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1,500 | 55,102 |
Connecticut Department of Public Safety v. Doe
|
https://api.oyez.org/cases/2002/01-1231
|
01-1231
|
2002
|
Connecticut Department of Public Safety
|
Doe
|
<p>Connecticut's "Megan's Law" requires persons convicted of sexual offenses to register with the Department of Public Safety and requires the Department to post a sex offender registry containing registrants' names, addresses, photographs, and descriptions on the Internet. John Doe, a convicted sex offender who is subject to the law, filed suit, claiming that the law violates the Fourteenth Amendment's Due Process Clause. The District Court enjoined the law's public disclosure provisions. In affirming, the Court of Appeals concluded that such disclosure violated the Due Process Clause because officials did not afford registrants a predeprivation hearing.</p>
| 668 | 9 | 0 | true |
majority opinion
|
reversed
|
Criminal Procedure
|
1,501 | 55,100 |
Georgia v. Ashcroft
|
https://api.oyez.org/cases/2002/02-182
|
02-182
|
2002
|
Georgia
|
John Ashcroft, Attorney General
|
<p>Following the 2000 Census, the Democratic-controlled Georgia legislature passed a redistricting plan that was backed by many black leaders because it would have spread black voters and influence across several districts rather than concentrating them in a select few. Georgia's Republican governor objected to the plan because he said it violated the Voting Rights Act of 1965, which discourages the dilution of minority voting strength. The U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia rejected the legislature's plan.</p>
| 531 | 5 | 4 | true |
majority opinion
|
vacated/remanded
|
Civil Rights
|
1,502 | 55,103 |
Woodford v. Garceau
|
https://api.oyez.org/cases/2002/01-1862
|
01-1862
|
2002
|
Woodford
|
Garceau
|
<p>In Lindh v. Murphy, 521 U.S. 320, the U.S. Supreme Court held that amendments to the criminal code made by the Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act of 1996 (AEDPA) do not apply to cases pending in federal court on the AEDPA's effective date, April 24, 1996. Robert Garceau was convicted of first-degree murder and sentenced to death. After his petition for state postconviction relief was denied, Garceau moved for the appointment of federal habeas counsel and a stay of execution in Federal District Court on May 12, 1995. He filed a federal habeas application on July 2, 1996. The District Court concluded that Garceau's habeas application was not subject to AEDPA because his motions for counsel and a stay were filed prior to that date. The Court of Appeals agreed.</p>
| 786 | 6 | 3 | true |
majority opinion
|
reversed/remanded
|
Criminal Procedure
|
1,503 | 55,105 |
Desert Palace, Inc. v. Costa
|
https://api.oyez.org/cases/2002/02-679
|
02-679
|
2002
|
Desert Palace, Inc.
|
Costa
|
<p>Catharina Costa was fired from her job as a heavy equipment operator at Desert Palace Casino. She filed a sexual discrimination lawsuit, charging that the firing was the culmination of discrimination that had occurred during her employment. Jurors during the trial were instructed by the judge to rule for Costa if they determined that sex was a motivating factor in the firing, even if other (legal) factors were present as well. The jury ruled for Costa. Desert Palace appealed, saying that the instructions incorrectly shifted the burden of proof to the defendant in the case. A three judge panel from the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals agreed, ruling for the casino, but a subsequent review of the case by all 11 judges of the 11th Circuit reversed the panel's decision.</p>
| 781 | 9 | 0 | false |
majority opinion
|
affirmed
|
Civil Rights
|
1,504 | 55,106 |
Washington State Department of Health and Human Services v. Guardianship Estate of Keffeler
|
https://api.oyez.org/cases/2002/01-1420
|
01-1420
|
2002
|
Washington State Department of Health and Human Services
|
Guardianship Estate of Keffeler
|
<p>The State of Washington, through its Department of Social and Health Services, provides foster care to certain children. It also receives and manages Social Security benefits, which it uses to cover its costs, for many of those children. Such beneficiary children filed suit, alleging that the Department's use of their benefits to reimburse itself for the foster care costs violated the "anti-attachment" provision of Title II of the Social Security Act, which protects certain benefits from "execution, levy, attachment, garnishment, or other legal process." The trial court enjoined the Department from continuing to charge its foster care costs against Social Security benefits and ordered restitution of previous reimbursement transfers. The Washington Supreme Court ultimately affirmed the trial court's holding that the Department's practices violated the anti-attachment provision.</p>
| 897 | 9 | 0 | true |
majority opinion
|
reversed/remanded
|
Civil Rights
|
1,505 | 55,104 |
Nevada Department of Human Resources v. Hibbs
|
https://api.oyez.org/cases/2002/01-1368
|
01-1368
|
2002
|
Nevada Department of Human Resources
|
Hibbs
|
<p>William Hibbs, an employee of the Nevada Department of Human Resources, sought leave to care for his wife under the Family and Medical Leave Act of 1993 (FMLA). The FMLA entitles an eligible employee to take up to 12 workweeks of unpaid leave annually for the onset of a "serious health condition" in the employee's spouse. The Department granted Hibbs's request for the full 12 weeks of FMLA leave and, after he had exhausted that leave, informed him that he must report to work by a certain date. When Hibbs failed to do so, he was fired. Pursuant to FMLA provisions creating a private right of action "against any employer" that "interfered with, restrained, or denied the exercise of" FMLA rights, Hibbs sued in Federal District Court, seeking money damages for FMLA violations. The District Court concluded that the Eleventh Amendment barred the FMLA claim. The Court of Appeals reversed.</p>
| 901 | 6 | 3 | false |
majority opinion
|
affirmed
|
Federalism
|
1,506 | 55,108 |
Inyo County v. Paiute-Shoshone Indians
|
https://api.oyez.org/cases/2002/02-281
|
02-281
|
2002
|
Inyo County, California
|
Paiute-Shoshone Indians
|
<p>During an investigation of welfare fraud, the Inyo County Sheriff's office requested personnel files from a casino owned by the Paiute-Shoshone Indian tribe. When the request was denied, the Sheriff's office obtained a warrant to search for the records at the casino. After the search, the tribe sued, claiming that it was a violation of their sovereign immunity. The district court ruled for Inyo County; a 9th Circuit Court of Appeals panel reversed, ruling for the Paiute-Shoshone tribe.</p>
| 498 | 9 | 0 | true |
majority opinion
|
vacated/remanded
|
Civil Rights
|
1,507 | 55,107 |
Pharmaceutical Research & Manufacturers of America v. Walsh
|
https://api.oyez.org/cases/2002/01-188
|
01-188
|
2002
|
Pharmaceutical Research & Manufacturers of America
|
Walsh
|
<p>In order to achieve savings on Medicaid purchases above federal cost-saving measures, the "Maine Rx" Program reduces prescription drug prices for state residents. Under the program, Maine attempts negotiate rebates with drug manufacturers. If a company does not enter into a rebate agreement, its Medicaid sales are subjected to a prior authorization procedure that requires state agency approval to qualify a doctor's prescription for reimbursement. The Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America, an association of nonresident drug manufacturers, challenged the program, claiming that it is pre-empted by the Medicaid Act and violates the Commerce Clause. Without resolving any factual issues, the District Court entered a preliminary injunction preventing the statute's implementation, concluding that any obstacle to the federal program's administration is sufficient to establish pre-emption. The Court of Appeals reversed.</p>
| 946 | 6 | 3 | false |
majority opinion
|
affirmed
|
Economic Activity
|
1,508 | 55,110 |
Lawrence v. Texas
|
https://api.oyez.org/cases/2002/02-102
|
02-102
|
2002
|
John Geddes Lawrence and Tyron Garner
|
Texas
|
<p>Responding to a reported weapons disturbance in a private residence, Houston police entered John Lawrence's apartment and saw him and another adult man, Tyron Garner, engaging in a private, consensual sexual act. Lawrence and Garner were arrested and convicted of deviate sexual intercourse in violation of a Texas statute forbidding two persons of the same sex to engage in certain intimate sexual conduct. In affirming, the State Court of Appeals held that the statute was not unconstitutional under the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment, with <a href="https://www.oyez.org/cases/1985/85-140"><em>Bowers v. Hardwick</em>, 478 U.S. 186 (1986)</a>, controlling.</p>
| 682 | 6 | 3 | true |
majority opinion
|
reversed/remanded
|
Privacy
|
1,509 | 55,109 |
Green Tree Financial Corp. v. Bazzle
|
https://api.oyez.org/cases/2002/02-634
|
02-634
|
2002
|
Green Tree Financial Corp.
|
Lynn W. Bazzle et al.
|
<p>In an attempt to solve a contract dispute, Lynn and Burt Bazzle filed suit against Green Tree Financial Corporation. After they filed the suit, the Bazzles learned that other Green Tree customers were dealing with the same sort of dispute. As a result, they asked for and received permission to file a class action suit. However, Green Tree contracts had a clause requiring that any contract disputes be settled by an arbitrator. Green Tree asked the court to revoke the class certification because the Federal Arbitration Act, it argued, did not permit class-wide arbitration. Instead, the arbitration would have to be conducted on a case-by-case basis. The South Carolina Supreme Court disagreed, ruling that, unless specifically banned in the contract, class-wide arbitration could be permitted by the courts.</p>
| 820 | 5 | 4 | false |
plurality opinion
|
vacated/remanded
|
Economic Activity
|
1,510 | 55,111 |
Dole Food Company v. Patrickson
|
https://api.oyez.org/cases/2002/01-593
|
01-593
|
2002
|
Dole Food Company
|
Patrickson
|
<p>In 1997, a group of farm workers from Costa Rica, Ecuador, Guatemala, and Panama, who alleged injury from chemical exposure, filed a state-court action against Dole Food Company and others. Subsequently, Dole impleaded Dead Sea Bromine Co. and Bromine Compounds, Ltd., or the Dead Sea Companies. Dole successfully removed the action to federal court, arguing that the federal common law of foreign relations provided federal-question jurisdiction. The District Court rejected the argument that the Dead Sea Companies were instrumentalities of a foreign state, Israel, as defined by the Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act of 1976 (FSIA) and thus entitled to removal. In reversing, the Court of Appeals concluded that Dole could not base removal on the federal common law of foreign relations and that the Dead Sea Companies were not instrumentalities of Israel because they did not meet the FSIA's instrumentality definition.</p>
| 930 | 9 | 0 | false |
majority opinion
| null |
Judicial Power
|
1,511 | 55,112 |
Citizens Bank v. Alafabco, Inc.
|
https://api.oyez.org/cases/2002/02-1295
|
02-1295
|
2002
|
The Citizens Bank
|
Alafabco, Inc. et al.
|
<p>Citizens Bank (Citizens) and Alafabco Inc. (Alafabco) had multiple business dealings with each other spanning over a decade. In 1998, Alafabco bid on a construction job based on a contract it had with Citizens to finance the project. When Citizens did not finance the project, Alafabco used existing funds meant to repay the debts it owed to Citizens to fund the project and subsequently defaulted on its loan payments to Citizens. Citizens and Alafabco composed two different debt-restructuring agreements, both of which included arbitration clauses that stated that the Federal Arbitration Act (FAA) would apply. Alafabco sued Citizens in Alabama state court for breach of contract and claimed that it had incurred detrimental debt because of Citizens’ breach. Citizens invoked the arbitration clause, and the state court ordered the parties to submit to arbitration pursuant to their agreement. The Supreme Court of Alabama reversed and held that, because the debt-restructuring agreements did not substantially involve interstate commerce, the FAA did not apply to the parties’ disputes.</p>
| 1,099 | 9 | 0 | true |
per curiam
|
reversed/remanded
|
Economic Activity
|
1,512 | 55,114 |
Howsam v. Dean Witter Reynolds, Inc.
|
https://api.oyez.org/cases/2002/01-800
|
01-800
|
2002
|
Howsam
|
Dean Witter Reynolds, Inc.
|
<p>According to Dean Witter Reynolds, Inc.'s standard client agreement, Karen Howsam chose to arbitrate her dispute with the company before the National Association of Securities Dealers (NASD). NASD's Code of Arbitration Procedure section 10304 states that no dispute "shall be eligible for submission...where six (6) years have elapsed from the occurrence or event giving rise to the dispute." Dean Witter filed suit, asking the Federal District Court to declare the dispute ineligible for arbitration because it was more than six years old. The court dismissed the action, stating that the NASD arbitrator should interpret and apply the NASD rule. In reversing, the Court of Appeals found that the rule's application presented a question of the underlying dispute's arbitrability and the presumption is that a court will ordinarily decide an arbitrability question.</p>
| 873 | 8 | 0 | false |
majority opinion
|
affirmed
|
Economic Activity
|
1,513 | 55,113 |
Syngenta Crop Protection, Inc. v. Henson
|
https://api.oyez.org/cases/2002/01-757
|
01-757
|
2002
|
Syngenta Crop Protection, Inc.
|
Henson
|
<p>Hurley Henson filed suit in Louisiana state court against Syngenta Crop Protection, Inc., asserting various tort claims related to the manufacture and sale of a chlordimeform-based insecticide. When Henson successfully intervened in a similar action, Price v. Ciba-Geigy Corp., in federal district court, the Louisiana court stayed his state court claim. Although the ensuing settlement in Price stipulated that his state-court action be dismissed with prejudice, the Louisiana state court allowed Henson to proceed. Syngenta then removed the action to the federal District Court under the All Writs Act. The District Court dismissed the former state-court action as barred by the Price settlement. Vacating the dismissal, the Court of Appeals wrote that the All Writs Act could not properly support removal of the state-court action.</p>
| 842 | 9 | 0 | false |
majority opinion
|
affirmed
|
Judicial Power
|
1,514 | 55,115 |
Ford Motor Co. v. McCauley
|
https://api.oyez.org/cases/2002/01-896
|
01-896
|
2002
|
Ford Motor Co.
|
McCauley
|
<p>When Ford Motor Company and Citibank (South Dakota), N.A. canceled a credit card rebate program that enabled cardholders to accrue and redeem rebates towards the purchase of a new Ford, cardholders filed multiple state-based class actions. Ford and Citibank removed the cases to federal court. The cardholder plaintiffs consolidated their actions, seeking reinstitution of the program. Ultimately, the Court of Appeals found that each class member was asserting a separate and distinct claim and that the individual claims did not satisfy the $75,000 amount-in-controversy requirement. The appellate court also concluded that premising jurisdiction on the cost of complying with an injunction in favor of a single plaintiff would conflict with the principle of the amount-in-controversy requirement.</p>
| 807 | 9 | 0 | false |
per curiam
| null |
Judicial Power
|
1,515 | 55,117 |
Overton v. Bazzetta
|
https://api.oyez.org/cases/2002/02-94
|
02-94
|
2002
|
Overton
|
Bazzetta
|
<p>In 1995, after the Michigan Department of Corrections (MDOC) banned visits to inmates by little brothers and sisters, nieces, nephews and other minors, a group of prisoners sued. They claimed that the ban violated the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment and the Cruel and Unusual Punishment Clause of the Eighth Amendment, and that it restricted their First Amendment right to association. The district court agreed, ruling against the ban. On appeal, the 6th Circuit Court of Appeals unanimously affirmed the district court's ruling.</p>
| 553 | 9 | 0 | true |
majority opinion
|
reversed
|
First Amendment
|
1,516 | 55,116 |
Smith v. Doe
|
https://api.oyez.org/cases/2002/01-729
|
01-729
|
2002
|
Smith
|
Doe
|
<p>Under the Alaska Sex Offender Registration Act, any sex offender or child kidnaper incarcerated in Alaska must register with the Department of Public Safety, which maintains a central registry of sex offenders. While some of the data is kept confidential, some, such as the offender's name, photograph, and physical description, is published on the Internet. The Act's requirements are retroactive. John Doe I and John Doe II were convicted of aggravated sex offenses before the Act's passage are thus covered by it. Both brought suit, seeking to declare the Act void as applied to them under the Ex Post Facto Clause of Article I Section 10 of the United States Constitution. The District Court ruled against them and the Court of Appeals disagreed, holding that, because its effects were punitive, the Act violates the Ex Post Facto Clause.</p>
| 850 | 6 | 3 | true |
majority opinion
|
reversed/remanded
|
Criminal Procedure
|
1,517 | 55,121 |
Arizona v. Gant
|
https://api.oyez.org/cases/2003/02-1019
|
02-1019
|
2003
|
Arizona
|
Rodney J. Gant
|
<p>Arizona police went to the home of Rodney Gant in search of drugs and to arrest him for failing to appear in court. When they arrived at the house, Gant was not there (though two other people were in his home, one of whom was in possession of a crack pipe) but while the police were still at the house Gant pulled into the driveway. While Gant was still in his car, an officer shined a flashlight into the vehicle, but the police made no other contact with him until he stepped out of the car. After he was out of the car, the police searched it and found drugs and a handgun. Gant was arrested and charged with possession of drugs and drug paraphernalia.</p>
<p>Before trial, Gant asked the judge to rule the evidence found in the car unconstitutional because the search had been conducted without a warrant in violation of the Fourth Amendment's prohibition of unreasonable searches and seizures. The trial judge denied the motion, ruling that the search was a direct result of Gant's lawful arrest and therefore an exception to the general Fourth Amendment warrant requirement under New York v. Belton (1981). Gant was convicted and sentenced to three years in prison.</p>
<p>Gant appealed, and the Arizona Court of Appeals reversed the conviction, ruling the search unconstitutional. The court found that exceptions to the Fourth Amendment warrant requirement must be justified by concerns for officer safety or evidence preservation. The court ruled that these justifications did not apply in Gant's case because he had left the vehicle voluntarily without being stopped by police or asked to get out of the car. The search of the vehicle was therefore not directly connected to the arrest and, without that justification, clearly violated the Fourth Amendment.</p>
| 1,774 | 0 | 0 | true |
per curiam
|
vacated/remanded
| null |
1,518 | 55,118 |
City of Cuyahoga Falls v. Buckeye Community Hope
|
https://api.oyez.org/cases/2002/01-1269
|
01-1269
|
2002
|
City of Cuyahoga Falls
|
Buckeye Community Hope
|
<p>After the City Council of Cuyahoga Falls, Ohio passed an ordinance authorizing construction of a low-income housing complex by the Buckeye Community Hope Foundation, a group of citizens filed a formal petition requesting that the ordinance be repealed or submitted to a popular vote. The voters passed the referendum repealing the ordinance. The Foundation filed suit, claiming that by submitting the site plan to voters, the City violated the Equal Protection and Due Process Clauses of the Fourteenth Amendment and the Fair Housing Act. After the Ohio Supreme Court declared the referendum invalid under Ohio's Constitution, the District Court granted the City summary judgment. In reversing, the Court of Appeals found that the Foundation had stated a valid Fair Housing Act claim and that a genuine issue of material fact existed as to whether the City had engaged in arbitrary and irrational government conduct in violation of substantive due process.</p>
| 964 | 9 | 0 | true |
majority opinion
|
reversed in-part/remanded
|
Civil Rights
|
1,519 | 55,122 |
Hiibel v. Sixth Judicial District Court of Nevada, Humboldt County
|
https://api.oyez.org/cases/2003/03-5554
|
03-5554
|
2003
|
Larry D. Hiibel
|
Sixth Judicial District Court of Nevada, Humboldt County, et al.
|
<p>Larry Hiibel was arrested and convicted in Nevada state court for failing to identify himself to a police officer who was investigating an assault. Nevada, and many other states, has a law that requires a person to tell an officer his name if asked. Hiibel challenged the conviction, claiming it violated his Fifth Amendment right not to incriminate himself and his Fourth Amendment right to be free from unreasonable searches. The state intermediate court and Supreme Court rejected his argument in affirming the conviction.</p>
| 533 | 5 | 4 | false |
majority opinion
|
affirmed
|
Criminal Procedure
|
1,520 | 55,123 |
Illinois v. Lidster
|
https://api.oyez.org/cases/2003/02-1060
|
02-1060
|
2003
|
Illinois
|
Robert S. Lidster
|
<p>Police stopped Robert Lidster at a checkpoint set up to find information about a recent hit-and-run accident. Lidster was arrested, and later convicted, for drunk driving. Lidster successfully appealed his conviction to the Illinois Appellate Court. It relied on the U.S. Supreme Court's decision in Indianapolis v. Edmond (2000) holding that a checkpoint is unconstitutional if its only purpose is to uncover "ordinary criminal wrongdoing." The Illinois Supreme Court affirmed.</p>
| 486 | 6 | 3 | true |
majority opinion
|
reversed
|
Criminal Procedure
|
1,521 | 55,124 |
Banks v. Dretke
|
https://api.oyez.org/cases/2003/02-8286
|
02-8286
|
2003
|
Delma Banks, Jr.
|
Doug Dretke, Director, Texas Department of Criminal Justice, Correctional Institutions Division
|
<p>Delma Banks, Jr. was convicted of murder and sentenced to death in Texas state court in 1980. Sixteen years later Banks learned that one of the witnesses against him, Robert Farr, was a paid informant (a fact not stated during the trial). Charles Cook, another witness against Banks, claimed that he had made up much of his testimony in order to get other criminal charges against him dropped as part of a plea agreement.</p>
<p>In Brady v. Maryland the U.S. Supreme Court held that due process is violated if prosecutors suppress evidence favorable to a defendant that relates to guilt or punishment. Pointing to Brady and evidence the prosecution suppressed information on its ties to the two witnesses, Banks sought a writ of habeas corpus in federal court to overturn his conviction and get a new trial. The district court granted habeas relief with respect to Banks' death sentence based on the state's failure to disclose Farr's informant status. However the district court refused to reverse the guilt verdict, rejecting Banks' Brady claim relating to Cook's testimony and Banks' argument that Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 15(b) allowed the claim to be treated as if it were raised earlier.</p>
<p>The Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals reversed the district court's decision to grant Banks relief as to his death sentence based on his Brady claim relating to Farr's testimony. The Court held that Banks first had to press his claims in state court. The Court upheld the district court's rejection of Banks' claim relating to Cook's testimony, holding that Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 15(b) does not apply to habeas proceedings.</p>
| 1,646 | 7 | 2 | true |
majority opinion
|
reversed/remanded
|
Criminal Procedure
|
1,522 | 55,126 |
Republic of Austria v. Altmann
|
https://api.oyez.org/cases/2003/03-13
|
03-13
|
2003
|
Republic of Austria, et al.
|
Maria V. Altmann
|
<p>Maria Altmann learned that the valuable artwork owned by her uncle had been either seized by the Nazi's or taken by Austria after World War II. She sued in American federal court to recover six paintings from the Austrian Gallery. She filed the suit under the Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act of 1976 (FSIA), which allows suits against foreign nations in cases involving "rights to property taken in violation of international law." Austria, however, claimed that the FSIA did not apply in this case because the paintings were taken in the 1940s, when the United States embraced a different - and more extensive - idea of immunity that would have barred the suit. Because the Act did not explicitly state that it applied retroactively (that is, to actions taken before it was passed) Austria claimed that it was entitled to this broader definition of immunity.</p>
<p>The district court sided with Altmann, holding that the FSIA applied retroactively. A Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals panel affirmed.</p>
| 1,008 | 6 | 3 | false |
majority opinion
|
affirmed
|
Criminal Procedure
|
1,523 | 55,125 |
United States v. Lara
|
https://api.oyez.org/cases/2003/03-107
|
03-107
|
2003
|
United States
|
Billy Jo Lara
|
<p>Bureau of Indian Affairs officials arrested Billy Jo Lara on the Spirit Lake Nation Reservation for public intoxication (though Lara is not a member of the reservation). During the arrest Lara attacked an officer.</p>
<p>A tribal court convicted Lara of assault. The federal government then indicted Lara for assaulting a federal officer. Lara moved to dismiss the indictment, claiming the federal charges violated the Fifth Amendment's prohibition against double jeapordy (being charged twice for the same crime). The district court denied Lara's motion. Lara then entered a conditional guilty plea, reserving the right to appeal the denial of his Fifth Amendment motion.</p>
<p>A panel of the U.S. Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals affirmed the district court ruling. However, the Eight Circuit reversed when it reviewed the case en banc (with the full court), ruling that Lara's federal charges violated the double jeapordy clause. The court reasoned that the only source of authority for Spirit Lake Nation to prosecute a nonmember (like Lara) came from the federal Indian Civil Rights Act (1968). Because the federal government delegated this prosecutorial authority to Indian Tribes, charging Lara for the same crime in tribal and federal courts was essentially trying Lara twice under federal authority.</p>
| 1,316 | 7 | 2 | true |
majority opinion
|
reversed
|
Civil Rights
|
1,524 | 55,128 |
Department of Transportation v. Public Citizen
|
https://api.oyez.org/cases/2003/03-358
|
03-358
|
2003
|
Department of Transportation, et al.
|
Public Citizen, et al.
|
<p>In 2001, President Bush announced that he planned to lift a temporary ban on Mexican trucking companies in the United States once new regulations were prepared by the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration (FMCSA) to regulate safety inspections and applications to transport materials. Congress specified certain standards that those regulations would have to meet before it would appropriate money to register the new carriers.</p>
<p>When the FMCSA formulated its regulations, it performed an Environmental Assessment (EA) to examine their effects on the environment. Under the National Environmental Policy Act of 1969 (NEPA), federal agencies must perform an Environmental Impact Study (EIS) of policies that are likely to have significant environmental effects. If an agency feels that its policies will not have significant effects, however, it may perform a more limited Environmental Assessment (EA) - which is what FMCSA chose to do. Public Citizen, a watchdog group that monitors government actions, challenged this decision in federal court. It argued that, because FMCSA knew that a large number of Mexican trucks would be admitted into the United States once it issued its regulations, it should have considered the environmental impact of the increased number of trucks in addition to the more limited impact of the safety inspections. The impact of the trucks would have been significant enough to warrant an EIS, so Public Citizen argued that FMCSA had violated NEPA by not conducting the more stringent study. The district court side with the FMCSA, holding that, while the passage of the regulations was necessary before the trucks could be admitted, the FMCSA nevertheless did not have control of those trucks and therefore did not have to account for them in its Environmental Assessment; a Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals panel reversed.</p>
| 1,870 | 9 | 0 | true |
majority opinion
|
reversed/remanded
|
Economic Activity
|
1,525 | 55,127 |
Barnhart v. Thomas
|
https://api.oyez.org/cases/2003/02-763
|
02-763
|
2003
|
Jo Anne B. Barnhart, Commissioner of Social Security
|
Pauline Thomas
|
<p>After a heart attack left her unable to continue working as a housekeeper in the late 1980s, Pauline Thomas took a job as an elevator operator. By the mid- 1990s, however, Thomas's job and others like it were eliminated as elevators became automated. Thomas applied for Social Security disability benefits because she could not do other work. The Social Security Administration (SSA), however, rejected her claim because, it said, she was still able to perform the duties of her former position. The fact that it was nearly impossible to find such a position, the SSA held, did not entitle her to benefits under disability law. An administrative judge and a federal district court both upheld the SSA's position, but the Third Circuit Court of Appeals reversed, holding that "a claimant's previous work must be substantial gainful work which exists in the national economy."</p>
| 882 | 9 | 0 | true |
majority opinion
|
reversed
|
Civil Rights
|
1,526 | 55,130 |
Illinois v. Fisher
|
https://api.oyez.org/cases/2003/03-374
|
03-374
|
2003
|
Illinois
|
Fisher
|
<p>Gregory Fisher was arrested and charged with possession of cocaine in 1988. He filed a motion for discovery, asking that the white powdery substance he had had in his possession be made available as evidence at trial so that he could have it independently tested in an attempt to disprove the four tests conducted by police showing that it was cocaine. The state agreed to make the substance available at a future date.</p>
<p>The defendant was released on bond, but in July of 1989 he failed to appear in court. He remained a fugitive for 10 years, during which time the police destroyed the substance in keeping with the standard practice of destroying old evidence. When Fisher was captured and brought to trial again in 1999, he claimed that the state had violated his Fourteenth Amendment Due Process Rights by destroying evidence that could possibly have proved his innocence after he had filed a motion for discovery. The trial court denied his motion, holding that the police had acted in "good faith" in accordance with Arizona v. Youngblood. Fisher was subsequently convicted. The Illinois Appellate Court overturned the conviction, however, holding that the case was different from Youngblood because Fisher had filed a discovery motion. The state Supreme Court declined to hear the case.</p>
| 1,307 | 9 | 0 | true |
per curiam
|
reversed/remanded
|
Due Process
|
1,527 | 55,131 |
Intel Corporation v. Advanced Micro Devices, Inc.
|
https://api.oyez.org/cases/2003/02-572
|
02-572
|
2003
|
Intel Corporation
|
Advanced Micro Devices, Inc.
|
<p>Advanced Micro Devices (AMD) filed a complaint against Intel with the European Commission, alleging that Intel was using its size to unfairly dominate the computer microprocessor market. Complaints filed with the European Commission are first reviewed by the commission's directorate general, which does fact-finding to decide whether or not to pursue the complaint. AMD asked the directorate to review documents containing some of Intel's trade secrets from a separate American court case involving Intel. The directorate declined.</p>
<p>Because European law did not provide a way for AMD to gain access to the documents, AMD filed suit against Intel in United States federal district court seeking access to the documents so that it could use them to support its complaint. The suit was filed under Title 28, Section 1782 of U.S. Code, which allows (but does not require) federal district courts to give "interested persons" access to material for proceedings before "foreign or international tribunal(s)." AMD argued that, though the directorate was only a fact-finding body, the case could eventually be appealed to a trial court and was therefore covered under section 1782. Further, it argued that the directorate's unwillingness to demand the documents was irrelevant. Intel, on the other hand, argued that the directorate was not a "foreign or international tribunal" and that the federal district court therefore did not have the authority to compel Intel to release the documents. It also argued that the directorate's unwillingness to compel production of the documents should preclude U.S. action.</p>
<p>The district court sided with Intel, ruling that the directorate's investigation was not a foreign tribunal and that the court therefore could not give AMD access to the documents. A Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals panel unanimously reversed the decision. After the case was accepted for review by the U.S. Supreme Court, the European Commission filed a brief in the case supporting Intel's position that the directorate was not a foreign tribunal.</p>
| 2,073 | 8 | 1 | false |
majority opinion
|
affirmed
|
Privacy
|
1,528 | 55,132 |
Tennard v. Dretke
|
https://api.oyez.org/cases/2003/02-10038
|
02-10038
|
2003
|
Robert James Tennard
|
Doug Dretke, Director, Texas Department of Criminal Justice, Correctional Institutions Division
|
<p>Robert Tennard was convicted of murder. During the sentencing phase, he presented evidence that he had an IQ of 67. The instructions given to the jury by the judge when it was considering whether to apply the death penalty, however, did not account for this - they instructed they jury to determine whether the crime was committed deliberately and whether Tennard posed a future risk. Under <em>Penry v. Lynaugh</em>, 492 U.S. 302, those instructions are not enough to allow the jury to weigh a defendant's mental retardation in his favor. After he was sentenced to death, Tennard filed a habeas corpus petition in federal district court, claiming that the sentence, given the shortcomings of the jury instructions, violated the Eighth Amendment's prohibition of Cruel and Unusual Punishment. The district court rejected the petition. The Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals affirmed, ruling that Tennard had no shown that his mental retardation was constitutionally relevant. To be constitutionally relevant, Tennard's retardation would have had to be responsible for his crime, and Tennard had not shown that this was the case.</p>
<p>After the Supreme Court decided, in <em>Atkins v. Virginia</em>, 536 U.S. 304, that executing the mentally retarded violated the Eighth Amendment, the Fifth Circuit reconsidered its holding. It affirmed the decision on the grounds that execution was only unconstitutional if the defendant could show that his mental retardation had actually caused the crime; being mentally retarded in and of itself did not exempt someone from the death penalty.</p>
| 1,586 | 6 | 3 | true |
majority opinion
|
reversed/remanded
|
Criminal Procedure
|
1,529 | 55,129 |
Cheney v. United States District Court for the District of Columbia
|
https://api.oyez.org/cases/2003/03-475
|
03-475
|
2003
|
Richard B. Cheney, Vice President of the United States, et al.
|
United States District Court for the District of Columbia, et al.
|
<p>In January 2001, President Bush created an advisory committee on energy policy headed by Vice President Dick Cheney. After the group issued its recommendations five months later, Judicial Watch, a non-profit government watchdog group, filed suit in federal district court. The Sierra Club, an environmentalist organization, later filed a nearly identical suit that was joined with the Judicial Watch suit. The two organizations alleged that the advisory committee had violated the Federal Advisory Committee Act (FACA) by not making public all the documents that it had generated. While FACA exempts committees composed entirely of federal officials, Judicial Watch and the Sierra Club argued that the exemption did not apply because private lobbyists had participated in the energy committee's meetings.</p>
<p>Cheney and the advisory group asked the court to dismiss the case, claiming that it violated the Constitutional separation of powers by requiring judicial oversight of internal executive branch deliberations. The district court refused.</p>
<p>The government then sought summary judgment of the case (without the discovery process) based on a few administrative documents that it claimed showed that only federal officials had worked on the group. The district court denied this request as well, and the government appealed to the Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia. The appeals court refused to grant summary judgment, arguing that it could not yet rule on the separation of powers argument. The government then appealed the case to the U.S. Supreme Court.</p>
| 1,588 | 7 | 2 | true |
majority opinion
|
vacated/remanded
|
Privacy
|
1,530 | 55,133 |
Elk Grove Unified School District v. Newdow
|
https://api.oyez.org/cases/2003/02-1624
|
02-1624
|
2003
|
Elk Grove Unified School District and David W. Gordon, Superintendent
|
Michael A. Newdow, et al.
|
<p>Michael Newdow's daughter attended public school in the Elk Grove Unified School District in California. Elk Grove teachers began school days by leading students in a voluntary recitation of the Pledge of Allegiance, including the words "under God" added by a 1954 Congressional act. Newdow sued in federal district court in California, arguing that making students listen - even if they choose not to participate - to the words "under God" violates the establishment clause of the U.S. Constitution's First Amendment.</p>
<p>The district court dismissed Newdow's complaint for lack of standing, because he and the mother of his daughter are divorced and he does not have custody. The U.S. Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals reversed, holding that Newdow did have standing "to challenge a practice that interferes with his right to direct the religious education of his daughter." The Ninth Circuit ruled that Congress's 1954 act adding the words "under God" to the Pledge and the school district policy requiring it be recited both violated the First Amendment's establishment clause.</p>
| 1,089 | 8 | 0 | true |
majority opinion
|
reversed
|
Judicial Power
|
1,531 | 55,134 |
Frew v. Hawkins
|
https://api.oyez.org/cases/2003/02-628
|
02-628
|
2003
|
Linda Frew, on Behalf of Her Daughter, Carla Frew, et al.
|
Albert Hawkins, Commissioner, Texas Health and Human Services Commission, et al.
|
<p>In 1996, Linda Frew and other citizens settled a class-action lawsuit in federal district court against the Texas Health and Human Services Commission. Settlement was reached through a consent decree, in which the parties make an agreement that is subject to court supervision. As part of this consent decree, Texas was supposed to improve health care for poor children to comply with a federally mandated program called Early and Periodic Screening, Diagnosis and Treatment. Two years later, Frew and others remained unsatisfied that Texas was complying with the federal requirements, and asked the court to force Texas to create a plan for how it would improve health care. Texas refused, however, claiming that it was immune from the court order under the 11th Amendment, which provides for state sovereignty. Texas argued that because no federal rights had been violated, suit could not be brought in federal court. The Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals agreed with Texas.</p>
| 981 | 9 | 0 | true |
majority opinion
|
reversed/remanded
|
Federalism
|
1,532 | 55,136 |
Lamie v. United States Trustee
|
https://api.oyez.org/cases/2003/02-693
|
02-693
|
2003
|
John M. Lamie
|
United States Trustee
|
<p>In the Bankruptcy Reform Act of 1994 Congress created a list of people that corporations could pay while going through Chapter 7 bankruptcy proceedings. The bankruptcy attorney for the corporation was not included in that list. John Lamie, a bankruptcy attorney, challenged the law, arguing that the omission of bankruptcy attorneys from the list was accidental. The bankruptcy court that heard the case ruled that the omission was not inadvertent. Nevertheless, it awarded Lamie the fees in question because money intended to pay them had been set aside in a retainer before the corporation entered Chapter 7 proceedings. A Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals panel reversed the decision to pay Lamie, holding that the retainer was not separate from the corporation's other funds. On the issue of whether the omission of the bankruptcy attorney from the list of acceptable payees, the panel affirmed the lower court's decision.</p>
| 932 | 9 | 0 | false |
majority opinion
|
affirmed
|
Attorneys
|
1,533 | 55,137 |
City of Littleton v. Z.J. Gifts D-4, L.L.C.
|
https://api.oyez.org/cases/2003/02-1609
|
02-1609
|
2003
|
City of Littleton, Colorado
|
Z.J. Gifts D-4, L.L.C., a Limited Liability Company, dba Christal's
|
<p>Littleton required adult businesses to apply for a permit to operate from the city. If the city denied the license, the business could appeal to a state district court under the Colorado Rules of Civil Procedure. Z.J. Gifts, an adult bookstore, wanted to operate in a place not zoned for adult businesses. Rather than apply for a license, they challenged the licensing law itself as unconstitutional, claiming that the Colorado Rules of Civil Procedure provide merely for prompt judicial review of city denial, not for a prompt judicial decision. Because stores denied a license cannot operate until the court has made its decision, they could potentially be forced to wait indefinitely for a license based solely on the content of the material they intend to sell. This, Z.J. argued, violated the Supreme Court's holding in <em>Freedman v. Maryland</em>, 380 U.S. 51, that censorship laws must provide for "prompt judicial determination."</p>
<p>The federal district court sided with Littleton. A Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals panel reversed.</p>
| 1,052 | 9 | 0 | true |
majority opinion
|
reversed
|
First Amendment
|
1,534 | 55,135 |
Central Laborers' Pension Fund v. Heinz
|
https://api.oyez.org/cases/2003/02-891
|
02-891
|
2003
|
Central Laborers' Pension Fund
|
Thomas E. Heinz, et al.
|
<p>Thomas Heinz worked as a construction worker for 20 years, then retired. Upon retirement, he began to receive pension payments from the Central Laborers' Pension Plan. He continued to receive the pension after he took another job as a supervisor in the construction industry. The pension plan had a list of occupations that a recipient could not work in while receiving pension payments, but construction supervisors were not included. After two years, however, Central Laborers' Pension amended the list of prohibited professions to include construction supervisors. As a result, Heinz stopped receiving his pension payment. He and Richard Schmitt, a friend who was in the same situation, filed suit in federal district court. They claimed that the amendment, because it was passed after they had already started receiving the benefits, violated the "anti-cutback" provision of the Employee Retirement Income Security Act (ERISA) of 1974. ERISA states that amendments to a pension plan may not decrease the "accrued benefit of a participant." Because the amendment barred them from receiving payments that they were otherwise eligible for, Heinz and Schmitt claimed that it had reduced their "accrued benefit." Central Laborers' Pension, however, argued that the men were still eligible to receive the same pension, they just could not receive it while working as construction supervisors. Because the value of the plan itself had not been changed, only the stipulations for receiving it, the pension plan managers argued that the amendment did not violate ERISA.</p>
<p>The federal district court sided with the pension plan. A divided Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals panel, however, reversed the decision, writing that "an amendment placing materially greater restrictions on the receipt of the benefit 'reduces' the benefit just as surely as a decrease in the size of the monthly benefit payment."</p>
| 1,910 | 9 | 0 | false |
majority opinion
|
affirmed
|
Economic Activity
|
1,535 | 55,139 |
Locke v. Davey
|
https://api.oyez.org/cases/2003/02-1315
|
02-1315
|
2003
|
Gary Locke, Governor of Washington, et al.
|
Joshua Davey
|
<p>The Washington State Promise Scholarship, created by the state legislature in 1999, gives college scholarship money to talented students. However, this money cannot be used to obtain a degree in theology if the program is taught to cause belief. Washington's constitution prohibits funding religious instruction. The 1969 state code applied this ban to college financial aid.</p>
<p>Joshua Davey forfeited his Promise Scholarship money in order to major in pastoral ministries at a private Christian college. Davey filed suit in U.S. district court, claiming the state constitution's ban on funding religious instruction violated his First Amendment right to free exercise of religion (in the U.S. Constitution). The district court rejected Davey's claim. The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals reversed, concluding Davey's free exercise rights were violated.</p>
| 863 | 7 | 2 | true |
majority opinion
|
reversed
|
First Amendment
|
1,536 | 55,138 |
United States v. Patane
|
https://api.oyez.org/cases/2003/02-1183
|
02-1183
|
2003
|
United States
|
Samuel Francis Patane
|
<p>Samuel Patane was arrested at his home for calling his ex-girlfriend in violation of a restraining order. During the arrest, police officers began reading Patane his Miranda rights. Patane told the officers that he knew his rights. The officers then stopped reading them, at which point Patane told police that he had a gun in his house. They searched the house with his permission and found the gun. As an ex-felon, Patane was not permitted to possess a gun and was prosecuted for possession.</p>
<p>During the trial on gun possession charges, Patane argued that his arrest violated the Fourth Amendment prohibition of unreasonable searches and seizures and the Fifth Amendment right not to incriminate oneself because there was not probable cause to arrest him and because the gun had been found as a result of an un-Mirandized confession.</p>
<p>The district court initially ruled that there was not probable cause for his arrest and that it was therefore unconstitutional. A 10th Circuit Court of Appeals panel disagreed, holding that Patane's ex-girlfriend had given police probable cause for the arrest. However, the panel held that gun could not be used as evidence because it had been found as the result of an un-Mirandized (and therefore unconstitutional) confession. The government appealed, arguing that physical evidence found as the result of un-Mirandized testimony could be used in court, despite the fact that the testimony itself was inadmissible.</p>
| 1,473 | 5 | 4 | true |
plurality opinion
|
reversed/remanded
|
Criminal Procedure
|
1,537 | 55,141 |
Sabri v. United States
|
https://api.oyez.org/cases/2003/03-44
|
03-44
|
2003
|
Basim Omar Sabri
|
United States
|
<p>Basim Omar Sabri, a Minneapolis landlord and developer, tried to bribe a Minneapolis City Council member who sat on the board of an organization that dispersed funding for economic revitalization of city neighborhoods. Some of the funds dispersed by the organization were federal funds.</p>
<p>Sabri was charged in federal court with bribery. He moved to dismiss the charges, claiming that the section of United States Code that he was charged under was unconstitutional. He claimed that Congress could only regulate the dispersal of federal funds; because the statute did not require the prosecutors to show that the bribery had affected any federal funds, only that it had affected an organization that received federal funds, he argued that it was outside of Congress's power to legislate. The district court sided with Sabri and dismissed the charges.</p>
<p>On appeal, an Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals panel reversed. It found that, because federal funds were often mixed with other funds by organizations that distributed them, it would be difficult for prosecutors to prove that the funds affected by an attempted bribe were federal funds. As a result, the government would have to regulate all bribes to organizations that dispersed federal funds in order to meaningfully protect federal funds. Because Congress had authority under the necessary and proper clause and the spending clause (both found in Article I, Section 8 of the Constitution) to ensure that government funds were not misspent, the bribery statute was therefore constitutional.</p>
| 1,563 | 9 | 0 | false |
majority opinion
|
affirmed
|
Federalism
|
1,538 | 55,140 |
Pennsylvania State Police v. Suders
|
https://api.oyez.org/cases/2003/03-95
|
03-95
|
2003
|
Pennsylvania State Police
|
Nancy Drew Suders
|
<p>Nancy Drew Suders quit her job as a dispatcher for the Pennsylvania State Police in August 1998. She claimed that she had been sexually harassed by her supervisors since she got the job in March of that year, and that she had finally decided to quit after she was accused of theft, handcuffed, photographed and questioned. Two days before quitting, she had contacted the state police equal opportunity officer about the harassment, but did not file a report because, Suders claimed, the woman was unhelpful and unsympathetic.</p>
<p>Suders then filed suit in federal district court, charging that the harassment had forced her to quit. The district court judge, however, granted summary judgment to the state police before the case went to trial. He found that Suders had failed to use the internal procedures set up by the state police to deal with sexual harassment, and that she therefore could not bring suit unless the police had taken a "tangible employment action" that substantially changed her employment status. On appeal, a Third Circuit Court of Appeals panel overturned the district judge's decision, ruling that the harassment had been so bad that Suders had no choice but to quit. While the police had not fired Suders, they had been directly responsible for her resignation and therefore could not use her failure to file a report as a defense.</p>
| 1,368 | 8 | 1 | true |
majority opinion
|
vacated/remanded
|
Civil Rights
|
1,539 | 55,142 |
Middleton v. McNeil
|
https://api.oyez.org/cases/2003/03-1028
|
03-1028
|
2003
|
Middleton
|
McNeil
|
<p>Sally Marie McNeil was convicted of the murder of her husband. She appealed her conviction, claiming that the trial judge had given the jury improper instructions when it was deciding whether to convict her of murder or voluntary manslaughter (the last four words of the instruction, not included in the model jury instruction provided with the criminal statute, might have led the jury to misunderstand the meaning of voluntary manslaughter). The California Court of Appeal acknowledged that the jury instruction had been wrong, but found that, taken as a whole, the instruction did not make it reasonably likely that the jury would misunderstood the meaning of voluntary manslaughter, especially given the closing statements of the prosecutor, which provided the correct definition of the law.</p>
<p>McNeil then petitioned for a writ of habeas corpus in federal court. The district court rejected her claim, but a Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals panel reversed.</p>
| 971 | 9 | 0 | true |
per curiam
|
reversed/remanded
|
Criminal Procedure
|
1,540 | 55,144 |
Pliler v. Ford
|
https://api.oyez.org/cases/2003/03-221
|
03-221
|
2003
|
Cheryl K. Pliler, Warden
|
Richard Herman Ford
|
<p>Richard Ford filed a habeas corpus petition in federal district court five days before the one-year statute of limitations for his appeal ended under the Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act of 1996 (AEDPA). He represented himself, and his petition contained some claims that had been decided on by state courts and others that had not. The judge informed him that he could not hear the claims that had not been heard by state courts, and that Ford had several options: the judge could dismiss all the claims, allowing Ford to re-file them after he had presented the unheard claims to a state court, or he could dismiss the unheard claims, but delay proceedings on the other ones so that Ford could re-add the unheard ones after they had been heard. Ford chose the first option, but when he tried to re-file the claims after they were rejected by a state court, the judge refused to let him file them because the one-year AEDPA statute of limitations had ended. Ford appealed the decision to the Circuit Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, which reversed the district court's decision, finding that the judge could have heard the claims if Ford had chosen the second option and that he should have warned Ford that the statute of limitations would likely end before he could re-file the claims under the first option.</p>
| 1,338 | 7 | 2 | true |
majority opinion
|
vacated/remanded
|
Criminal Procedure
|
1,541 | 55,146 |
Groh v. Ramirez
|
https://api.oyez.org/cases/2003/02-811
|
02-811
|
2003
|
Jeff Groh
|
Joseph R. Ramirez, et al.
|
<p>Jeff Groh, a special agent for the U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms, applied for a search warrant to search the Ramirez ranch for illegal weapons. On the warrant, Groh mistakenly omitted the exact items sought (though he correctly listed the items on the application itself). A federal magistrate issued the warrant.</p>
<p>The Ramirezes later sued Groh and the law enforcement officers involved in the search in federal court for violating their Fourth Amendment rights. They argued that the incorrectly completed warrant violated the Fourth Amendment requirement that any items searched for be described in the warrant.</p>
<p>The district court ruled that no constitutional violation took place. The officers, the court held, retained "qualified immunity" - meaning they are legally immune while doing their jobs unless they violate a "clearly established" constitutional right.</p>
<p>A Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals panel reversed. The court held that the warrant violated the Fourth Amendment and that Groh is not immune to lawsuit because he was personally responsible for using the warrant.</p>
| 1,120 | 5 | 4 | false |
majority opinion
|
affirmed
|
Economic Activity
|
1,542 | 55,145 |
United States v. Flores-Montano
|
https://api.oyez.org/cases/2003/02-1794
|
02-1794
|
2003
|
United States
|
Manuel Flores-Montano
|
<p>When Manuel Flores-Montano approached the U.S.-Mexico border, U.S. Customs inspectors noticed his hand shaking; an inspector tapped Flores-Montano's gas tank with a screwdriver and noticed that the tank sounded solid; a drug-sniffing dog alerted to the vehicle. After a mechanic began disassembling the car's fuel tank, inspectors found 37 kilograms of marijuana bricks in the tank.</p>
<p>Flores-Montano was charged in federal district court in California for importing and possessing marijuana with intent to distribute. Flores-Montano moved to suppress the marijuana finding on Fourth Amendment grounds. He argued that the search that yielded the marijuana finding was intrusive and non-routine and therefore required reasonable suspicion (which, he argued, was not present in his case).</p>
<p>Relying on U.S. v. Molina-Tarazon, a case decided by the U.S. Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals in 2002 (with similar circumstances), the district court agreed that the search was non-routine and thus required reasonable suspicion. The government, the court held, failed to prove that reasonable suspicion prompted its search. The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals affirmed.</p>
| 1,174 | 9 | 0 | true |
majority opinion
|
reversed/remanded
|
Criminal Procedure
|
1,543 | 55,143 |
Tennessee v. Lane
|
https://api.oyez.org/cases/2003/02-1667
|
02-1667
|
2003
|
Tennessee
|
George Lane, et al.
|
<p>George Lane and Beverly Jones were disabled and could not access upper floors in Tennessee state courthouses. Lane, Jones, and several others sued Tennessee in federal district court, alleging that by denying them public services based on their disabilities, Tennessee was in violation of Title II of the Americans with Disabilities Act (1990). According to Title II, no person may be denied access to "services, programs, or activities" on the basis of his disability. The act allows alleged victims of discrimination to sue states for damages.</p>
<p>Tennessee asked that the case be dismissed, claiming that it was barred by the 11th Amendment's prohibition of suits against states in federal courts (the sovereign immunity doctrine). The state cited <em>Alabama v. Garrett</em> (2001), in which the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that Congress had acted unconstitutionally in granting citizens the right to sue states for disability discrimination (such as the denial of employment) under the 14th Amendment's equal protection clause. In that case the Supreme Court reasoned that Congress did not have enough evidence of disability discrimination by states to justify the waiver of sovereign immunity.</p>
<p>The district court rejected the state's argument and denied the motion to dismiss. The Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals panel affirmed. The courts reasoned that because Title II of the ADA dealt with the Due process Clause of the 14th Amendment, not the equal protection clause, the ruling in <em>Garrett</em> did not apply. The court found that while Congress may not have had enough evidence of disability discrimination to waive sovereign immunity for equal protection claims, it did have enough evidence of Due Process violations (such as non-handicap-accessible courthouses) to waive the sovereign immunity doctrine for Due Process claims.</p>
| 1,857 | 5 | 4 | false |
majority opinion
|
affirmed
|
Civil Rights
|
1,544 | 55,148 |
Beard v. Banks
|
https://api.oyez.org/cases/2003/02-1603
|
02-1603
|
2003
|
Jeffrey A. Beard, Secretary, Pennsylvania Department of Corrections, et al.
|
George E. Banks
|
<p>In 1982, George Banks was sentenced to death in Pennsylvania for the murder of 13 people. After the Pennsylvania Supreme Court upheld the conviction, Banks unsuccessfully sought a writ of habeas corpus in federal district court. Reversing the district court, the Third Circuit Court of Appeals found Banks's death sentence unconstitutional. The court held that jury instructions during sentencing led jurors to believe they could not vote against the death penalty unless they all agreed on mitigating evidence (that is, evidence that would have inclined them to vote against the death penalty). This, the court reasoned, violated the U.S. Supreme Court's ruling in Mills v. Maryland (1988). The U.S. Supreme Court reversed the decision (in part) and remanded it. Pointing to its opinion in Teague v. Lane (1989) and the fact that Mills was decided after Banks's conviction, the Court reasoned that the appeals court did not consider whether Mills could be "retroactively" applied. The Third Circuit Court - reviewing its ruling - did not change its original opinion. It found that "Mills did not announce a new rule of constitutional law for retroactivity purposes" and that Banks's death sentence was unconstitutional.</p>
| 1,228 | 5 | 4 | true |
majority opinion
|
reversed/remanded
|
Criminal Procedure
|
1,545 | 55,147 |
Raytheon Company v. Hernandez
|
https://api.oyez.org/cases/2003/02-749
|
02-749
|
2003
|
Raytheon Company
|
Joel Hernandez
|
<p>In 1991, Joel Hernandez tested positive for cocaine use in a drug test administered by his employer. As a result of the incident, he was forced to resign. In 1994, he reapplied for a job from the company. His application was rejected. Hernandez claimed that the company was discriminating against him because of his drug and alcohol addiction (though at the time he reapplied he had been sober for two years) in violation of the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990. The district court sided with the company, dismissing the case before it ever went to trial. A Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals panel unanimously reversed, however, holding that Raytheon's decision not to rehire Hernandez because of an incident related to his past addiction could constitute discrimination under the act.</p>
| 797 | 7 | 0 | true |
majority opinion
|
vacated/remanded
|
Civil Rights
|
1,546 | 55,149 |
Tennessee Student Assistance Corporation v. Hood
|
https://api.oyez.org/cases/2003/02-1606
|
02-1606
|
2003
|
Tennessee Student Assistance Corporation
|
Pamela L. Hood
|
<p>Pamela Hood had an outstanding debt to the Tennessee Student Assistance Corporation, a loan-granting institution established by the state, when she filed for bankruptcy. The state objected to her request that the debt be forgiven ("discharged" in the terms of bankruptcy law) by the federal bankruptcy court, arguing that to discharge the debt would violate the state's sovereign immunity (that is, its right not to be sued). Hood countered that the Federal Rules of Bankruptcy Procedure allow student loan debts to be discharged if the bankruptcy filer can demonstrate that they will suffer "undue hardship" if the debt is not forgiven, and that this congressional permission is a constitutional waiver of state sovereign immunity because it falls under the power granted to Congress by the Bankruptcy Clause (Article I, Section 8 of the U.S. Constitution).</p>
<p>The bankruptcy court sided with Hood, finding that Congress had acted constitutionally in waiving the states' sovereign immunity. The Sixth Circuit Bankruptcy Appellate Panel affirmed, as did a normal panel of the Sixth Circuit.</p>
| 1,102 | 7 | 2 | false |
majority opinion
|
affirmed
|
Federalism
|
1,547 | 55,151 |
Till et ux. v. SCS Credit Corp.
|
https://api.oyez.org/cases/2003/02-1016
|
02-1016
|
2003
|
Till
|
SCS Credit Corp.
|
<p>Lee Till owed $4,000 in payments on his truck when he filed for Chapter 13 bankruptcy. Under the Bankruptcy Code, a Chapter 13 debtor must promise each creditor future payments "not less than the [claim's] allowed amount." When a repayment plan includes a series of payments (installments), as Till's did, the installments must equal the "total present value" of the amount owed. Till proposed that he make monthly payments on the truck to SCS Credit with a 9.5 percent yearly interest rate, which was slightly higher than the average loan rate to make up for the increased risk that Till would fail to make a payment (because he had already declared bankruptcy once). SCS, however, argued that it was entitled to 21 percent interest because that was how much it would have made if it had foreclosed on the loan, taken the truck, sold it, and reinvested the proceeds. SCS argued that this 21 percent plan was necessary to ensure that the payments were equal to the "total present value" or "not less than the [claim's] allowed amount." The bankruptcy court ruled for Till. The district court reversed, imposing SCS's 21 percent rate. A divided Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals panel modified that approach slightly, ruling that the 21 percent rate was probably correct but that the parties could introduce evidence that a higher or lower rate should apply.</p>
| 1,364 | 5 | 4 | true |
plurality opinion
|
reversed/remanded
|
Economic Activity
|
1,548 | 55,153 |
Verizon Communications, Inc. v. Law Offices of Curtis V. Trinco, LLP
|
https://api.oyez.org/cases/2003/02-682
|
02-682
|
2003
|
Verizon Communications Inc.
|
Law Offices of Curtis V. Trinko, LLP
|
<p>Curtis Trinko was an AT&T customer but received service on lines owned by Verizon, which AT&T was permitted to use for a fee under the anti-monopoly 1996 Telecommunications Act. Trinko claimed that Verizon discriminated against AT&T customers by providing them worse service than it provided to its own customers. He claimed that this violated both the Telecommunications Act and the Sherman Anti-Trust Act of 1890, which prohibits monopolies from aggressively defending their monopoly position in the market. A federal district court ruled that Trinko had no grounds to sue because he was not a direct customer of Verizon. A 2nd Circuit Court of Appeals panel, however, reinstated the charges leveled under the Sherman Act.</p>
| 744 | 9 | 0 | true |
majority opinion
|
reversed/remanded
|
Economic Activity
|
1,549 | 55,152 |
Jones v. R. R. Donnelley & Sons Company
|
https://api.oyez.org/cases/2003/02-1205
|
02-1205
|
2003
|
Edith Jones, et al., on Behalf of Herself and a Class of Others Similarly Situated
|
R. R. Donnelley & Sons Company
|
<p>In November of 1996, Edith Jones and several other African Americans filed a class action lawsuit in federal district court against R.R. Donnelley and Sons, a commercial printing company. They claimed they had suffered racial discrimination in violation of section 1981 of United States Code (U.S.C.), which had no specified statute of limitations. Donnelley and Sons, however, argued that the section was bound by a two-year statute of limitations established by Illinois for all personal injury claims. The suit fell outside that statute of limitations, and the company argued that it should therefore be dismissed.</p>
<p>Jones, however, argued that a separate section of U.S.C. extended the statute of limitations to four years for any civil suit brought under an act of Congress passed after 1990. Because the 1991 Civil Rights Act had broadened the definition of section 1981, she argued, the four-year statute of limitations should apply to that section and the suit should therefore not be thrown out. Donnelley and Sons countered that the 1991 Civil Rights Act had merely amended the section, not created a new law, and that the four-year statute of limitations therefore did not apply.</p>
<p>A federal district court sided with Jones. A Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals panel unanimously reversed.</p>
| 1,316 | 9 | 0 | true |
majority opinion
|
reversed/remanded
|
Judicial Power
|
1,550 | 55,155 |
Hamdi v. Rumsfeld
|
https://api.oyez.org/cases/2003/03-6696
|
03-6696
|
2003
|
Yaser Esam Hamdi and Esam Fouad Hamdi, as Next Friend of Yaser Esam Hamdi
|
Donald H. Rumsfeld, Secretary of Defense, et al.
|
<p>In the fall of 2001, Yaser Hamdi, an American citizen, was detained by the United States military in Afghanistan. He was accused of fighting for the Taliban against the U.S., declared an "enemy combatant," and was held in Guantanamo Bay. Upon learning he was an American citizen, he was transferred to a military prison in Virginia. Hamdi’s father, Esam Fouad Hamdi, filed a petition for a writ of habeas corpus naming himself as Hamdi’s “next friend,” in an attempt to have Hamdi’s detention declared unconstitutional. The district court granted Hamdi’s petition, and appointed the Federal Public Defender for the Eastern District of Virginia, Frank Dunham, Jr., as counsel for the petitioners. He argued that the government had violated Hamdi's Fifth Amendment right to Due Process by holding him indefinitely and not giving him access to an attorney or a trial. The government countered that the Executive Branch had the right, during wartime, to declare people who fight against the United States "enemy combatants" and thus restrict their access to the court system.</p>
<p>The district court refused to answer the question of whether the declaration of "enemy combatant" was sufficient to justify his detention without review of materials and criteria used in making the determination. It ordered the government to produce these materials for a review by the court. Not wanting to produce these materials, the government appealed. The Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals panel reversed, finding that the separation of powers required federal courts to practice restraint during wartime because "the executive and legislative branches are organized to supervise the conduct of overseas conflict in a way that the judiciary simply is not." The panel therefore found that it should defer to the Executive Branch's "enemy combatant" determination.</p>
| 1,853 | 8 | 1 | true |
plurality opinion
|
vacated/remanded
|
Due Process
|
1,551 | 55,156 |
Securities and Exchange Commission v. Edwards
|
https://api.oyez.org/cases/2003/02-1196
|
02-1196
|
2003
|
Securities and Exchange Commission
|
Charles E. Edwards
|
<p>Charles Edwards founded a company that sold pay telephones and then leased them back from the purchasers for a fixed monthly fee. After Edwards filed for bankruptcy, the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) sued him for selling securities (considering the telephones to be investments on the part of the purchasers and therefore securities) in violation of the registration and anti-fraud provisions of the federal securities laws.</p>
<p>A federal district court froze Edwards' assets in a preliminary injunction. The 11th Circuit Court of Appeals overruled the district court's injunction for lack of jurisdiction. The SEC, the court reasoned, failed to show that Edwards' selling pay telephones was an "investment contract" under federal securities laws. In defining "investment contract," the court used the Supreme Court's ruling in SEC v. W.J. Howey Co. (1946), that a financial interest is an "investment contract" if it involves (1) an investment of money, (2) in a common enterprise, (3) with the expectation of profits to be derived solely from the efforts of others. The 11th Circuit ruled that the SEC could not meet the test's third part because the purchasers received a fixed fee that was guaranteed by contract and therefore not dependant on Edwards' success.</p>
| 1,287 | 9 | 0 | true |
majority opinion
|
reversed/remanded
|
Economic Activity
|
1,552 | 55,158 |
Baldwin v. Reese
|
https://api.oyez.org/cases/2003/02-964
|
02-964
|
2003
|
George H. Baldwin
|
Michael Reese
|
<p>A state trial court sentenced Reese to 33 years in prison. An appellate court lowered the sentence to 24 years. In another appeal to a state appellate court, Reese argued his federal Sixth Amendment right to effective counsel was violated at trial and on appeal. The appellate court refused to reverse Reese's sentence. Reese appealed to the state supreme court and failed.</p>
<p>Reese appealed to a U.S. District Court. Ruling against Reese, the Court held that Reese did clearly say to the state supreme court his claims were federal. Federal law requires state prisoners to "fairly present" federal constitutional claims in each state court before appealing to federal courts. A federal appellate court reversed, ruling that the state supreme court had had the opportunity to read the state appellate court decision - had the court done this, it would have understood Reese's claims were federal.</p>
| 908 | 8 | 1 | true |
majority opinion
|
reversed
|
Judicial Power
|
1,553 | 55,160 |
South Florida Water Management District v. Miccosukee Tribe of Indians
|
https://api.oyez.org/cases/2003/02-626
|
02-626
|
2003
|
South Florida Water Management District
|
Miccosukee Tribe of Indians, et al.
|
<p>The Miccosukee Tribe of Indians and the Friends of the Everglades sued the South Florida Water Management District under the Clean Water Act (CWA) in federal district court. The suit alleged that the water district violated the Clean Water Act by releasing pollutants from a pump system without a discharge elimination system permit. The Clean Water Act prohibits the "addition of any pollutant... from any point source" without a specific permit. The water district defended its action by claiming that it was not actually adding pollutants to the water, but merely transporting polluted water from one body of water to another, less polluted, body.</p>
<p>The district court ruled against the water district and found that it had violated the CWA by using the pump. The 11th Circuit Court of Appeals affirmed on this point, "conclud[ing] that the release of water caused by the... pump station's operation constitutes an addition of pollutants from a point source."</p>
| 975 | 9 | 0 | true |
majority opinion
|
vacated/remanded
|
Economic Activity
|
1,554 | 55,159 |
Yarborough v. Gentry
|
https://api.oyez.org/cases/2003/02-1597
|
02-1597
|
2003
|
Yarborough
|
Gentry
|
<p>A jury convicted Gentry in state court for stabbing his girlfriend. Gentry appealed, arguing his lawyer's closing argument deprived him of his federal Sixth Amendment right to effective assistance of counsel. While Gentry's appeal lost in state courts, the U.S. Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals reversed Gentry's conviction.</p>
| 330 | 9 | 0 | true |
per curiam
|
reversed
|
Criminal Procedure
|
1,555 | 55,157 |
Aetna Health, Inc. v. Davila
|
https://api.oyez.org/cases/2003/02-1845
|
02-1845
|
2003
|
Aetna Health Inc., fka Aetna U.S. Healthcare Inc. and Aetna U.S. Healthcare of North Texas Inc.
|
Ruby R. Calad, et al.
|
<p>Juan Davila sued his HMO in state court because it had refused to provide certain procedures, and the refusal led to certain injuries. He brought the suit under a Texas law that requires HMOs "to exercise ordinary care" for their patients. The HMO asked that the case be moved to federal court, arguing that the case should be governed under the Employee Retirement Income Security Act of 1974 (ERISA) rather than the Texas law, because ERISA is a federal law the takes precedence over any state laws dealing with the same subject matter. Davila objected, arguing that the case did not fall under ERISA and should be heard in state court. The federal district court sided with the HMO, finding that ERISA prohibits individuals from filing state suits against HMOs when they refuse to pay for a particular treatment. A Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals panel reversed.</p>
| 872 | 9 | 0 | true |
majority opinion
|
reversed/remanded
|
Federalism
|
1,556 | 55,162 |
Olympic Airways v. Husain
|
https://api.oyez.org/cases/2003/02-1348
|
02-1348
|
2003
|
Olympic Airways
|
Rubina Husain, Individually, and as Personal Representative of the Estate of Abid M. Hanson, Deceased, et al.
|
<p>Abid Hanson was allergic to second-hand smoke. On an Olympic Airways flight, he and his wife, Rubina Husain, sat in non-smoking seats. However, because the seats were close to the smoking section, Mrs. Husain requested she and her husband be moved. Her request was denied twice, even after the smoke began bothering Hanson. Hanson died during the flight. Husain filed suit in California federal district court. She sought damages under Article 17 of the Warsaw Convention, which allows damages recovery for international air travelers for accidents on airplanes. The district court agreed that Hanson's death was an "accident" as defined by the convention and awarded Husain $1.4 million. The 9th Circuit Court of Appeals affirmed.</p>
| 739 | 6 | 2 | false |
majority opinion
|
affirmed
|
Economic Activity
|
1,557 | 55,161 |
F. Hoffman-LaRoche, Ltd. v. Empagran S.A.
|
https://api.oyez.org/cases/2003/03-724
|
03-724
|
2003
|
F. Hoffmann-La Roche Ltd, et al.
|
Empagran S.A., et al.
|
<p>Under the Foreign Trade Antitrust Improvements Act of 1982 (FTAIA), the Sherman Act (which regulates monopolies and attempts to unfairly raise prices) does not apply to foreign commerce unless that commerce significantly harms domestic commerce, American imports, or American exporters. In this case, several companies that purchase and resell vitamins sued several vitamin manufacturers for illegal attempts to raise prices, both within the United States and in foreign countries. The manufacturers asked the district judge to dismiss several of the vitamin purchasers from the case because they only did business in other countries and, the manufacturers argued, could therefore not bring claims under the Sherman Act. The purchasers countered that the foreign price-fixing attempts were linked to the domestic attempts and could therefore be heard under the exception to the FTAIA. The district court sided with the manufacturers. On appeal, a D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals panel reversed, finding that the price fixing schemes were independent of each other but that Congress' intent had been to prevent price-fixing both at home and abroad, and that even the foreign claims could therefore be brought under the exception to the FTAIA.</p>
| 1,247 | 8 | 0 | true |
majority opinion
|
vacated/remanded
|
Economic Activity
|
1,558 | 55,164 |
Norton v. Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance
|
https://api.oyez.org/cases/2003/03-101
|
03-101
|
2003
|
Gale Norton, Secretary of the Interior, et al.
|
Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance, et al.
|
<p>The federal Bureau of Land Management (BLM) designated 2.5 million acres of land in Utah as "Wilderness Study Areas" under the Federal Land Policy and Management Act of 1976 (FLPMA). Under the Act, the BLM is required to manage this land "so as not to impair the suitability of such areas for preservation as wilderness."</p>
<p>The Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance (SUWA) and several other environmentalist groups brought suit in federal district court under section 706 (1) of the Administrative Procedure Act (APA), which allows federal courts to compel government action when an agency has failed to meet its legal duties. SUWA claimed that the BLM had failed to take a "hard look," as required by the National Environmental Policy Act of 1969, at the effects of off-road vehicles on the Wilderness Study Areas. It also claimed that the permitted off-road vehicle use was in fact damaging the study areas in violation of the agency's FLPMA obligations.</p>
<p>The district court dismissed the case, holding that SUWA's charge that the bureau had failed to adequately protect the study areas was not specific enough for the court to hear under the Administrative Procedure Act. On appeal, a divided panel of the 10th Circuit Court of Appeals reversed the decision. It held that the bureau's discretion was limited to deciding how to implement the act, not if to implement it, and that SUWA could therefore bring suit to force it at least to take a "hard look" at the effects of the off-road vehicle policy.</p>
| 1,518 | 9 | 0 | true |
majority opinion
|
reversed/remanded
|
Economic Activity
|
1,559 | 55,163 |
Yarborough v. Alvarado
|
https://api.oyez.org/cases/2003/02-1684
|
02-1684
|
2003
|
Michael Yarborough, Warden
|
Michael Alvarado
|
<p>Police interviewed Michael Alvarado, 17, without his parents at a police station about his involvement in a crime. Police neither arrested nor Mirandized Alvarado. During the interview, Alvarado confessed involvement. Based, in part, on these statements, Alvarado was convicted of second-degree murder and attempted robbery. After failed appeals in the California courts, Alvarado unsuccessfully sought a writ of habeas corpus in federal district court in California. The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals reversed. Recognizing the "in custody" standard to be whether a reasonable person would feel free to end interrogation, the appeals court held that a juvenile is more likely to feel he is in custody. Because Alvarado was "in custody," the Fifth Amendment required that his rights under Miranda v. Arizona (1966) be read to him.</p>
| 838 | 5 | 4 | true |
majority opinion
|
reversed
|
Criminal Procedure
|
1,560 | 55,167 |
Scarborough v. Principi
|
https://api.oyez.org/cases/2003/02-1657
|
02-1657
|
2003
|
Randall C. Scarborough
|
Anthony J. Principi, Secretary of Veterans Affairs
|
<p>Randall Scarborough won a case against the Department of Veterans Affairs. He then applied for attorney's fees to the U.S. Veterans' Court under the federal Equal Access to Justice Act (EAJA). Under the EAJA, the government must pay attorney's fees to anyone who wins against the federal government in litigation unless the government can show that its position was "substantially justified." However, Scarborough's attorney submitted an incomplete application, neglecting to assert that the government's position was not substantially justified. Though he amended and resubmitted it, he did so after the 30-day filing deadline. The Veterans' Court dismissed the application for "lack of subject matter jurisdiction" - that is, because it was not filed in its complete form within the 30-day deadline. The Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit affirmed.</p>
| 864 | 7 | 2 | true |
majority opinion
|
reversed/remanded
|
Attorneys
|
1,561 | 55,168 |
Grupo Dataflux v. Atlas Global Group, L.P.
|
https://api.oyez.org/cases/2003/02-1689
|
02-1689
|
2003
|
Grupo Dataflux
|
Atlas Global Group, L.P., et al.
|
<p>Atlas Global Group was a limited partnership company created under Texas law. They filed a suit in federal court against Grupo Dataflux, a Mexican corporation. The suit dealt with a state law, but Atlas filed the case in federal court because, it claimed, the court had "diversity jurisdiction" (when a case involves citizens of two different states, or an American citizen and a foreign citizen, it is heard in federal court). However, at the time the case was filed, two of Atlas's partners were Mexican citizens (they left the partnership before the trial began). After the case was decided, but before the judgment was announced, Grupo Dataflux filed a motion to dismiss the case because the court did not have diversity jurisdiction. The judge granted the motion, finding that Atlas was a Mexican "citizen" at the time of filing because of the citizenship of its partners, and that the federal courts therefore did not have jurisdiction. On appeal, Atlas argued that even if the necessary diversity had not been present at the time of filing, it was present before the trial began and the court should therefore ignore the error under an exception for cases that have already been decided. A Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals panel agreed, reversing the decision.</p>
| 1,273 | 5 | 4 | true |
majority opinion
|
reversed
|
Judicial Power
|
1,562 | 55,165 |
Rumsfeld v. Padilla
|
https://api.oyez.org/cases/2003/03-1027
|
03-1027
|
2003
|
Donald H. Rumsfeld, Secretary of Defense
|
Jose Padilla and Donna R. Newman, as Next Friend of Jose Padilla
|
<p>Jose Padilla, an American citizen, was arrested in Chicago's O'Hare International Airport after returning from Pakistan in 2002. He was initially detained as a material witness in the government's investigation of the al Qaeda terrorist network, but was later declared an "enemy combatant" by the Department of Defense, meaning that he could be held in prison indefinitely without access to an attorney or to the courts. The FBI claimed that he was returning to the United States to carry out acts of terrorism.</p>
<p>Donna Newman, who had represented him while he was being held as a material witness, filed a petition for habeas corpus on his behalf. The U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York ruled that Newman had standing to file the petition despite the fact that Padilla had been moved to a military brig in South Carolina. However, the court also found that the Department of Defense, under the President's constitutional powers as Commander in Chief and the statutory authorization provided by Congress's Authorization for Use of Military Force, had the power to detain Padilla as an enemy combatant. The district judge rejected Newman's argument that the detention was prohibited by the federal Non-Detention Act, which states that no "citizen shall be imprisoned or otherwise detained by the United States except pursuant to an Act of Congress."</p>
<p>On appeal, a divided Second Circuit Court of Appeals panel reversed the district court's "enemy combatant" ruling. The panel found that the Authorization for Use of Military force did not meet the requirement of the Non-Detention Act and that the President could not, therefore, declare American citizens captured outside a combat zone as enemy combatants.</p>
| 1,748 | 5 | 4 | true |
majority opinion
|
reversed/remanded
|
Criminal Procedure
|
1,563 | 55,166 |
Missouri v. Seibert
|
https://api.oyez.org/cases/2003/02-1371
|
02-1371
|
2003
|
Missouri
|
Patrice Seibert
|
<p>Patrice Seibert was convicted of second degree murder for the death of 17 -year-old Donald Rector, who died in a fire set in the mobile home where he lived with Seibert. Several days after the fire, Seibert was interrogated by a police officer. The officer initially withheld her Miranda warnings, hoping to get a confession from her first. Once she had confessed, the officer took a short break from questioning, then read her her Miranda rights and resumed questioning her after she waived those rights. He prompted her to restate the confession that she had made earlier. Based on this second, Mirandized confession, Seibert was convicted.</p>
<p>She appealed, charging that the officer's intentional use of an un-Mirandized interrogation to get the initial confession made the later confession, though it occurred after she had waived her Miranda rights, inadmissable. The prosecution cited Oregon v. Elstad to argue that an initial, un-Mirandized confession did not make a defendant incapable of voluntarily waiving her Miranda rights and confessing later.</p>
<p>The Supreme Court of Missouri agreed with Seibert, overturning the conviction.</p>
| 1,155 | 5 | 4 | false |
plurality opinion
|
affirmed
|
Criminal Procedure
|
1,564 | 55,170 |
Rasul v. Bush
|
https://api.oyez.org/cases/2003/03-334
|
03-334
|
2003
|
Fawzi Khalid Abdullah Fahad Al Odah, et al.
|
George W. Bush, President of the United States, et al.
|
<p>Two Australians and 12 Kuwaitis were captured by the American military in Pakistan or Afghanistan during the United States' War on Terror. The captives were transported to the American military base in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. When their families learned of the arrests, they filed suit in federal district court seeking a writ of habeas corpus that would declare the detention unconstitutional. They claimed that the government's decision to deny the men access to attorneys and to hold them indefinitely without access to a court violated the Fifth Amendment's Due Process Clause. The government countered that the federal courts had no jurisdiction to hear the case because the prisoners were not American citizens and were being held in territory over which the United States did not have sovereignty (the Guantanamo Bay base was leased from Cuba indefinitely in 1903, and Cuba retains "ultimate sovereignty").</p>
<p>The district court agreed with the government, dismissing the case because it found that it did not have jurisdiction. The US Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia affirmed the district court's decision.</p>
| 1,138 | 6 | 3 | true |
majority opinion
|
reversed/remanded
|
Criminal Procedure
|
1,565 | 55,169 |
Muhammad v. Close
|
https://api.oyez.org/cases/2003/02-9065
|
02-9065
|
2003
|
Shakur Muhammad, aka John E. Mease
|
Mark Close
|
<p>Prison officials sentenced Muhammad, a state prisoner, to seven days of special detention and 30 days of restricted privileges for insolence toward Close, a prison guard. Muhammad filed suit with a magistrate judge under section 1983 of the Civil Rights Act of 1871, seeking $10,000 in damages. Muhammad alleged Close had charged him with threatening behavior in retaliation for other proceedings against Close. Muhammad did not challenge his insolence conviction or punishment. The magistrate judge ruled that Muhammad lacked evidence proving Close acted in retaliation. The U.S. District Court agreed.</p>
<p>The U.S. Court of Appeals affirmed the ruling for a different reason, citing the U.S. Supreme Court decision Heck v. Humphrey (1994). In Heck the Court held that when a prisoner seeks damages in a case that questions his sentence, the prisoner must first have successfully challenged the sentence itself or the conviction itself. The Court of Appeals held that because Muhammad's damages case questioned his sentence, he must first successfully appeal the sentence itself. Going further the Court of Appeals held that Heck applies to all challenges to prison disciplinary proceedings.</p>
| 1,203 | 9 | 0 | false |
per curiam
|
reversed/remanded
|
Civil Rights
|
1,566 | 55,172 |
Maryland v. Pringle
|
https://api.oyez.org/cases/2003/02-809
|
02-809
|
2003
|
Maryland
|
Joseph Jermaine Pringle
|
<p>A police officer stopped a car for speeding, searched the car, and seized money from the glove compartment and cocaine from behind the back-seat armrest. The officer arrested the car's three occupants after they denied ownership of the drugs and money. A state court sentenced Pringle, the front-seat passenger, for possessing and intending to distribute cocaine after he signed a written confession. The state appellate court reversed the conviction, holding that the mere finding of cocaine in the back armrest when Pringle was in the front-seat of a car being driven by its owner was insufficient to establish probable cause for arrest for possession.</p>
| 662 | 9 | 0 | true |
majority opinion
|
reversed/remanded
|
Criminal Procedure
|
1,567 | 55,173 |
Johnson v. California
|
https://api.oyez.org/cases/2003/03-6539
|
03-6539
|
2003
|
Jay Shawn Johnson
|
California
|
<p>Jay Shawn Johnson, on trial in California for murder, objected to the district attorney's use of peremptory challenges to eliminate all three black prospective jurors. Johnson argued the eliminations were based on race. The judge denied Johnson's motions and held that Johnson had failed to show a "strong likelihood" that the dismissals were race-based. The judge relied on People v. Wheeler, the 1978 case in which the California Supreme Court ruled that to establish a prima facie case of racial bias in peremptory challenges, the objector had to show "strong likelihood" that the challenges were race- based. The jury found Johnson guilty of second-degree murder.</p>
<p>Johnson appealed and argued that the "strong likelihood" standard in Wheeler was at odds with the 'reasonable inference" standard the U.S. Supreme Court set in Batson v. Kentucky (1986). The appeals court agreed and reversed Johnson's conviction. The California Supreme Court reversed and ruled that the two standards were the same.</p>
| 1,015 | 9 | 0 | false |
per curiam
| null |
Judicial Power
|
1,568 | 55,174 |
Alaska Dept. of Environmental Conserv. v. EPA
|
https://api.oyez.org/cases/2003/02-658
|
02-658
|
2003
|
Alaska Department of Environmental Conservation
|
Environmental Protection Agency, et al.
|
<p>Under the Clean Air Act, state agencies must determine the best way to prevent air pollution in areas that have met national clean air standards. In part, they must require that polluting companies use the "best available control technology" to limit pollution whenever they construct new facilities. In 1998, Teck Cominco Alaska, a mining company, requested a permit to build an additional generator at one of its mines. The Alaska Department of Environmental Conservation (ADEC) issued the permit, which called for Cominco to use "Low NOx" technology on all its generators, not just the new one. The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), however, stepped in, arguing that a better technology was available. ADEC appealed the EPA's decision to the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals, arguing that the EPA did not have the right to interfere with the state agency's decision. The Ninth Circuit sided with the EPA.</p>
| 918 | 5 | 4 | false |
majority opinion
|
affirmed
|
Economic Activity
|
1,569 | 55,171 |
Kontrick v. Ryan
|
https://api.oyez.org/cases/2003/02-819
|
02-819
|
2003
|
Andrew J. Kontrick
|
Robert A. Ryan
|
<p>Andrew Kontrick filed for bankruptcy after he and his partner, Robert Ryan, dissolved their plastic surgery practice. Ryan notified the court that Kontrick owed him money before the 60-day filing deadline set by Bankruptcy Rule 4004. More than three months later (after the deadline for filing had passed) Ryan filed an amended complaint charging that Kontrick was diverting paychecks into his wife's account so that he wouldn't have to pay Ryan. Ryan's attorneys claimed that they were not making a new claim - the diversion had been alluded to in other court documents - but that they were merely refocusing the judge's attention. Furthermore, they argued that the deadline for filing could be - and had been - waived by the judge. Kontrick's attorneys, on the other hand, argued that the amended complaint was a new filing and that the deadlines for filing could not be waived. The bankruptcy court ruled for Ryan. The district court and a Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals panel both affirmed, holding that the deadline was subject to waiver.</p>
| 1,053 | 9 | 0 | false |
majority opinion
|
affirmed
|
Economic Activity
|
1,570 | 55,175 |
Engine Manufacturers' Association v. South Coast Air Quality Management District
|
https://api.oyez.org/cases/2003/02-1343
|
02-1343
|
2003
|
Engine Manufacturers Association and Western States Petroleum Association
|
South Coast Air Quality Management District, et al.
|
<p>The Engine Manufacturers Association (EMA) sued the South Coast Air Quality Management District (SCAQMD) - established under the California Health and Safety Code - in federal district court. The EMA alleged that the Clean Air Act (CAA) preempted SCAQMD's "fleet rules" - rules that required new commercial vehicles to meet specific emissions standards - and that the rules were therefore illegal. The EMA pointed to section 209 of the act, which prohibits states from enforcing "any standard relating to the control of emissions from new motor vehicles." Reasoning that the regulations affected the standards at which engines could be sold, not the standards to which they must be manufactured, and finding that Congress's purpose was to protect manufactures from "having to build engines in compliance with a multiplicity of standards," the district court ruled that the CAA did not preempt California's fleet rules. The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals affirmed.</p>
| 971 | 8 | 1 | true |
majority opinion
|
vacated/remanded
|
Federalism
|
1,571 | 55,176 |
Hibbs v. Winn
|
https://api.oyez.org/cases/2003/02-1809
|
02-1809
|
2003
|
J. Elliott Hibbs, Director, Arizona Department of Revenue
|
Kathleen M. Winn, et al.
|
<p>Several Arizona residents challenged in federal district court an Arizona statute that allows tax credits for money spent toward parochial schools. They alleged that the statute violates the religious establishment clause of the U.S. Constitution's First Amendment.</p>
<p>The district court dismissed the case and ruled that it lacked jurisdiction for two reasons: First, the federal Tax Injunction Act (TIA) prohibits federal district courts from ruling on the "assessment, levy or collection of any tax under state law where a plain, speedy and efficient remedy may be had in the courts of such state." And second, the court pointed to the comity doctrine - that is, the deference that federal courts should generally give to state tax laws. The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals reversed, ruling that neither the TIA nor comity place the case outside federal jurisdiction. The court reasoned that the TIA was inapplicable because invalidating a tax credit would not harm Arizona's ability to raise revenue.</p>
| 1,015 | 5 | 4 | false |
majority opinion
|
affirmed
|
Federalism
|
1,572 | 55,178 |
United States v. Galletti
|
https://api.oyez.org/cases/2003/02-1389
|
02-1389
|
2003
|
United States
|
Abel C. Galletti, et al.
|
<p>Abel Galletti and his wife, along with another couple, the Briguglios, formed a business partnership. The partnership underpaid its federal employment taxes, and the IRS assessed the unpaid taxes against the partnership (meaning the partnership would be forced to pay the taxes). According to the Internal Revenue Code, if a tax debt is assessed within three years after the return was filed, the government has 10 additional years to collected the money.</p>
<p>More than three years later, the Gallettis and the Briguglios separately filed for bankruptcy. The IRS made a claim in bankruptcy court against the two couples for the taxes assessed against the partnership. The couples objected, arguing that because the partners themselves had not been separately assessed, the statute of limitations had not been extended to the partners.</p>
<p>The bankruptcy court ruled against the IRS, holding that the IRS must assess tax claims against individual partners, not just the partnership, in order to later collect on those claims from the individuals. The district court and a Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals panel both affirmed the decision.</p>
| 1,149 | 9 | 0 | true |
majority opinion
|
reversed/remanded
|
Federal Taxation
|
1,573 | 55,177 |
Household Credit Services, Inc. v. Pfennig
|
https://api.oyez.org/cases/2003/02-857
|
02-857
|
2003
|
Household Credit Services, Inc. and MBNA America Bank, N.A.
|
Sharon R. Pfennig
|
<p>Sharon Pfennig went over her $2000 credit limit. The company that issued Pfennig her credit card, Household Credit Services, Inc., charged her a fee of $29 for each month that her balance remained over $2000. This fee was listed in the "Purchases" category on her monthly statement rather than as a "finance charge." Under the Truth in Lending Act (TILA), any charges "incident to the extension of credit" must be listed separately as "finance charges."</p>
<p>Household Credit Services chose not to list the over-limit fee as a "finance charge," however, based on the Federal Reserve Board's definition of the term, which explicitly excludes "charges ... for exceeding a credit limit." Pfenning countered that the Board's definition was an unreasonable interpretation of TILA's plain language and should therefore be disregarded.</p>
<p>The district court sided with Household Credit Services, finding that the the Federal Reserve Board had properly exercised its authority under TILA to define the term, that the definition was a reasonable interpretation of TILA, and that the credit company was therefore justified in relying on its definition. The Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals reversed.</p>
| 1,201 | 9 | 0 | true |
majority opinion
|
reversed
|
Economic Activity
|
1,574 | 55,180 |
Holland v. Jackson
|
https://api.oyez.org/cases/2003/03-1200
|
03-1200
|
2003
|
Flora Holland, Warden
|
Jessie L. Jackson
|
<p>Jessie L. Jackson was sentenced to life in prison in Tennessee in 1987 for the murder of James Crawley. Jackson sought post-conviction relief on the grounds that his trial counsel was ineffective and had failed to conduct an adequate investigation. In order to establish ineffective assistance of counsel as a violation of the Sixth Amendment based on the Supreme Court’s decision in <em>Strickland v. Washington</em>, the accused must show a lack of reasonably effective counsel and that there was a reasonable probability that, but for counsel’s unprofessional errors, the result at trial would have been different. The state court denied relief and determined that Jackson’s counsel was not deficient and that, regardless, he had not suffered prejudice as a result of his counsel’s performance.</p>
<p>Jackson then sought federal habeas relief, and the district court confirmed the state court’s denial of relief. Despite finding that there had been ineffective assistance of counsel and a reasonable likelihood of prejudice, the district court held that a federal court can only grant relief if the state court’s determination was contrary to established federal law, which was not the case here. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit reversed and held that Jackson was entitled to relief because the state court unreasonably applied the Strickland test and the state court’s opinion was contrary to the established Strickland precedent in that it applied a preponderance-of-the-evidence standard rather than a reasonable-probability standard.</p>
| 1,565 | 5 | 4 | true |
per curiam
|
reversed/remanded
|
Criminal Procedure
|
1,575 | 55,181 |
National Archives and Records Administration v. Favish
|
https://api.oyez.org/cases/2003/02-954
|
02-954
|
2003
|
National Archives and Records Administration
|
Allan J. Favish, et al.
|
<p>Vincent Foster, a high-ranking White House lawyer involved in the investigation of possible fraud by the Clinton family in the Whitewater real estate venture, was found dead in a Virginia park. Two government investigations subsequently found that the death had been a suicide. Allan Favish questioned the findings of the government investigations, claiming that they were part of a government cover-up of murder. Under the Freedom of Information Act, Favish requested access to 150 photos of Foster's body in the park and during the autopsy. He later reduced his request to 129 photos.</p>
<p>The government initially denied him access to all the photos, but eventually gave him access to 118 of them. It withheld the rest, arguing that the privacy interest of Foster's family members in relation to Foster's death trumped the public interest served by providing Favish access to the photos. The government stated that the photos were very graphic and that releasing them would upset the family. Favish countered by arguing that the family did not have a relevant privacy interest; the only person whose privacy interests would be violated by the release of the photos was Foster, Favish argued, and Foster's death had rendered him incapable of exercising that interest.</p>
<p>After a series of appeals in which a Ninth Circuit panel held that the Foster family's right to privacy was relevant to the case but that the district court must look at the specific photos in order to weigh the privacy rights against Favish's right to access government information, the Ninth Circuit eventually decided that Favish should be given access to all but four of the photos. The government, joined by the Foster family, appealed the decision to the Supreme Court.</p>
| 1,762 | 9 | 0 | true |
majority opinion
|
reversed/remanded
|
Privacy
|
1,576 | 55,179 |
United States v. Banks
|
https://api.oyez.org/cases/2003/02-473
|
02-473
|
2003
|
United States
|
Lashawn Lowell Banks
|
<p>On July 15, 1998 police officers, with a warrant, knocked on the door of suspected drug dealer Lashawn Banks. They waited between 15 and 20 seconds, and when Banks did not come to the door they smashed it open with a battering ram. Banks was arrested but, before his trial, he filed a motion to suppress the evidence found in his apartment because, he claimed, the forced entry had been unlawful. When the request was denied, he pled guilty, but eventually attempted to retract his guilty plea on the advice of a new attorney. The new attorney, Randall Roske, argued that the search was unconstitutional because officers did not wait long enough before breaking down the door, and had no evidence that waiting longer would have had negative consequences. A Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals agreed, ruling the search unconstitutional and suppressing the evidence found during it.</p>
| 884 | 9 | 0 | true |
majority opinion
|
reversed
|
Criminal Procedure
|
1,577 | 55,183 |
Vieth v. Jubelirer
|
https://api.oyez.org/cases/2003/02-1580
|
02-1580
|
2003
|
Robert C. Jubelirer, President of the Pennsylvania Senate, et al.
|
Richard Vieth, Norma Jean Vieth, and Susan Furey
|
<p>After the 2000 census reduced the size of the Pennsylvania Congressional delegation by two members, the Republican-controlled state legislature passed a redistricting plan that clearly benefitted Republican candidates. Several members of the Democratic party sued in federal court, claiming that the plan was unconstitutional because it violated the one-person, one-vote principle of Article I, Section 2 of Constitution, the Equal Protection clause, the Privileges and Immunities clause, and the freedom of association.</p>
<p>The district court dismissed all but the Article I, Section 2 claim. It held that the voters bringing the suit had not proved that they would be denied representation, only that they would be represented by Republican officials. Because the plaintiffs (those bringing the suit) were not denied the right to vote, to be placed on the ballot box, to associate as a party, or to express their political opinions, their political discrimination claims failed.</p>
<p>However, the court found the act unconstitutional because it created districts with different numbers of voters, thereby violating the one-person, one-vote principle. Because the plaintiffs had shown that it was possible to create districts with smaller differences, and because the defendants had failed to justify the disparities resulting under their plan, it was therefore unconstitutional.</p>
| 1,393 | 5 | 4 | false |
plurality opinion
|
affirmed
|
Judicial Power
|
1,578 | 55,182 |
Thornton v. United States
|
https://api.oyez.org/cases/2003/03-5165
|
03-5165
|
2003
|
Marcus Thornton
|
United States
|
<p>Marcus Thornton was stopped after getting out of his vehicle by a police officer who had noticed that the license plate on Thornton's Lincoln Town Car belonged to a Chevy two-door car. During his conversation with Thornton, the officer asked if he could search him. During the search he found two bags of drugs. The officer arrested Thornton, then searched his vehicle (which Thornton had already exited by the time the police officer spoke with him, though the officer had seen him exit it). In the vehicle the officer found a gun.</p>
<p>Thornton was convicted of drug and firearms offenses. On appeal, he moved to have the gun dismissed as evidence because, he claimed, it had been found as the result of an unconstitutional search. He argued that the officer had contacted him after he had left the vehicle and that the search therefore did not fall within the "search incident to arrest" exception to the Fourth Amendment warrant requirement (the exception allows police to search the person being arrested and the area "within his immediate control").</p>
<p>A Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals panel rejected his argument, holding that requiring officers to signal their intent to arrest a person before he exited his vehicle would be dangerous because it would give him a chance to get any weapons in the vehicle or to use the vehicle to get away or run over the officers.</p>
| 1,386 | 7 | 2 | false |
majority opinion
|
affirmed
|
Criminal Procedure
|
1,579 | 55,184 |
BedRoc Limited, LLC v. United States
|
https://api.oyez.org/cases/2003/02-1593
|
02-1593
|
2003
|
BedRoc Limited, LLC, and Western Elite, Inc.
|
United States, et al.
|
<p>BedRoc Ltd. and Western Elite, Inc., own property in Nevada patented under the federal Pittman Act (1919). (The act was repealed in 1964.) The act authorized the issuance of patents to desert lands in Nevada to individuals who successfully developed underground water resources. However, the act specified that patents reserve to the United States "all the coal and other valuable minerals" in the patented lands. When the previous owner of BedRoc and Western Elite's land extracted and sold commercially valuable sand and gravel from the lands without a federal mineral contract, the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) gave notification that the mining was illegal under federal law. The owner lost an appeal to the Interior Board of Land Appeals (IBLA). Once BedRoc and Western Elite owned the land, they filed suit in U.S. district court, arguing that the Pittman Act's "valuable minerals" provision did not include valuable sand and gravel. The district court rejected the companies' argument and sided with the United States. The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals affirmed.</p>
| 1,080 | 6 | 3 | true |
plurality opinion
|
reversed/remanded
|
Economic Activity
|
1,580 | 55,187 |
Fellers v. United States
|
https://api.oyez.org/cases/2003/02-6320
|
02-6320
|
2003
|
John J. Fellers
|
United States
|
<p>After a grand jury indicted Fellers, police arrested him at home. Fellers made incriminating statements during the arrest. Police officially interrogated Fellers at county jail and told him of his Miranda rights. Fellers signed a waiver of these rights and restated incriminating statements he had made at home. Fellers later argued that, when he was arrested in his home without a lawyer, police "deliberately elicited" incriminating statements. Pointing to his Sixth Amendment right to counsel, Fellers argued it would be unconstitutional to admit at trial his incriminating statements made in jail, because these were the "fruits" of comments made at home without a lawyer.</p>
<p>Fellers was convicted in federal district court. A federal appellate court affirmed the conviction and ruled that officers did not violate Fellers' Sixth Amendment right to counsel either at home or in the jailhouse.</p>
| 908 | 9 | 0 | true |
majority opinion
|
reversed/remanded
|
Criminal Procedure
|
1,581 | 55,185 |
Blakely v. Washington
|
https://api.oyez.org/cases/2003/02-1632
|
02-1632
|
2003
|
Ralph Howard Blakely, Jr.
|
Washington
|
<p>Blakely pleaded guilty to the kidnapping of his estranged wife and the facts admitted in his plea supported a maximum sentence of 53 months. Washington state law allows a judge to impose a sentence above the standard range if he finds "substantial and compelling reasons" for doing so that were not computed into the standard range sentence. The judge in this case imposed an "exceptional" sentence of 90 months after determining Blakely had acted with "deliberate cruelty."</p>
<p>Blakely appealed, arguing that this sentencing procedure deprived him of his federal Sixth Amendment right to have a jury determine beyond a reasonable doubt all facts legally essential to his sentence. A state appellate court affirmed the sentence and the state supreme court denied review.</p>
| 781 | 5 | 4 | true |
majority opinion
|
reversed/remanded
|
Criminal Procedure
|
1,582 | 55,186 |
Nixon v. Missouri Municipal League
|
https://api.oyez.org/cases/2003/02-1238
|
02-1238
|
2003
|
Southwestern Bell Telephone, L.P., fka Southwestern Bell Telephone Company
|
Missouri Municipal League, et al.
|
<p>The Telecommunications Act of 1996 allowed federal preemption of state and local regulations "prohibiting the ability of any entity" to provide telecommunications services. Based on this act, a group of local governments in Missouri (the Missouri Municipal League) asked the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) to nullify a state law that prevented municipalities from providing telecommunications services. Missouri argued that municipal governments were not separate entities but merely subsections of the state government and that the state could therefore restrict their authority. The FCC agreed with the state, refusing to nullify the law.</p>
<p>The Municipal League appealed, and an Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals panel reversed the decision. The panel held the words "any entity" were intentionally broad and that a proper understanding of them would include municipal governments. The state could therefore not regulate attempts by municipalities to provide telecommunications services. The FCC, along with the state of Missouri and Southwestern Bell Telephone Company, appealed the decision to the Supreme Court.</p>
| 1,136 | 8 | 1 | true |
majority opinion
|
reversed
|
Federalism
|
1,583 | 55,188 |
Iowa v. Tovar
|
https://api.oyez.org/cases/2003/02-1541
|
02-1541
|
2003
|
Iowa
|
Felipe Edgardo Tovar
|
<p>Felipe E. Tovar was charged with drunk-driving in Iowa three times in four years. Tovar pleaded guilty both times and waived his right to an attorney the first time. The third time, because Iowa law increases sentencing for successive drunk-driving, Tovar faced up to five years in prison. Tovar argued that his first conviction was an invalid waiver of his 6th Amendment right to counsel and should not increase his third sentence. The waiver was invalid, Tovar argued, because the judge did not warn him of the consequences of entering a guilty plea without an attorney. The Iowa district court rejected Tovar's argument and sentenced him to 30 days in jail. The court of appeals affirmed. The Iowa Supreme Court reversed.</p>
| 732 | 9 | 0 | true |
majority opinion
|
reversed/remanded
|
Criminal Procedure
|
1,584 | 55,189 |
Ashcroft v. American Civil Liberties Union
|
https://api.oyez.org/cases/2003/03-218
|
03-218
|
2003
|
John D. Ashcroft, Attorney General
|
American Civil Liberties Union, et al.
|
<p>Congress passed the Child Online Protection Act (COPA) to prevent minors from accessing pornography online. The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) and online publishers sued in federal court to prevent enforcement of the act, arguing that it violated the Free Speech clause of the First Amendment. The District Court agreed. On appeal, a Third Circuit Court of Appeals panel affirmed, holding that because the act used "community standards" to decide which material was harmful to minors, it would prohibit material that was felt offensive in the most "puritanical" communities from being displayed in more "tolerant" ones.</p>
<p>On appeal, the Supreme Court ruled that the "community standards" provision alone did not make the act unconstitutional and sent the case back to the Third Circuit for further evaluation.</p>
<p>The Third Circuit again prohibited implementation of the act, holding that it was likely to fail the "strict scrutiny" test because it was not narrowly tailored - that is, it prevented online publishers from publishing some material that adults had a right to access - and because it did not use the least restrictive means possible to protect children (the court found that blocking software installed on home computers by parents would do as good a job without preventing free speech). For similar reasons, the panel found that the act was unconstitutionally "overbroad" - that is, it applied to too much protected material.</p>
| 1,463 | 5 | 4 | false |
majority opinion
|
affirmed
|
First Amendment
|
1,585 | 55,190 |
General Dynamics Land Systems Inc. v. Cline
|
https://api.oyez.org/cases/2003/02-1080
|
02-1080
|
2003
|
General Dynamics Land Systems, Inc.
|
Dennis Cline, et al.
|
<p>General Dynamics Land Systems renegotiated its union contract to provide full health care benefits only to retirees who were more than 50 years old by a July 1, 1997, deadline. Union member Dennis Cline fell two years short of 50 at the time of the deadline and was excluded permanently from receiving health benefits.</p>
<p>Cline - along with 196 other 40-to 49-year-old employees - filed suit against General Dynamics under the Age Discrimination in Employment Act of 1967 (ADEA). ADEA protects workers over 40 from age discrimination. Since the contract excluded workers between the ages of 40 and 49, Cline alleged that providing benefits only to retirees 50 and up was illegal age discrimination.</p>
<p>A U.S. district court in Ohio rejected Cline's claims. The court ruled that the ADEA does not recognize claims for "reverse discrimination" or preferential treatment for older people within the same over-40 class. Cline appealed and the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit reversed. The court ruled that General Dynamics was guilty of plain age discrimination, since the ADEA protects all persons over 40 from age discrimination by their employers.</p>
| 1,174 | 6 | 3 | true |
majority opinion
|
reversed
|
Civil Rights
|
1,586 | 55,191 |
Dretke v. Haley
|
https://api.oyez.org/cases/2003/02-1824
|
02-1824
|
2003
|
Doug Dretke, Director, Texas Department of Criminal Justice, Correctional Institutions Division
|
Michael Wayne Haley
|
<p>Haley was convicted in Texas state courts of a felony theft and sentenced as a habitual felony offender (extending his sentence). After a failed appeal to the Texas appellate court, Haley filed a state habeas application in the trial court, arguing that his past crimes did not qualify him as a habitual offender and that his attorney had provided ineffective counsel when he failed to object to the extended sentence. The court dismissed his claims on procedural grounds, because he had not raised the issue during his trial and therefore could not raise it in the habeas petition. The Texas Court of Criminal Appeals denied his habeas application based on the trial court's findings.</p>
<p>Haley then filed for habeas corpus relief in federal district court. Pointing to the procedural-default doctrine, Texas argued that Haley's claim was procedurally barred from federal habeas review. Under the procedural-default doctrine, federal courts cannot grant habeas relief if the last state court rejected the appeal for procedural violations of state law; the only exception is if the petitioner is actually innocent.</p>
<p>The district court held that Haley showed he was "actually innocent" of earlier violations on which his sentence enhancement was based. The court ruled that Haley's sentence was therefore improperly extended. It never reached his ineffective assistance of counsel claim, having already found grounds for overturning the extended sentence. The U.S. Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals affirmed, rejecting Texas's argument that the actual-innocence exception applies only to cases involving capital offenses.</p>
| 1,634 | 6 | 3 | true |
majority opinion
|
vacated/remanded
|
Criminal Procedure
|
1,587 | 55,192 |
Crawford v. Washington
|
https://api.oyez.org/cases/2003/02-9410
|
02-9410
|
2003
|
Michael D. Crawford
|
Washington
|
<p>Michael Crawford stabbed a man he claimed tried to rape his wife. During Crawford's trial, prosecutors played for the jury his wife's tape-recorded statement to the police describing the stabbing. The statement contradicted Crawford's argument that he stabbed the man in defense of his wife. Because it was pre-recorded, Crawford could not cross-examine the statement. The jury convicted Crawford for assault.</p>
<p>Crawford claimed the playing of his wife's statement, with no chance for cross-examination, violated the Sixth Amendment guarantee that "[i]n all criminal prosecutions, the accused shall enjoy the right...to be confronted with the witnesses against him." The state supreme court upheld the conviction, relying on the U.S. Supreme Court's decision in Ohio v. Roberts (1980). That decision allowed the admission of out-of-court testimony against a defendant if that testimony was reliable.</p>
| 912 | 9 | 0 | true |
majority opinion
|
reversed/remanded
|
Criminal Procedure
|
1,588 | 55,194 |
Nelson v. Campbell
|
https://api.oyez.org/cases/2003/03-6821
|
03-6821
|
2003
|
David L. Nelson
|
Donal Campbell, Commissioner, Alabama Department of Corrections, et al.
|
<p>David Nelson was sentenced to death for murder and scheduled for execution in 1997. A series of appeals and habeas petitions in federal court delayed the execution until 2002, when an 11th Circuit Court of Appeals panel unanimously rejected a claim dealing with the alleged violation of his Sixth Amendment right to an attorney. After the final appeal was rejected, Nelson was rescheduled for execution on October 9, 2003.</p>
<p>Nelson filed petition in federal district court alleging that the method of execution proposed by Alabama violated his Eighth Amendment protection against cruel and unusual punishment. Alabama had notified Nelson that, because of damage done to his veins by previous intravenous drug abuse, the execution procedure might require corrections officers to cut through muscles and fat in his arm to get access to a vein that could carry the toxins. He claimed that this was an inhumane method of execution and should therefore be barred. Further, he argued that the petition was not an appeal of his conviction or sentence (appeals of both were prohibited by U.S. Code Title 28, Section 2254, a federal law designed to limit the number of habeas corpus appeals by death row inmates) but rather a freestanding lawsuit challenging the constitutionality of the proposed execution procedure. Alabama countered that Nelson's appeal was intended only to prolong his life through procedural delays, exactly what the federal law was designed to prevent, and should therefore be thrown out.</p>
<p>The federal district court agreed with Alabama, holding that Nelson's appeal dealt not just with the procedure but with the sentence itself. It was therefore functionally equivalent to a habeas corpus petition, which was barred by Section 2254. A divided 11th Circuit Court of Appeals panel affirmed the decision. After the 11th Circuit declined to rehear the case as a whole (en banc), the U.S. Supreme Court issued a stay of execution and then accepted the case for appeal.</p>
| 1,998 | 9 | 0 | true |
majority opinion
|
reversed/remanded
|
Civil Rights
|
1,589 | 55,193 |
United States v. Dominguez Benitez
|
https://api.oyez.org/cases/2003/03-167
|
03-167
|
2003
|
United States
|
Carlos Dominguez Benitez
|
<p>Carlos Dominguez Benitez confessed to selling drugs to an informant. He made a plea agreement with the government in which he would plead guilty to conspiracy to sell drugs, which normally carried a 10-year minimum sentence. However, the government agreed to ask the judge to reduce the sentence below that minimum. The plea agreement also said that, if the judge did not agree to the government's request to lower the sentence, Dominguez could not withdraw his guilty plea. During discussions of the plea, the judge failed to mention the fact that it prohibited him from withdrawing his plea (the written statement, which did contain the fact, was read to him at another time). When the judge ruled that he could not lower the sentence, Dominguez appealed. He argued that the judge's failure to tell him that he would be unable to withdraw his appeal was a "plain error" under Federal Rule of Criminal Procedure 52 and therefore required reversal. The prosecutors countered that, in order to show that the judge had made a "plain error" Dominguez would need to show not just that he had made a mistake but also that it was reasonably likely that, without the error, Dominguez would not have pled guilty. A Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals rejected that argument, siding with Dominguez to reverse the decision.</p>
| 1,316 | 9 | 0 | true |
majority opinion
|
reversed/remanded
|
Criminal Procedure
|
1,590 | 55,195 |
Mitchell v. Esparza
|
https://api.oyez.org/cases/2003/02-1369
|
02-1369
|
2003
|
Mitchell
|
Esparza
|
<p>Gregory Esparza murdered a store clerk during a robbery in Ohio. He was convicted and sentenced to death for the murder. He appealed the death sentence, arguing that the prosecutors had failed to charge him as the "principle offender" in the murder and that he was therefore ineligible for the death penalty under Ohio law. The Ohio Court of Appeals rejected this argument, holding that, because Esparza had been the only person charged in the crime, it would have been redundant (and therefore unnecessary) to charge him as the "principle offender."</p>
<p>Esparza then filed a second appeal before the Court of Appeals, this time arguing that he had received ineffective assistance of counsel during his first appeal. He specifically cited his attorney's failure to argue that the state had violated the Eighth Amendment's prohibition on cruel and unusual punishment by not following the "letter of the law" in its sentencing. The court again rejected Esparza's argument, referring back to its first decision and holding that the prosecutor's error had been harmless and was therefore not grounds for overturning the sentence. The defense attorney's failure to raise Eighth Amendment objections to the prosecutor's error, therefore, was also harmless.</p>
<p>Esparza then filed a petition for a writ of habeas corpus in federal district court, raising the same ineffective assistance of counsel claim. In response, Ohio argued that the Ohio Appeals Court's decision had not violated "clearly established Federal law" and that the district court therefore could not overturn the sentence. The court sided with Esparza, however, holding that the state's failure to follow its sentencing laws violated the Eighth Amendment. The attorney's failure to raise the Eighth Amendment claim in the first appeal, therefore, was not harmless and could serve as grounds for overturning the sentence. A Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals panel affirmed the federal district court's opinion.</p>
| 1,981 | 9 | 0 | true |
per curiam
|
reversed/remanded
|
Criminal Procedure
|
1,591 | 55,197 |
United States Postal Service v. Flamingo Industries (USA), Limited
|
https://api.oyez.org/cases/2003/02-1290
|
02-1290
|
2003
|
United States Postal Service
|
Flamingo Industries (USA) Ltd., et al.
|
<p>When the U.S. Postal Service ended its mail-sack contract with Flamingo Industries, Flamingo sued in U.S. district court. Flamingo claimed the Postal Service declared a "fake emergency in the supply of mail sacks" so it could give no-bid contracts to cheaper foreign manufacturers without allowing U.S. companies to compete for them. Flamingo claimed this violated federal antitrust laws (among other charges). The district court dismissed the antitrust claim reasoning that the federal government is protected by sovereign immunity. The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals reversed on the antitrust immunity count. It ruled that the 1970 Postal Reorganization Act waived the Postal Service's sovereign immunity and that it could be sued under federal antitrust laws as a "person."</p>
| 784 | 9 | 0 | true |
majority opinion
|
reversed
|
Economic Activity
|
1,592 | 55,198 |
Schriro v. Summerlin
|
https://api.oyez.org/cases/2003/03-526
|
03-526
|
2003
|
Dora B. Schriro, Director, Arizona Department of Corrections
|
Warren Wesley Summerlin
|
<p>Warren Summerlin killed a loan collector with a hatchet in 1982 and was subsequently convicted of murder. He was sentenced to death by a state trial judge because of the heinous nature of the crime and his previous criminal history. He appealed the sentence, arguing that his attorney's romantic relationship with the prosecutor and the trial judge's proven use of marijuana had prevented him from receiving a fair trial, but the Arizona state courts rejected his appeals.</p>
<p>In June 2002, however, the U.S. Supreme Court issued its decision in Ring v. Arizona. The decision found that the Sixth Amendment right to jury trial meant that only juries, not judges, could sentence someone to death. The Ring decision gave Summerlin new hope. He appealed his conviction, arguing that the decision changed the substance of the law rather than just the procedure used to apply it, and that it should therefore be applied retroactively. The state countered that the change dealt only with who did the actual sentencing, not with the burden of proof, and was therefore only procedural. Because procedural changes are not applied retroactively under the Supreme Court's 1989 decision in Teague v. Lane, the state argued that Summerlin's sentence should be upheld. A divided Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals disagreed, siding instead with Summerlin and ordering the state to reopen his trial for re-sentencing.</p>
| 1,409 | 5 | 4 | true |
majority opinion
|
reversed/remanded
|
Criminal Procedure
|
1,593 | 55,199 |
Sosa v. Alvarez-Machain
|
https://api.oyez.org/cases/2003/03-339
|
03-339
|
2003
|
Jose Francisco Sosa
|
Humberto Alvarez-Machain, et al.
|
<p>A U.S. Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA) special agent was kidnapped and murdered by a Mexican drug cartel in 1985. After an investigation, the DEA concluded that Humberto Alvarez-Machain had participated in the murder. A warrant for his arrest was issued by a federal district court. The DEA, however, was unable to convince Mexico to extradite Alvarez-Machain, so they hired several Mexican nationals to capture him and bring him back to the United States. His subsequent trial went all the way to the Supreme Court, which found that the government could try a person who had been forcibly abducted, but that the abduction itself might violate international and provide grounds for a civil suit. When the case went back to the district court for trial, Alvarez-Machain was found not guilty for lack of evidence.</p>
<p>Alvarez-Machain then filed a group of civil suits in federal court against the United States and the Mexican nationals who had captured him under the Federal Tort Claims Act (FTCA), which allows the federal government to be sued on tort claims, and the Alien Tort Statute (ATS), which permits suits against foreign citizens in American courts. The government argued that the FTCA applied only to claims arising from actions that took place in the United States and therefore did not cover Alvarez-Machain's case because the arrest took place in Mexico. Further, the government and the Mexican nationals argued that the ATS gave federal courts jurisdiction to hear tort claims against foreign citizens, but did not allow private individuals to bring those suits.</p>
<p>The federal district court disagreed with the government's contention that the FCTA claim did not apply, finding that plan to capture Alvarez-Machain was developed on U.S. soil and therefore covered. However, the court then ruled that the DEA had acted lawfully when they arrested Alvarez-Machain and was therefore not liable. On the ATS claims, the court rejected the argument that private individuals could not bring suit under the Act. The court found that Jose Francisco Sosa, one of the Mexican nationals who kidnapped Alvarez- Machain, had violated international law and was therefore liable under the ATS.</p>
<p>On appeal, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals overturned the district court's FTCA decision, ruling that the DEA could not authorize a citizen's arrest of Alvarez-Machain in another country and was therefore liable. The appeals court did, however, affirm the lower court's finding on the ATS claim, upholding the judgment against Sosa.</p>
| 2,549 | 6 | 3 | true |
majority opinion
|
reversed
|
Economic Activity
|
1,594 | 55,200 |
Doe v. Chao
|
https://api.oyez.org/cases/2003/02-1377
|
02-1377
|
2003
|
Buck Doe
|
Elaine L. Chao, Secretary of Labor
|
<p>Seven coal miners sued the Department of Labor, claiming that the department had violated the federal Privacy Act and the right to privacy found in the federal Constitution by releasing their social security numbers (SSNs). The Privacy Act stated that any "person entitled to recovery" in a suit against the government for a violation of privacy would be awarded "actual damages sustained by the individual... but in no case... [would the damages awarded be] less than the sum of $1000" and attorney fees.</p>
<p>The miners argued that all they needed to prove in order to receive the $1000 minimum award was that the government had violated their privacy by releasing their SSNs; they did not need to prove that they had suffered actual damages. They maintained that the inclusion of "actual damages" in the act was only intended to limit the size of judgments awarded against the government, not to require proof of actual damage. The government argued that the act required the miners to prove that they had been harmed by the government's violation of their privacy.</p>
<p>The district court ruled in favor of the government. A divided Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals panel affirmed.</p>
| 1,196 | 6 | 3 | false |
majority opinion
|
affirmed
|
Privacy
|
1,595 | 55,201 |
Raymond B. Yates, M. D., P. C. Profit Sharing Plan v. Hendon
|
https://api.oyez.org/cases/2003/02-458
|
02-458
|
2003
|
Raymond B. Yates, M.D., P.C. Profit Sharing Plan, and Raymond B. Yates, Trustee
|
William T. Hendon, Trustee
|
<p>Raymond Yates owned a corporation with a profit sharing/pension plan. Yates borrowed money from the plan at a set interest. After he had repaid the loan to his profit sharing/pension plan, Yates' creditors filed an involuntary bankruptcy petition against him. They asked the bankruptcy court to set aside the repayment (interest included) and give it to the creditors.</p>
<p>Yates argued that under the Employee Retirement Income Security Act (ERISA), the interest from the profit sharing/pension plan could not be seized (except for loans to participants). The bankruptcy court disagreed and granted Yates' creditors' requests. The court reasoned that as the sole owner of the business, Yates was an employer under ERISA, not a "participant." The plan's prohibition on interest seizure therefore did not apply. A federal district court and a Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals panel both affirmed.</p>
| 903 | 9 | 0 | true |
majority opinion
|
reversed/remanded
|
Economic Activity
|
1,596 | 55,202 |
Castro v. United States
|
https://api.oyez.org/cases/2003/02-6683
|
02-6683
|
2003
|
Hernan O'Ryan Castro
|
United States
|
<p>Hernan O'Ryan Castro was sentenced to 20 years in prison for drug related offenses. After the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals affirmed his conviction, Castro alleged that he had discovered evidence that a government witness had testified falsely. Based on this evidence, he requested a new trial without legal representation. The district court, because Castro had no legal representation, attempted to help him by re-characterizing his request for a new trial as a petition for a writ of habeas corpus. The judge's re-characterization of Castro's appeal was intended to help him, but two years later, in the Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act of 1996, Congress limited the number of petitions for writ of habeas corpus that a prisoner could file to one. When Castro attempted to petition for what he thought was his first write of habeas corpus in 1998, he was denied because of the earlier reclassification of his request for a new trial. When he appealed, the 11th Circuit Court of appeals initially sided with Castro, ruling that the reclassification should not count against him. Four months later, however, the 11th Circuit reconsidered, siding with the government.</p>
| 1,188 | 9 | 0 | true |
majority opinion
|
vacated/remanded
|
Criminal Procedure
|
1,597 | 55,203 |
Johanns v. Livestock Marketing Association
|
https://api.oyez.org/cases/2004/03-1164
|
03-1164
|
2004
|
Mike Johanns, Secretary of Agriculture, et al.
|
Livestock Marketing Association; Nebraska Cattlemen, Inc. v. Livestock Marketing Association
|
<p>The Beef Promotion and Research Act (1985) required cattle producers to pay a fee for generic beef advertisements done on behalf of the cattle industry. Some cattle producers disagreed with the advertisements. The Livestock Marketing Association sued the Department of Agriculture (USDA) in federal district court and alleged a government-required fee for advertising with which some cattle producers disagreed violated their First Amendment right to free speech. The USDA argued the advertising was government speech immune from First Amendment challenge. Another group of cattle producers, the Nebraska Cattlemen, sided with the USDA and sued the Livestock Marketing Association. The two cases were consolidated. The district court and the Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals ruled the program violated the First Amendment and that the advertising was compelled and not government speech.</p>
| 894 | 6 | 3 | true |
majority opinion
|
vacated/remanded
|
First Amendment
|
1,598 | 55,204 |
Tory v. Cochran
|
https://api.oyez.org/cases/2004/03-1488
|
03-1488
|
2004
|
Ulysses Tory, et al.
|
Johnnie L. Cochran, Jr.
|
<p>Johnnie Cochran sued his former client Ulysses Tory in a California court for making defaming statements. Tory had tried to force Cochran to pay him money in exchange for desisting, Cochran argued. A judge agreed and ordered Tory to never talk about Cochran again. Tory appealed unsuccessfully in state court, arguing the order violated his First Amendment right to free speech. The U.S. Supreme Court agreed to hear the case. Cochran died one week after oral argument.</p>
| 477 | 7 | 2 | true |
majority opinion
|
vacated/remanded
|
First Amendment
|
1,599 | 55,205 |
Van Orden v. Perry
|
https://api.oyez.org/cases/2004/03-1500
|
03-1500
|
2004
|
Thomas Van Orden
|
Rick Perry, in his Official Capacity as Governor of Texas and Chairman, State Preservation Board, et al.
|
<p>Thomas Van Orden sued Texas in federal district court, arguing a Ten Commandments monument on the grounds of the state capitol building represented an unconstitutional government endorsement of religion. Orden argued this violated the First Amendment's establishment clause, which prohibits the government from passing laws "respecting an establishment of religion." The district court and the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals ruled against Orden and said the monument served a valid secular purpose and would not appear to a reasonable observer to represent a government endorsement of religion.</p>
| 602 | 5 | 4 | false |
plurality opinion
|
affirmed
|
First Amendment
|
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