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

Pangea challenged the district court's order granting in part and denying in part the company's motion for writ of execution upon the proceeds from the sale of a property previously owned by appellees. The Second Circuit certified questions of New York law for which no controlling decisions of the New York Court of Appeals exist: (1) If an entered divorce judgment grants a spouse an interest in real property pursuant to D.R.L. Section 236, and the spouse does not docket the divorce judgment in the county where the property is located, is the spouse's interest subject to attachment by a subsequent judgment creditor that has docketed its judgment and seeks to execute against the property? (2) If the answer to Question (1) is "no," then: If a settlor creates a trust solely for the purpose of holding title to property for the benefit of himself and another beneficiary, and the settlor retains the unfettered right to revoke the trust, does the settlor remain the absolute owner of the trust property relative to his creditors, or is the trust property conveyed to the beneficiaries? View "Pangea Capital Management, LLC v. Lakian" on Justia Law

The Second Circuit reversed the tax court's decision rejecting the Commissioner's claim that the Estate of Andrew J. McKelvey owed $41 million in taxes with respect to McKelvey's 2008 income tax return for omitting what the Commissioner alleged were short‐ and long‐term capital gains arising from the execution of new contracts extending the valuation dates of two variable prepaid forward contracts. The court remanded for determination of whether the termination of obligations that occurred when the new contracts were executed resulted in taxable short‐term capital gains, and calculation of the amount of long‐term capital gains that resulted from the constructive sales of the collaterized shares. View "Estate of Andrew J. McKelvey v. Commissioner" on Justia Law

Utica and Clearwater appealed from the district court's summary judgment orders regarding Clearwater's obligations to Utica under five facultative reinsurance policies. The Second Circuit held that Clearwater's liability was expense-supplemental because its obligations under the reinsurance contracts followed Utica's expense-supplemental obligations under the umbrella policies. The court vacated and remanded for the district court to determine whether this obligation encompasses certain expenses. The court vacated and remanded the cross-appeal because Utica failed to demonstrate its entitlement to a judgment that Clearwater was bound to indemnify Utica according to Utica's settlement with its insured. View "Utica Mutual Insurance Co. v. Clearwater Insurance Co." on Justia Law

The Second Circuit affirmed defendant's 288 month sentence after he pleaded guilty for conspiracy to manufacture and distribute, and to import into the United States, five or more kilograms of cocaine. The court held principally that the district court did not err in applying the enhancement under USSG 2D1.1(b)(15)(C) to calculate defendant's Guidelines score, properly determining that defendant's drug‐related activity outside the United States constituted direct involvement in the importation of a controlled substance. In this case, the government presented sufficient evidence to show that defendant participated directly in transporting hundreds of kilograms of cocaine from South America through Honduras for Mexican drug cartels to smuggle into the United States. View "United States v. Lobo" on Justia Law

Plaintiff appealed the district court's grant of summary judgment to Just Energy on plaintiffs' minimum wage and overtime claims brought under the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) and New York Labor Law. The Second Circuit held that there was no genuine issue of fact to dispute that plaintiffs were outside salesmen—that is, to dispute that they were regularly employed away from Just Energy's office and that their primary duty was to make sales as well as to obtain orders or contracts for services.The court rejected plaintiffs' argument that the outside salesman exemption may not be applied because of the fact that Just Energy retained discretion to reject commitment contracts that plaintiffs secured from their door‐to‐door customers, and that the outside salesman exemption may not be applied because of the overall degree of supervision that Just Energy exercised over plaintiffs' activities. The court also held that the district court did not err or abuse its discretion when it declined to find that Just Energy should be collaterally estopped from invoking the outside salesman exemption in this case. View "Flood v. Just Energy Marketing Corp." on Justia Law

The Second Circuit affirmed the district court's judgment that Interstate breached its contractual duty to indemnify the Archdiocese under certain excess insurance policies. The Archdiocese appealed from an amended judgment that Interstate's breach did not violate the Connecticut Unfair Insurance Practices Act (CUIPA). At issue were two contract provisions invoked by Interstate to deny coverage for sexual abuse by priests: the exclusion for assault and battery, and the coverage grant for occurrences that unintentionally and unexpectedly result in personal injury.The court held that the Exclusion applied only to a person "acting within the scope of his duties," and that the assailant priests were not acting within the scope of their duties when they committed sexual assault of children. The court held that Interstate was bound to indemnify the Archdiocese for all sums it was obligated to pay arising out of any occurrences or happening during the period of insurance. The court also held that the Archdiocese failed to demonstrate a violation of CUIPA. View "Hartford Roman Catholic Diocesan Corp. v. Interstate Fire & Casualty Co." on Justia Law

The Second Circuit affirmed the district court's grant of summary judgment to DLC in an action under the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA), seeking overtime compensation for former DLC drivers. The court held that the FLSA's overtime requirement did not apply to DLC's drivers because DLC was engaged in the business of operating taxicabs. The court reasoned that a taxicab was (1) a chauffeured passenger vehicle; (2) available for hire by individual members of the general public; (3) that has no fixed schedule, fixed route, or fixed termini. In this case, there was no genuine dispute that DLC's vehicles met this description and thus DLC's drivers were employed by an employer engaged in the business of operating taxicabs. View "Munoz-Gonzalez v. D.L.C. Limousine Services" on Justia Law

Defendant appealed his 108 month sentence for his role in a robbery and a firearms offense. The Second Circuit held that the two level enhancement for physically restraining a person during the robbery, pursuant to USSG 2B3.1(b)(4)(B), was not validly imposed. In this case, the undisputed facts, revealed by a surveillance videotape, showed that no one was "physically restrained" within the meaning of the applicable guideline during the robbery. Accordingly, the court remanded for recalculation of the sentencing range and for resentencing. View "United States v. St. Juste (Paul)" on Justia Law

Defendant appealed his sentence of failure to register as a sex offender in violation of 18 U.S.C. 2250, arguing that the district court modified his sentence by including in the written judgment a duty to submit to polygraph testing that was not mentioned during pronouncement of sentence. The Second Circuit remanded for entry of an amended judgment, holding that the inclusion of a duty to submit to polygraph testing was, in this case, an impermissible modification of the spoken sentence, from which those words were omitted, because polygraph testing was burdensome to defendant and not a necessary or invariable component of sex‐offender treatment. View "United States v. Washington" on Justia Law

The Second Circuit granted a petition for review of the Commissioner's decision adopting the Department of Appeals Board's (DAB) decision and imposition of an assessment and penalty for petitioner's failure to report work activity while receiving Social Security disability insurance (SSDI) benefits. Although the court agreed that petitioner's failure to report work activity was "material" and thus authorized the Commissioner to impose an assessment and penalty, the court held that the DAB lacked substantial evidence to support the amounts of the assessment and penalty it imposed. In this case, petitioner's earnings from work activity did not amount to "substantial gainful activity," he remained disabled while failing to report work activity, and the findings of fact on which the DAB relied established only that petitioner's work was "sporadic." Therefore, the court vacated the DAB's decision and remanded for further proceedings. View "Cappetta v. Commissioner of Social Security Administration" on Justia Law