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

Charges were ultimately dropped against plaintiff-appellant Aaron Puller following his 2009 arrest for his suspected involvement in a racially motivated attack of another. The charges were dismissed without hearing because the state district court concluded the affidavit of defendant-appellee Detective Paul Baca, the officer who applied for and obtained the arrest warrant, had omitted material information and supplied false information, and the warrant therefore lacked probable cause. Puller sued Baca under 42 U.S.C. 1983. The federal district court concluded that Baca was entitled to qualified immunity, and entered summary judgment in Baca's favor. Puller appealed, but the Tenth Circuit agreed with the federal district court, and affirmed that court's decision. View "Puller v. Baca" on Justia Law

Plaintiffs John Quinn and Lavern Gonzalez were arrested in connection with an Albuquerque Police Department (APD) larceny sting. They subsequently filed a civil-rights lawsuit against the arresting officers, William Young and Benjamin Melendrez, alleging: (1) a warrantless arrest without probable cause in violation of the Fourth Amendment; (2) entrapment; (3) substantive due process; and (4) malicious prosecution. The Officers moved for summary judgment based on qualified immunity, but the district court denied their motion. The district court concluded that a reasonable jury could have found that the Officers arrested Quinn and Gonzalez without probable cause. Additionally, the court determined that a reasonable law-enforcement official in the Officers’ position would have known it was unlawful to make the challenged arrests without probable cause that Quinn and Gonzalez possessed the requisite mens rea for the crime of larceny. In an interlocutory appeal of the denial of qualified immunity, the Officers argued the district court erred because they had probable cause to arrest Plaintiffs and, alternatively, because the law did not clearly establish that their actions during the sting violated the Fourth Amendment. The Tenth Circuit agreed with the Officers that the extant clearly established law would not have put a reasonable, similarly situated officer on notice that his conduct was unlawful. Therefore, the Court reversed the district court's decision on their motion for summary judgment based on qualified immunity grounds. The Court also dismissed Plaintiffs’ entrapment claim. Lastly, the Court remanded the case to the district court with instructions to explicitly set forth its reasoning as to whether the Officers could avail themselves of qualified immunity on Plaintiffs’ malicious-prosecution and substantive due process claims and to rule on those claims anew. View "Quinn v. Young" on Justia Law

Defendant-appellee Sirius Computer Solutions, Inc. recruited plaintiff-appellant Diane David as a salesperson for the company's computer equipment. The Company promised that David could continue serving her existing customers after she worked for Sirius. After she agreed to work for Sirius on those terms, Sirius changed its mind and refused to allow David to conduct business with her outside clients. David sued, alleging that the Company's recruiting promises negligently misrepresented the actual terms of employment. A jury returned a verdict in David's favor, awarding her damages on David's negligent misrepresentation claim, but did not award damages for "noneconomic losses or injuries." After trial, David filed a motion under section 13-21-101 of the Colorado Revised Statutes, which guaranteed prejudgment interest "[i]n all actions brought to recover damages for personal injuries." Because the jury found David suffered only economic losses, the district court proceeded as if she suffered no "personal injur[y]" and denied her motion for prejudgment interest. On appeal to the Tenth Circuit, David argued that her suit was brought to recover damages for a personal injury and that the district court was wrong to equate personal injuries with noneconomic losses. After review of the statute at issue, the Tenth Circuit concluded that "Ms. David may have a point. [. . .] In these circumstances it seems to us Ms. David’s interpretation has the better of it when it comes to taking in 'the broader context of the statute as a whole.'" The Court reversed the district court and remanded for an award of prejudgment interest. View "David v. Sirius Computer Solutions" on Justia Law

In 2012, plaintiff-appellant Sandra Ellis filed a lawsuit against her former employer, defendant-appellee J.R.'s Country Stores, Inc., bringing one claim under the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA). Ellis began working as the manager of a J.R.'s store in Colorado in 2007. The Company classified her as an exempt, salaried employee and paid her $600 on a weekly basis (an amount that increased to $625 in February 2011), as well as a monthly bonus commensurate with her store's performance. While Ellis was employed in this capacity, she generally worked fifty-hour (and sometimes closer to sixty-hour) weeks, which was consistent with the terms of the Pay Plan. On April 3, 2012, Ellis received a paycheck in the amount of $593.80, instead of the $625 she customarily earned in a pay period. The Company had deducted $31.20 from that paycheck because for the work week of March 16 to March 22, 2012, Ellis reported having worked only 40.91 hours of the requisite fifty. This was the only instance during Ellis's tenure with the Company that she received less than her predetermined pay. Ellis resigned a few days later, and soon after that, she sent the Company a letter "claim[ing] that she [was] owed $42,187.50 in unpaid overtime wages." Ellis argued that she had "lost her exempt status under the [FLSA] . . . when J.R.'s made a one-time deduction from [her] pay for not working fifty hours during a workweek," which, in turn, entitled her to three years' worth of retroactive overtime pay. The district court awarded summary judgment to the Company and denied Ellis's motion for class certification as moot. Ellis timely appealed from the district court's judgment. Finding no reversible error in the district court's decision, the Tenth Circuit affirmed. View "Ellis v. J.R.'s Country Stores" on Justia Law

The District Court (Colorado) granted Defendant Naif Al-Yousif's application for a writ of habeas corpus. Defendant, a native of Saudi Arabia, moved to the United States in 1996 to study English. Defendant's conviction was for the 2001 murder of Abdulaziz Al-Kohaji. Although the application was untimely filed, the district court granted equitable tolling and proceeded to the merits. It ruled that the state-court decision was both contrary to and an unreasonable application of "Miranda v. Arizona," (384 U.S. 436 (1966)), and "Moran v. Burbine," (475 U.S. 412 (1986)). The State of Colorado appealed. The Tenth Circuit concluded the district court erred in its analysis and application of the cited cases, reversed and remanded for further proceedings. View "Al-Yousif v. Trani" on Justia Law

Defendant Brian Hicks entered a conditional guilty plea and was later convicted of: one count of possession with intent to distribute more than five kilograms of a mixture or substance containing a detectable amount of cocaine; one count of possession of a firearm or ammunition by a felon; and one count of possession of body armor by a felon previously convicted of a crime of violence. The district court sentenced Hicks to 240 months’ imprisonment. Hicks raises two arguments on appeal to the Tenth Circuit:(1) that the district court erred in denying his two motions to dismiss based on alleged violations of his speedy trial rights under the Speedy Trial Act and Sixth Amendment; and (2) that the district court violated the prohibition against judicial participation in plea negotiations. The Court affirmed in part, reversed in part and remanded. The Court concluded that Hicks’s Speedy Trial Act rights were violated, but his Sixth Amendment rights were not. Because the case was remanded for the district court to determine whether the charges against Hicks should have been dismissed with or without prejudice, the Court did not reach his challenge to the plea negotiations. View "United States v. Hicks" on Justia Law

Defendant Billy Engles appealed the revocation of his federal supervised release based on a criminal conviction in state court. Defendant was a registered sex offender in Oklahoma. In 2013, he was on federal supervised release for an unrelated federal offense. A condition of Defendant’s supervised release stated that he “shall not commit another federal, state or local crime.” Defendant accompanied his then live-in girlfriend to her sixteen-year-old daughter’s high school to update the daughter’s emergency contact form. Defendant and his girlfriend spent approximately 10 minutes on campus completing this task. One of the school employees recognized Defendant as a sex offender, and reported his visit. Based on this 10-minute visit to the school, Oklahoma charged Defendant with violating Oklahoma’s Zone of Safety Around Schools statute. Defendant argued in state court that he was not “loitering” because he went to the school very briefly to perform a specific task. The state judge and jury rejected Defendant’s argument, convicted him, and imposed a sentence of time served plus a $2,500 fine. At the time of Defendant’s appeal before the Tenth Circuit, his appeal of that conviction was pending in Oklahoma state court. Because his direct appeal asserted on View "United States v. Engles" on Justia Law

Plaintiff-appellant National Credit Union Administration Board ("NCUA") appealed the district court's order dismissing as untimely its complaint against defendants-appellees Barclays Capital Inc., BCAP LLC, and Securitized Asset Backed Receivables LLC. This case arose from the failure of two of the nation's largest federally insured credit unions: U.S. Central Federal Credit Union and Western Corporate Federal Credit Union. The NCUA was appointed conservator and later as their liquidating agent. The NCUA determined that the Credit Unions had failed because they had invested in residential mortgage-backed securities ("RMBS") sold with offering documents that misrepresented the quality of their underlying mortgage loans. The NCUA set out to pursue recoveries on behalf of the Credit Unions from the issuers and underwriters of the suspect RMBS, including Barclays, and began settlement negotiations with Barclays and other potential defendants. As these negotiations dragged on through 2011 and 2012, the NCUA and Barclays entered into a series of tolling agreements that purported to exclude all time that passed during the settlement negotiations when "calculating any statute of limitations, period of repose or any defense related to those periods or dates that might be applicable to any Potential Claim that the NCUA may have against Barclays." Significantly, Barclays also expressly made a separate promise in the tolling agreements that it would not "argue or assert" in any future litigation a statute of limitations defense that included the time passed in the settlement negotiations. After negotiations with Barclays broke down, the NCUA filed suit, more than five years after the RMBS were sold, and more than three years after the NCUA was appointed conservator of the Credit Unions. Barclays moved to dismiss for failure to state a claim on several grounds, including untimeliness. Barclays initially honored the tolling agreements but argued that the NCUA's federal claims were nevertheless untimely under the Securities Act's three-year statute of repose, which was not waivable. While Barclays's motion to dismiss was pending, the district court in a separate case involving different defendant Credit Suisse, granted Credit Suisse's motion to dismiss a similar NCUA complaint on the grounds that contractual tolling was not authorized under the Extender Statute. Barclays amended its motion to dismiss asserting a similar Extender Statute argument. The district court dismissed the NCUA's complaint, incorporating by reference its opinion in Credit Suisse. The NCUA appealed, arguing that its suit was timely under the Extender Statute. The Tenth Circuit reversed and remanded: "while it is true that the NCUA's claims are outside the statutory period and therefore untimely, that argument is unavailable to Barclays because the NCUA reasonably relied on Barclays's express promise not to assert that defense." View "National Credit Union v. Barclays Capital" on Justia Law

Petitioner Benjamin Rodas-Orellana entered the United States without inspection to escape gang recruitment in El Salvador. He applied for asylum and withholding of removal. An Immigration Judge (IJ) and the Board of Immigration Appeal's (BIA) denied petitioner's application because he failed to show a well-founded fear of persecution on account of membership in a particular social group. The proposed group, "Salvadorans who resisted gang recruitment" lacked "social visibility" and therefore did not constitute a "particular social group." After the BIA issued its final order in this case, it issued decisions in two other cases that modified the social visibility requirement to be one of "social distinction." In light of these decisions, petitioner moved for reconsideration, which the BIA denied. In his petition to the Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals, petitioner contested both the final order of removal by the BIA and the Board's denial of his motion to reconsider. Finding no reversible error after review of the matter, the Tenth Circuit affirmed the BIA. View "Rodas-Orellana v. Holder" on Justia Law

Plaintiff Max Seifert sued defendants Unified Government of Wyandotte County and Kansas City, Kansas (the Unified Government), Wyandotte County Sheriff Donald Ash, and Wyandotte County Undersheriff Larry Roland under 42 U.S.C. sections 1983 and 1985, and brought and state-law retaliation claims against defendants too. Plaintiff, a former reserve deputy for the Wyandotte County Sheriff's Department (WCSD), alleged that defendants removed him from investigations and revoked his reserve commission because of his testimony supporting allegations by a former criminal defendant of mistreatment by federal law-enforcement officers. The district court granted summary judgment in favor of defendants, holding that Plaintiff's testimony was not legally protected speech, that defendants' actions were not unconstitutionally motivated, and that defendants would have taken the same actions regardless of his testimony. Upon review, the Tenth Circuit affirmed the dismissal of Plaintiff's state-law claims because federal law provided an adequate alternative remedy; and the Court affirmed the qualified-immunity dismissal of the 1983 claims against Sheriff Ash and Undersheriff Roland because at the time of the alleged retaliatory actions the law was not clearly established that the First Amendment protected Plaintiff's testimony. In all other respects the Court reversed and remanded, holding that Plaintiff's testimony was constitutionally protected and a jury could have reasonably found that the explanations defendants gave for their actions were pretextual. View "Seifert v. Unified Government" on Justia Law