to defendant. View "Price Trucking Corp. v. Norampac Indus., Inc." on Justia Law

Defendants pled guilty to conspiring to distribute a controlled substance in violation of 21 U.S.C. 841(a), 841(b), and 846, and to using and carrying a firearm during and in relation to that conspiracy in violation of 18 U.S.C. 924(c). On appeal, defendants challenged their sentences. The court affirmed the sentence, holding that neither U.S.S.G. 5G1.3 nor 18 U.S.C. 3584 authorizes a district court to run a term of imprisonment concurrently with a discharged term of imprisonment on related charges, and (2) that those provisions' distinctions between discharged and undischarged terms were not irrational. Defendants' remaining arguments were without merit. View "United States v. Lucas" on Justia Law

SDIF appealed the district court's grant of summary judgment in favor of Deep Woods against SDIF on the issue of liability. The main issue on appeal was whether Deep Woods, through its predecessor-in-interest David Lichtenstein, timely exercised a call option within 45 days of the delivery by SDIF of the shares subject to the call option in accordance with a Stipulation entered into by the parties. The court concluded that Deep Woods failed to exercise its call option in a timely manner; found that SDIF properly preserved its argument that Lichtenstein failed to exercise timely his call option under the terms of the Stipulation; and concluded that SDIF rather than Deep Woods was entitled to summary judgment where Deep Woods failed to comply with the terms governing its exercise of the call option. Accordingly, the court reversed and remanded. View "Deep Woods Holdings, L.L.C. v. Savings Deposit Ins. Fund" on Justia Law

Plaintiff filed suit under 8 U.S.C. 1503(a), seeking a declaration of U.S. nationality and the return of his Consular Report of Birth Abroad (CRBA) and passport. The district court granted summary judgment in favor of plaintiff and the government appealed. The consular officer had erroneously applied the five-year rule under 8 U.S.C. 1401(g), instead of the ten-year rule, in granting plaintiff a CRBA. The court concluded that plaintiff was not entitled to documentary proof of U.S. citizenship because he was indisputably not a U.S. citizen. The court held that section 1503(a) allows a district court to grant just one type of relief: a declaration that a person is a U.S. national; the enactment of section 1504 did not change the citizenship rights provided by statute, and simply providing jurisdiction where none existed previously did not create an impermissible retroactive effect; and despite the considerable inequities in plaintiff's favor, the courts were simply unable to provide plaintiff the relief he seeks. According, the court reversed and remanded with directions to dismiss the complaint. View "Hizam v. Kerry" on Justia Law

Defendant appealed the denial of his motion under 28 U.S.C. 2255 to vacate, set aside, or correct his sentence. Defendant challenged, among other things, the imposition of the career offender enhancement under the Sentencing Guidelines for two drug convictions under Connecticut law, which the court later determined in United States v. Savage, did not qualify as controlled substance offenses for enhancement purposes. The court held that when entering his guilty plea, defendant knowingly waived his rights to attack collaterally his sentence; the process by which the district court advised defendant of his rights to appeal and to attack collaterally his conviction did not constitute plain error; and the district court did not abuse its discretion when it denied defendant's motion to amend his petition to plead an ineffective assistance of counsel claim. Accordingly, the court affirmed the judgment of the district court. View "Tellado v. United States" on Justia Law

After plaintiff sought to obtain records from the SSA related to his father's disability status in order to support his efforts to obtain proceeds of his father's life insurance policy, plaintiff filed suit pro se alleging that the failure to provide the requested records violated the Privacy Act of 1974, 5 U.S.C. 552a, and the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA), 5 U.S.C. 552. The SSA eventually voluntarily provided the requested records to plaintiff. On appeal, plaintiff challenged the dismissal of his claim for damages and litigation fees under the Privacy Act and FOIA. The court affirmed the dismissal of plaintiff's claim for damages under the Privacy Act because the Act guarantees access only to an individual's own records and does not require federal agencies to provide information that pertains to a requesting individual, but is contained in another individual's records. However, because FOIA allows for fee shifting where, as here, a federal agency voluntarily complies with a requested disclosure following the filing of a FOIA lawsuit, the court vacated that portion of the district court's judgment denying plaintiff's request for $350 in litigation costs and remanded with instructions. View "Warren v. Colvin" on Justia Law

Defendant appealed an order revoking his supervised release. The district court concluded that defendant committed "another federal, state or local offense" in violation of the conditions of his supervised release, based solely on his pleas of guilty to a state drug offense entered under the Alford doctrine. The court concluded that the district court did not abuse its discretion in concluding, by a preponderance of the evidence, that defendant committed another offense in violation of the conditions of his supervised release because an Alford plea, under Connecticut law, constituted an acknowledgement of the strength of the state's evidence. Accordingly, the court affirmed the judgment of the district court. View "United States v. Glenn" on Justia Law

Plaintiffs placed their son in a specialized private school designed to educate children with learning disabilities and filed suit against the District for tuition reimbursement under the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA), 20 U.S.C. 1400 et seq. An Impartial Hearing Officer (IHO) awarded tuition reimbursement but the State Review Officer (SRO) reversed. The court held that the SRO's decision was insufficiently reasoned to merit deference and deferred to the IHO's decision, which was more thorough and carefully considered. The court affirmed the dismissal of plaintiff's claim under Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act of 1973, 29 U.S.C. 794, where the parents had not presented sufficient evidence of bad faith or gross misjudgment. View "C.L. v. Scarsdale Union Free Sch. Dist." on Justia Law

In 2004, plaintiff appealed the denial of his long term disability (LTD) benefits under the Employee Retirement Income Security Act (ERISA), 29 U.S.C. 1001 et seq. Liberty moved for summary judgment. In a 2009 Report and Recommendation (R&R), the magistrate judge recommended denying Liberty's motion and granting summary judgment sua sponte to plaintiff. In 2012, the district court adopted the R&R and entered summary judgment for plaintiff, but denied his request for attorneys' fees. The court concluded that the district court did not err in granting summary judgment on plaintiff's claim for LTD benefits because Liberty's denial of LTD benefits was arbitrary and capricious where Liberty ignored substantial evidence from plaintiff's treating physician that he was incapable of performing his current occupation, while failing to offer any reliable evidence to the contrary; the court retained discretion to consider the Chambless v. Masters, Mates & Pilots Pension Plan factors, in determining whether to grant an eligible plaintiff's request for attorneys' fees, but must do so in a manner consistent with the court's case law, and could not selectively consider some factors while ignoring others; the district court misapplied the Chambliss framework, and therefore erred, in denying fees to a prevailing plaintiff primarily on the conclusion that Liberty had not acted in bad faith; and the record revealed no particular justification for denying plaintiff's attorneys' fees, and awarding fees in the circumstances presented here furthered the policy interest in vindicating the rights secured by ERISA. Accordingly, the court affirmed in part, vacated in part, and remanded for further proceedings. View "Donachie v. Liberty Mutual Ins. Co., et al." on Justia Law

Plaintiff filed a qui tam action against defendants under the federal False Claims Act, 31 U.S.C. 3729 et seq., and under the New York False Claims Act, N.Y. Fin. Law 187 et seq. Before defendants filed an answer or made a motion for summary judgment, plaintiff sought to voluntarily dismiss the action. The district court dismissed the action without prejudice as to the United States and the State of New York, but with prejudice as to plaintiff. The court disagreed with the district court that the statement by plaintiff's counsel that plaintiff would not "pursue this matter any further" constituted "the plain English equivalent of a request that the Court dismiss the claim with prejudice." The court concluded that the plain language of the letter supplied no reason to conclude that plaintiff's counsel was requesting a dismissal with prejudice. In the absence of any indication by the plaintiff, Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 41(a), which governs the voluntary dismissal of an action, presumes that a voluntary dismissal under these circumstances is without prejudice. Accordingly, the district court erred by dismissing the case with prejudice. The court also rejected defendants' alternative argument that the dismissal should be analyzed under Rule 41(a)(2). The court vacated and remanded. View "Youseff v. Tishman Construction Corp." on Justia Law