Justia U.S. 10th Circuit Court of Appeals Opinion Summaries

Scott and Audrey Blum, through Mr. Blum’s interest in a partnership, participated in a tax shelter known as BLIPS, which generated a reported $78.5 million tax loss in 1999. The IRS determined that the BLIPS transactions lacked economic substance and disallowed the loss. The partnership in which Mr. Blum participated challenged the IRS’s determination in the United States District Court for the Northern District of California but was unsuccessful. Subsequently, the IRS issued notices of deficiency (NODs) to the Blums for tax years 1999, 2007, and 2010, assessing significant additional taxes and penalties.After receiving the NODs, the Blums challenged them in the United States Tax Court. They argued, among other things, that the IRS’s partnership-level determination (through the Final Partnership Administrative Adjustment, or FPAA) was untimely because the necessary consents to extend the statute of limitations were invalid. The Tax Court rejected this argument, holding that any challenge to the timeliness of the FPAA had to be raised during the partnership-level proceedings in the Northern District of California, where the Blums were parties but did not raise the issue. The Tax Court further held that the NODs were timely under the relevant statutes.On appeal, the United States Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit reviewed the Tax Court’s decision. The Tenth Circuit held that the timeliness of the FPAA is a “partnership item” under TEFRA, and any challenge to it must be raised in the partnership-level proceeding, not in a later partner-level case. Because the Blums failed to raise the timeliness argument at the partnership level, they waived the issue. The Tenth Circuit affirmed the Tax Court’s judgment, leaving the Blums liable for the assessed deficiencies and penalties. View "Blum v. Commissioner of Internal Revenue" on Justia Law

A man serving a life sentence for terrorism-related convictions at a federal prison in Colorado, who is severely disabled with both arms amputated above the elbow and vision loss in one eye, filed suit against several federal officials. He alleged violations of his federal constitutional and statutory rights stemming from his conditions of confinement and medical care while incarcerated. His claims included inadequate dental and medical care, denial of a medical diet, lack of proper prosthetics, and insufficient accommodation for his disabilities.The United States District Court for the District of Colorado dismissed most claims on the defendants’ motions to dismiss and for summary judgment. Some claims were dismissed as moot or for failure to exhaust administrative remedies, while others, including his Eighth Amendment deliberate indifference claim, were dismissed for failure to state a claim under Bivens v. Six Unknown Named Agents of Federal Bureau of Narcotics. The district court also found his Administrative Procedure Act (APA) claim challenging his placement at the prison was time-barred. The plaintiff voluntarily dismissed his remaining claims with prejudice and then appealed.The United States Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit affirmed the district court’s judgment. The appellate court held that the plaintiff could not pursue his Eighth Amendment deliberate indifference claim under the APA because he failed to allege a final agency action and sued individual officers rather than the agency or officials in their official capacities. The court also held that his Bivens claim for deliberate indifference arose in a new context and was foreclosed due to the existence of the Bureau of Prisons’ administrative remedies. The appellate court further found no abuse of discretion in denying leave to amend the complaint and ruled that the plaintiff had waived his challenge to deposition transcript fees by failing to object before the magistrate judge. View "Mostafa v. Blanche" on Justia Law

Several companies and an individual alleged that certain defendants conspired to steal trade secrets and transfer them to a Chinese company for the manufacture of unauthorized products. The plaintiffs filed suit in the United States District Court for the District of Colorado, where one defendant resided. However, some defendants—the Rong Defendants—were Illinois residents and had limited direct connections to Colorado. Plaintiffs claimed these defendants supervised the alleged misappropriation and provided a loan to another defendant in Colorado, purportedly to facilitate the theft. The Rong Defendants denied these allegations, asserting their contacts were minimal and not related to the alleged injury.After the suit was filed, the Rong Defendants moved to dismiss for lack of personal jurisdiction. The magistrate judge recommended granting the motion, finding that while there may have been some contact with Colorado, plaintiffs failed to show their injuries arose from these contacts. The District Court accepted this recommendation, dismissed the Rong Defendants, and later certified the decision as a final judgment under Rule 54(b). Plaintiffs appealed the dismissal. The Rong Defendants then sought attorneys’ fees under Colorado’s fee-shifting statute, and the District Court awarded the fees, as well as a subsequent supplemental award for fees incurred in later proceedings. Plaintiffs appealed both fee awards.The United States Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit reviewed all three consolidated appeals. It affirmed the District Court’s dismissal, holding that although there were some contacts with Colorado, plaintiffs did not establish their injuries arose out of those contacts, and thus personal jurisdiction was lacking. The Court also affirmed both the initial and supplemental fee awards, finding that Colorado’s mandatory fee-shifting statute applied, the fees were reasonable, and the District Court had authority to award supplemental fees after the initial judgment. View "Flux Drive v. Sparks" on Justia Law

The owner of a long-standing hamburger restaurant in Salina, Kansas hired an artist to paint a large, UFO-themed display on the exterior wall of the business. The display included playful imagery related to the restaurant and a slogan. Shortly after painting began, city officials determined the display was a "sign" under Salina's sign code, not an unregulated mural, because it referenced the restaurant's products. They concluded the display was too large to qualify for a permit, informed the owner to pause work, and instructed him to submit a permit application. The city later placed the application on indefinite hold, citing a review of the sign regulations. The owner disputed consenting to this hold and subsequently filed suit challenging the sign code and the city's enforcement.The United States District Court for the District of Kansas granted summary judgment to the plaintiffs on their First Amendment claims. The court found Salina's sign code failed intermediate scrutiny because there was insufficient evidence connecting the city’s distinction between signs and murals to its stated interests of safety, aesthetics, and property values. Declaratory relief was granted, but a permanent injunction was denied. Salina appealed.Reviewing the case, the United States Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit affirmed the district court’s judgment. The appellate court held that Salina did not produce evidence demonstrating that regulated signs—as defined by the city—posed greater risks to its interests than unregulated murals. Therefore, the sign code failed intermediate scrutiny. The court further held that placing the permit application on indefinite hold constituted an impermissible prior restraint on speech, as the city did not show the applicant consented to the hold or that it complied with required time limits. The district court’s judgment was affirmed. View "Cozy Inn, Incorporated v. City of Salina, Kansas" on Justia Law

Two individuals operated a funeral home and nonprofit organization in Colorado, offering low-cost cremation services to families and marketing body donation for medical research. Over several years, they fraudulently obtained, sold, and shipped bodies and body parts without proper consent, often misrepresenting services and forging documents. They targeted particularly vulnerable victims, including those experiencing financial hardship or dealing with terminal illness and hospice care. Many families were misled, charged for services never rendered, and provided false cremains, while the defendants profited from unauthorized sales.After indictment, both defendants pleaded guilty to mail fraud charges involving the shipment of remains; other counts were dismissed pursuant to plea agreements. Their initial Presentence Investigation Reports recommended sentencing enhancements for targeting vulnerable victims and substantial upward variances. The United States District Court for the District of Colorado imposed significant sentences—240 months for one defendant and 180 months for the other—after finding the offenses involved a large number of vulnerable victims. On appeal, the United States Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit vacated the sentences, holding the district court had not made sufficient particularized findings of vulnerability as required under U.S.S.G. § 3A1.1(b)(2).On remand, the district court received new evidence and identified twenty-one specific victims whose vulnerabilities were directly exploited by the defendants, including those with financial hardship and families referred by hospice. The court found a sufficient nexus between each victim’s vulnerability and the fraud, applied the two-level enhancement for offenses involving a large number of vulnerable victims, and resentenced the defendants to the same terms as before. The Tenth Circuit affirmed, holding that the district court correctly applied the enhancement, rejected arguments relating to post-sentencing rehabilitative efforts and substantive reasonableness, and upheld both sentences. View "United States v. Hess" on Justia Law

The defendant was arrested in Wyoming for possession of and conspiracy to distribute methamphetamine. When police apprehended him, they found a baseball bat, a police-style baton, and drug paraphernalia in his car. The defendant admitted to having used the bat and baton days earlier to retake his car after it had been stolen with methamphetamine stored inside. Evidence showed that he believed meth might still be in the car when he recovered it by force, though there was no proof that meth was actually present at that time. Five days later, police tracked his movements, observed what appeared to be a drug transaction, and ultimately arrested him after a brief chase, finding methamphetamine and the same bat and baton in his vehicle.The United States District Court for the District of Wyoming accepted the defendant’s guilty plea to conspiracy to distribute methamphetamine and possession with intent to distribute methamphetamine. The presentence report recommended a two-level sentencing enhancement under § 2D1.1(b)(1) of the Sentencing Guidelines for possession of dangerous weapons. At sentencing, the defendant objected to this enhancement. The district court, after hearing testimony and arguments, found that the totality of the circumstances linked the bat and baton to his drug offense and imposed the enhancement, resulting in a 151-month sentence.The United States Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit reviewed the district court’s application of the sentencing enhancement for clear error and legal questions de novo. The court held that the enhancement was properly imposed because the defendant failed to demonstrate that a connection between the weapons and his drug activity was “clearly improbable.” The court affirmed the district court’s judgment, concluding that the facts—including the defendant’s use of the weapons to retake his car associated with drug trafficking—supported the enhancement. View "United States v. Barrera" on Justia Law

In 1999, a warrant was issued for the arrest of a man involved in methamphetamine distribution in eastern Oklahoma after he failed to appear for trial on drug charges. For months, law enforcement sought his capture, eventually locating him at his residence where they executed a no-knock search warrant. During the early morning raid, the defendant opened fire with a rifle, killing one state trooper and wounding another. Following his arrest, authorities found weapons, drug paraphernalia, and cash in the residence and on his person.The defendant was initially tried in Oklahoma state court, where his first trial ended with a hung jury. At a second trial, he was acquitted of murder but convicted of first-degree manslaughter and assault and battery with a dangerous weapon, resulting in a 30-year state sentence. Subsequently, federal authorities charged him with three counts, including using a firearm in relation to a crime of violence (with the killing of a law enforcement officer as the predicate offense) under federal statutes. He was convicted on all counts, receiving life sentences for the firearm offenses and a death sentence for the killing. His convictions and death sentence were affirmed on direct appeal, but post-conviction proceedings led to the death sentence being vacated due to ineffective assistance of counsel during sentencing.The United States District Court for the Eastern District of Oklahoma later denied his second or successive motion to vacate his conviction for using a firearm in relation to a crime of violence. On appeal, the United States Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit held that causing the intentional killing of a law enforcement officer during a drug crime under 21 U.S.C. § 848(e)(1)(B) categorically qualifies as a “crime of violence” under 18 U.S.C. § 924(c)(3)’s elements clause. Therefore, any error regarding the use of the now-invalid “residual clause” was harmless. The Tenth Circuit affirmed the district court’s denial of relief. View "United States v. Barrett" on Justia Law

A noncitizen from Mexico entered the United States without inspection in 1997 and was later placed in removal proceedings. She applied for cancellation of removal but was denied relief by an Immigration Judge, who instead granted her voluntary departure. She appealed the denial, but her subsequent departure from the United States, due to a family emergency, caused her appeal to be automatically withdrawn, making the original decision final. After returning to the United States without inspection in 2013, she was apprehended and a reinstatement order of removal was issued. She remained in the country under stays of removal until she was detained again in 2025, at which point she sought review of the reinstatement order while also pursuing withholding-only proceedings due to fear of persecution in her home country.Previously, the United States Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit had held that a removal order did not become final until the conclusion of withholding-only proceedings, following circuit precedent. However, the Supreme Court’s decision in Riley v. Bondi, 606 U.S. 259 (2025), abrogated this approach, holding that an order of removal becomes final upon its issuance or administrative affirmation, regardless of ongoing withholding-only proceedings.In the present case, the United States Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit reviewed the petitioner’s arguments that jurisdiction existed to review her reinstatement order and that the deadline for filing her petition should be equitably tolled due to the change in law. The Tenth Circuit held that it retains jurisdiction to review reinstatement orders as final orders of removal, consistent with its precedent and not contradicted by Riley. However, the court found that the petition for review was untimely, as it was not filed within thirty days of the reinstatement order, and the petitioner failed to demonstrate extraordinary circumstances justifying equitable tolling. The court therefore dismissed the petition as untimely. View "Vizguerra-Ramirez v. Blanche" on Justia Law

A noncitizen from Iran, who was granted asylum in the United States as a child, faced removal proceedings after a drug conviction. In 2002, an immigration judge deferred his removal under the Convention Against Torture, and he was released on supervision, consistently complying with all terms for over 20 years. After relocating from California to Kansas with approval from immigration authorities, he was unexpectedly detained by ICE officers in June 2025, despite no alleged violations of his release terms. He was subsequently notified that his release was revoked due to a supposed new possibility of removal to a third country, yet was not given the required informal interview to contest this revocation.The United States District Court for the District of Kansas denied his initial habeas petition challenging the legality of his detention, as well as his request for a preliminary injunction to stop his transfer out of Kansas. The court suggested he could file a new habeas petition if detained for more than six months. After over eight months in detention, the petitioner filed a second habeas petition, which the district court granted, leading to his release. The government then moved to dismiss his appeal as moot.The United States Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit determined the appeal was not moot, applying the exception for wrongs capable of repetition yet evading review. On the merits, the court held that the district court misapplied the applicable legal standards. It concluded that the government violated its own regulations by failing to promptly provide the petitioner with an informal interview upon revocation of his release, a due process violation that was per se prejudicial. The court also found error in the district court's application of the six-month presumptive reasonableness standard for detention under Zadvydas v. Davis, ruling it did not reset with each re-detention. The Tenth Circuit reversed and remanded for further proceedings. View "Abedi v. Carter" on Justia Law

Oklahoma was authorized by Congress in 2005 to extend its administration of federal environmental programs into Indian country, upon approval by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). For many years, Oklahoma did not invoke this provision. However, after the Supreme Court's decision in McGirt v. Oklahoma expanded the definition of Indian country in the state, Oklahoma requested EPA approval to apply its environmental programs to these areas. The EPA initially granted the request in 2020, then withdrew it to allow for further tribal consultation. After extensive engagement with tribal nations, the EPA issued a new approval in January 2025 with added conditions requiring tribal engagement, but subsequently rescinded those conditions in May 2025 and reissued its approval without them.The Pawnee Nation of Oklahoma challenged the EPA’s May 2025 decision in the United States Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit. Pawnee Nation argued that the EPA's action was unlawful because the congressional provision authorizing Oklahoma's request, § 10211(a) of the Safe, Accountable, Flexible, Efficient Transportation Equity Act (SAFETEA), had expired in 2009, that the EPA erred by refusing to impose conditions on Oklahoma’s approval, and that the EPA failed to make contemporaneous determinations of Oklahoma’s programs’ compliance with federal law.The United States Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit exercised exclusive jurisdiction and denied Pawnee Nation’s petition for review. The court held that § 10211(a) was unambiguous and remains active, not expired. It determined that EPA’s statutory obligation to approve Oklahoma’s request did not permit the agency to impose additional conditions, and found that EPA acted within the provision’s requirements by relying on its previous determinations that Oklahoma’s programs complied with federal law. The court affirmed EPA’s interpretation and approval. View "Pawnee Nation of Oklahoma v. Zeldin" on Justia Law