Justia Construction Law Opinion Summaries

Plaintiffs brought an action under 42 U.S.C. 1983, seeking to prove that they were subjected to excessive force while in custody at the Sacramento County Main Jail. At issue was whether the district court erred by refusing to use certain jury instructions plaintiffs had requested. The court held that the district court prejudicially erred in refusing to instruct the jury that, for purposes of proving a Monell claim, a custom or practice could be supported by evidence of repeated constitutional violations which went uninvestigated and for which the errant municipal officers went unpunished. Therefore, the court vacated the judgment and remanded for a new trial. View "Hunter, et al. v. County of Sacramento, et al." on Justia Law

Plaintiff brought a pro se action under 42 U.S.C. 1983 against defendants, alleging excessive force and other Eighth Amendment and due process violations in connection with a prison yard altercation. At issue was whether a plaintiff in a lawsuit governed by the Prison Litigation Reform Act of 1995 (PLRA), 42 U.S.C. 1997e(a), was entitled to a jury trial on disputed factual issues relating to his exhaustion of administrative remedies. The court held that the Seventh Amendment did not guarantee a jury trial on factual disputes regarding administrative exhaustion under the PLRA. Accordingly, the judgment of the district court was affirmed. View "Messa v. Goord, et al." on Justia Law

Defendant Chad Booker was convicted of manslaughter and sentenced to twenty years' imprisonment. Defendant unsuccessfully appealed his sentence to the Court of Appeals. On appeal to the Supreme Court, Defendant argued multiple errors at the trial court entitled him to a new trial. The majority for the Court of Appeals found no merit in Defendant's arguments. Though it affirmed the appellate court's holding, the Supreme Court took the opportunity to expand upon points in the Court of Appeals' discussion on "Weathersby v. State" and whether the "Weathersby Rule" was correctly interpreted by the lower courts in Defendant's case. In sum, the rule applies where a defendant or his witnesses are the only eyewitnesses to the homicide: "Their version, if reasonable, must be accepted as true unless substantially contradicted in material particulars by a credible witness or witnesses for the state, or by the physical facts of the common knowledge." In Defendant's case, the Weathersby rule was inapplicable because Defendant's own version of the incident satisfied the elements of manslaughter. Furthermore, Defendant's version was substantially contradicted "in material particulars" by witnesses presented at trial. The Supreme Court found that the trial judge correctly found Weathersby inapplicable and properly permitted this case to go to the jury.

Petitioner appealed the district court's order denying him habeas relief where a jury convicted him of first degree murder of a police officer and the trial court imposed a death sentence. At issue was whether the district court erred in denying petitioner relief on his claims of ineffective assistance of counsel at the guilt phase; denied petitioner relief on his claim that counsel failed to investigate and present more detailed mitigation evidence at the penalty phase; and determined that petitioner's claim of ineffective assistance of counsel of appellate counsel for failure to challenge the trial court's impartiality was barred from federal review. The court affirmed the judgment and held that the district court did not err in denying petitioner habeas relief on his claims of ineffective assistance of counsel at the guilt phase where counsel did not proffer a defense counsel could not support and where, even if petitioner could show that counsel were ineffective for failing to proffer a voluntary intoxication defense, petitioner could not demonstrate that counsel's deficient performance prejudiced him. The court also held that counsel did not fail to investigate and present more detailed mitigation evidence at the penalty phase where counsel made numerous attempts to secure a mental health expert and strategically decided not to present some of the mental health experts counsel consulted and where the penalty-phase jury was presented with identical evidence of the effects of long-term or continuous drug use that petitioner presented at the collateral hearing. The court further held that, because petitioner never raised his claim of ineffective assistance of appellate counsel, the district court properly dismissed it.

Defendant was arrested and charged with illegal entry into the United States and appeared at a group plea hearing in the United States District Court for the District of Arizona as part of the district's "Operation Streamline." At issue was whether the taking of guilty pleas at a large group plea hearing violated a criminal defendant's rights protected by Federal Rule of Criminal Procedure 11 and the Fifth and Sixth Amendments. The court held that any Rule 11(b)(1) error was harmless where defendant would not have changed her plea of guilty if the magistrate judge had conducted sixty-seven separate advisements of rights and that, although the district court failed to comply strictly with Rule 11(b)(2), such failure was not plain error where the record reflected that defendant's plea was fully informed and the record did not demonstrate that such a plea would have changed if the magistrate had expressly inquired into the voluntariness of her decision. The court also held that the record did not suggest that defendant misunderstood her rights or involuntarily entered her plea and there was no question that this procedure complied with due process. The court further held that the plea hearing did not deprive defendant of her right to counsel where she was provided with adequate, even superior, representation by counsel and failed to demonstrate a reasonable probability that the result of the proceeding would have been different if counsel had not been temporarily separated from her during the group advisement. Accordingly, the court confirmed defendant's conviction and sentence.

Petitioner requested a judgment of acquittal on the charge of felony criminal mischief where defense counsel argued that the state failed to establish a prima facie case that the damage to the doors that petitioner drove into was one thousand dollars or more, the threshold amount for the felony charge. At issue was whether the Third District Court of Appeal properly relied on a "life experience" exception to the general rule that a state must establish the amount of damage to prove felony criminal mischief. The court quashed the Third District's decision, disapproved of Jackson v. State, and other decisions in this context that applied to the "life experience" exception and held that before a defendant could be convicted of felony criminal mischief, the state must prove the amount of damage associated with the criminal conduct.

Appellants appealed their convictions and sentences for aiding and abetting possession with intent to distribute phencyclidine ("PCP"), a controlled substance. Appellants raised issues regarding the admissibility of certain evidence and contested the basis for their sentences. The court held that the district court properly denied the first defendant's motion to suppress evidence obtained during the search of a certain house where, under the circumstances and in light of his failure on appeal to demonstrate that Los Angeles police were dishonest or reckless in relying on the house warrant, the good faith exception applied. The court also held that evidence from the second house at issue was inextricably intertwined with evidence tending to prove that the second defendant aided and abetted to possess with intent to distribute PCP and, in light of evidence implicating the second defendant in a scheme to aid and abet possession with intent to distribute PCP, any error in admitting evidence of the July 2008 controlled buy was harmless. The court further held that the district court's factual findings and application of U.S.S.G. 3C1.1 were not erroneous where certain material assertions were not worthy of credence in light of the weight of the physical evidence and were flatly contradicted by other witnesses and the ultimate finding of the jury. The court finally held that the sentencing enhancement for the first defendant's leadership role was based on an erroneous recitation of facts and therefore, was vacated and remanded for resentencing.

Defendant appealed his conviction of possession of a firearm without a firearm identification card, carrying a loaded firearm without a license, and resisting arrest. At issue was whether the court properly denied defendant's motion to suppress and properly convicted him. The court affirmed the denial of defendant's motion and held that there was no error in denying his pretrial motion to suppress evidence where the firearm was recovered as a result of a lawful seizure of his person; there was sufficient evidence to support his convictions of resisting arrest to and unlawful possession of a firearm where he charged at officers and used physical force against one officer; and there was no merit to his ineffective assistance of counsel claim that counsel failed to suppress his statement in response to an officer where there was sufficient evidence from which a rational trier of fact could have could have inferred that he knew that the two men following him were police officers and that the police wished to stop him. The court also held that defendant's right to bear arms and to self-defense under the Second Amendment and his equal protection guarantees under Federal and State Constitutions were not violated.

Suspecting the defendant of drug trafficking, federal agents attached a GPS device to his vehicle while it was parked in a public place. The GPS tracked the defendant from Phoenix to Illinois, where the state police took up live surveillance, stopped the defendant for a traffic violation, searched the vehicle after a canine unit alerted to the presence of drugs, and found nine packages of heroin. The district court refused to suppress the evidence. The Seventh Circuit affirmed. The GPS surveillance conducted in this case was not lengthy and did not expose, or risk exposing, the "twists and turns" of the defendant's life. The purpose of the GPS was only to record the trip, so no warrant was required; real-time information from a GPS is exactly the kind of information that drivers make available by traversing public roads.

Petitioner, serving 387 months for drugs and weapons offenses, filed a pro se action he characterized as habeas corpus (28 U.S.C. 2241). The district court characterized the suit as a civil rights action and dismissed for failure to pay the filing fee. The petitioner has a long history of abusive litigation and may not proceed in forma pauperis, under the "three strikes" rule, 28 U.S.C. 1915(g). The Sixth Circuit affirmed. The district court properly characterized the claim, which stated that it was asserting a âcivil tort action for civil rightâs violation,â alleged violations of the First Amendment, and sought monetary damages. The district court effectively warned the petitioner about the consequences of recharacterization in a 2002 order, stating that he âshall not be permitted to file any further actions in forma pauperis without first obtaining leave."