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

Defendant Thompson appealed his sentence for drug-related convictions. The court concluded that the district court cannot satisfy United States v. Dunnigan by simply adopting a PSR's conclusory statements that the defendant committed perjury. Rather, the court has allowed a district court to rely on the PSR to impose an obstruction‐of‐justice enhancement only if the PSR “sets forth reasonably detailed findings in support of its conclusions.” In this case, the district court did not make a finding of specific intent to obstruct justice before imposing a two-level sentencing enhancement for obstruction of justice. The court concluded that this error is not harmless because the record does not clearly indicate that the district court would have imposed the same sentence in any event. The court vacated as to this issue and remanded for further proceedings. View "United States v. Thompson" on Justia Law

Peter Paul Biro, a controversial figure known in the art world for using fingerprint analysis to authenticate art in an effort to insert a measure of objectivity into a previously subjective process, filed suit against the New Yorker defendants as well as republishers for defamation after an article was published about him. Among other things, the article contained interviews of various individuals critical of plaintiff, and it suggested that he stood to profit from some of his more dubious authentications. The district court dismissed the complaint. The court held that Rule 8 of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure requires a limited‐purpose public figure to plead in a plausible way that defendants acted with actual malice. In this case, the court concluded that plaintiff failed to plausibly allege that defendants acted with actual malice. Accordingly, the court affirmed the judgment. View "Biro v. Conde Nast" on Justia Law

Plaintiffs filed suit under the Anti-Terrorism Act (ATA), 18 U.S.C. 2333(a), the Alien Tort Statute Act (ATS), 28 U.S.C. 1350, and federal common law, seeking judgments against Arab Bank for allegedly financing and facilitating the activities of organizations that committed the attacks that caused plaintiffsʹ injuries. The district court entered judgments on the pleadings as to the ATS claims. On appeal, plaintiffs argued principally that this Circuitʹs opinion in Kiobel v. Royal Dutch Petroleum Co. (Kiobel I), when analyzed in light of the Supreme Courtʹs decision in Kiobel II, which was affirmed on other grounds, is no longer ʺgood law,ʺ or at least, does not control this case. The court declined to conclude that Kiobel II overruled Kiobel I on the issue of corporate liability under the ATS. The court noted that Kiobel II appears to suggest that the ATS allows for some degree of corporate liability. The court went on to say that one panelʹs overruling of the holding of a case decided by a previous panel is perilous. The court affirmed on the basis of Kiobel I. Finally, the court concluded that the district court acted within its discretion in declining to permit the plaintiffs to amend their complaints. View "Jesner v. Arab Bank" on Justia Law

Defendant appealed his convictions stemming from his conduct as a securities broker and trader at a global securities broker-dealer and investment banking firm. The court concluded that there was an insufficient basis for a rational jury to conclude that defendant's misstatements were material to the Department of Treasury and reversed the fraud against the United States and making false statement counts; because a rational jury could conclude that defendant’s misstatements were material, the materiality inquiry - a mixed question of fact and law - was properly reserved for the jury’s determination; defendant is incorrect that “contemplated harm” is a requisite component of the scienter element of securities fraud and the court rejected this challenge; and, in regards to defendant's claims of evidentiary errors, the court agreed that the exclusion of certain proffered expert testimony exceeded the district court’s allowable discretion, and that such error was not harmless. The court vacated the district court's judgment of conviction as to the securities fraud charges and remanded for a new trial. The court also addressed other evidentiary rulings that are likely to be at issue on remand. View "United States v. Litvak" on Justia Law

Petitioner, a citizen of the United Kingdom who resides in Northern Ireland, appealed from the denial of her petition filed under the International Child Abduction Remedies Act (ICARA), 22 U.S.C. 9001 et seq. Respondents filed a motion to dismiss the appeal as moot, claiming that a New York court's custody determination resolved the parties dispute. The court denied the motion to dismiss where holding that the petition is moot because respondents received a favorable custody determination in a potentially friendlier New York court could encourage the jurisdictional gerrymandering that the Hague Convention was designed to prevent. View "Tann v. Bennett" on Justia Law

Defendant was convicted of one count of conspiracy to kidnap and one count of improperly accessing a computer in violation of the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act (CFAA), 18 U.S.C. 1030. On appeal, the government challenged the district court's judgment of acquittal on the conspiracy count and defendant appealed from the judgment of conviction on the CFAA count. Defendant was an active member of an Internet sex fetish community and many of his Internet communications involved discussions of committing horrific acts of sexual violence. Because “[t]he link between fantasy and intent is too tenuous for fantasy [alone] to be probative,”and because the remaining evidence is insufficient to prove the existence of an illegal agreement or defendant’s specific intent to kidnap anyone, the court affirmed the district court’s judgment of acquittal on the single count of conspiracy to kidnap. The court also concluded that the text, statutory history, and purpose of the CFAA permit both the following interpretations: (1) an individual “exceeds authorized access” to a computer when, with an improper purpose, he accesses a computer to obtain or alter information that he is otherwise authorized to access, and (2) an individual “exceeds authorized access” only when he obtains or alters information that he does not have authorization to access for any purpose which is located on a computer that he is otherwise authorized to access. Consequently, the court applied the rule of lenity and adopted the latter construction. The court reversed the judgment of conviction as to the CFAA count. View "United States v. Valle" on Justia Law

Defendant appealed his conviction and sentence for conspiracy to commit murder-for-hire and substantive murder-for-hire. The court joined the First, Eighth, and Ninth Circuits in affirming that the district court was correct to use U.S.S.G. 2E1.4, cmt. n.1 to calculate an offense level based on U.S.S.G. 2A1.5, rather than section 2E1.4 itself, for a defendant who has been convicted of 18 U.S.C. 1958 where the underlying conduct violated state law. Therefore, the district court properly computed defendant' s offense level based on U.S.S.G. 2A1.5 for conspiracy or solicitation to commit murder rather than U.S.S.G. 2E1.4 for use of interstate commerce facilities in the commission of murder-for-hire. The court also concluded that the evidence was sufficient to convict defendant and defendant failed to demonstrate plain error in the jury instruction given by the district court. Accordingly, the court affirmed the judgment. View "United States v. Lisyansky" on Justia Law

Plaintiff filed suit against Jay Peak to recover for injuries he claims were sustained as a result of Jay Peak's negligence. Plaintiff asserted that Jay Peak negligently permitted dangerous jumps on its ski trails and that, in consequence of such a constructed jump at the Kokomo-Northwest Passage intersection, plaintiff suffered a collision with another skier resulting in harm to his left side. The court affirmed the district court's grant of summary judgment for Jay Peak because plaintiff failed to establish that Jay Peak's negligence was the cause of plaintiff's injury. The court could not infer a causal link between Jay Peak’s assumed negligence in its maintenance of ski jumps and the injury incurred on the facts presented, and plaintiff does not provide sufficient evidence to support a link between his injuries and alleged theory of causation. View "Gemmink v. Jay Peak Inc." on Justia Law

Defendant plead guilty to one count of securities fraud. The district court sentenced defendant principally to a term of imprisonment of 121 months, which it incorporated into an amended judgment, from which defendant has not filed a second notice of appeal. The court concluded that the district court did not err, much less clearly err, in determining that defendant's offense involved 50 or more victims. In this case, the district court properly counted each married couple jointly holding investments as two individual “victims” within the meaning of that term as used in U.S.S.G. 2B1.1(b)(2). The court further found no error in the district court's rejection of defendant's claim that there were only 31 or 32 victims on the ground that the list defendant submitted with his sentencing memorandum was based on his personal recollection and was unsubstantiated. Finally, the court concluded that defendant's sentence was substantively reasonable where the sentence fell within the Guidelines range. Accordingly, the court affirmed the judgment, remanding for the sole purpose of making ministerial corrections. View "United States v. Ryan" on Justia Law

Plaintiffs appealed the dismissal of their amended complaint for failure to state a claim. Plaintiffs alleged that they suffered losses in excess of $800 million when they refrained from selling their shares of Citigroup stock based on the fraudulent and negligent misrepresentations of defendants Citigroup and Citigroup executives. Defendants cross‐appealed, arguing that the district court erred by addressing the adequacy of plaintiffs’ substantive claims as “holders” of the shares during a period of decline in share value. Defendants claim that Delaware law mandates that such claims be brought in a shareholder derivative action, not as direct claims. The court certified the following question to the Delaware Supreme Court: Are the claims of a plaintiff against a corporate defendant alleging damages based on the plaintiff’s continuing to hold the corporation’s stock in reliance on the defendant’s misstatements as the stock diminished in value properly brought as direct or derivative claims? View "AHW Inv. P'ship v. Citigroup Inc." on Justia Law