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

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Wichita Police were conducting a proactive patrol in a high-crime area. After officers pulled over Defendant John Canada for failing to engage his turn signal, one officer saw Defendant “strenuously arching his hips, reaching his right arm under the rear of his seat. Officers also believed Defendant delayed bringing his vehicle to a stop, which caused them concern. Defendant claimed the officers lacked reasonable suspicion to engage in a protective sweep. To this, the Tenth Circuit disagreed: the officers here could not have been sure that Defendant was dangerous or had a weapon present. But the furtive movement and slow roll provided enough for the officers to reasonably suspect that Defendant was both dangerous and had access to a weapon.” View "United States v. Canada" on Justia Law

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Three conservation groups challenged the U.S. Bureau of Land Management’s approval of Jonah Energy’s development project on state and federal land in Wyoming. The project was designed to drill exploratory wells on land for which Jonah possessed development rights. The conservation groups argued the district court erred in upholding the BLM’s approval under the National Environmental Protection Act and the Federal Land Polocy and Management Act. Specifically, they contended the BLM inadequately considered the impact of the project on the sage-grouse and pronghorn antelope migration and grazing patterns. The Tenth Circuit concluded the BLM adequately collected and considered information on the sage-grouse and pronghorn, and selected a development plan that met statutory requirements. View "Western Watersheds Project, et al. v. United States Bureau of Land Management, et al." on Justia Law

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Appellants were salespersons who sold solar lenses to investors on behalf of RaPower-3, LLC, International Automated Systems, Inc. (“IAS”), LTB1, LLC and their subsidiaries (collectively, the “Receivership Entities”). Appellants appealed the district court’s grant of summary judgment in favor of R. Wayne Klein, the Receiver who controlled the Receivership Entities. In an adjunct action, the government filed suit against Receivership Defendants Nelson Johnson and R. Gregory Shepard for allegedly operating a fraudulent and unlawful solar energy tax scheme in which they encouraged investors to take federal tax deductions for purchasing defunct solar technology. The district court enjoined the entities from continuing to promote the scheme, ordered disgorgement of their gross receipts, and appointed Klein as the Receiver with full control of their assets and business operations. The Receiver then filed suits against individuals and entities (including Appellants) that were paid commissions for selling the Receiver Defendants’ solar lenses to investors. The trial court granted summary judgment in favor of the Receiver on his claims. Appellants appealed, arguing the district court erred in granting summary judgment on the Receiver’s Uniform Voidable Transaction Act (“UTVA”) claim, as Appellants allegedly gave reasonably equivalent value for the commissions they received. They also claimed the court’s disgorgement order was improper. Finding no reversible error, however, the Tenth Circuit affirmed the district court’s judgment. View "Klein v. Roe" on Justia Law

Posted in: Business Law
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Defendant Jeriah Budder, an enrolled member of the Cherokee Nation, killed David Jumper in Indian Country. He was charged by the State of Oklahoma with first-degree manslaughter. THe charges were dismissed for lack of subject-matter jurisdiction in the wake of McGirt v. Oklahoma, 140 S.Ct. 2452 (2020). A federal grand jury then indicted Defendant on three charges: (1) first-degree murder in Indian country; (2) carrying, using, brandishing and discharging a firearm during and in relation to a crime of violence; and (3) causing the death of another in the course of (2). On appeal, defendant argued he was denied the due process of law guaranteed by the federal constitution because the retroactive application of McGirt v. Oklahoma, 140 S.Ct. 2452 (2020) deprived him of Oklahoma’s law of self-defense, which he argued was broader than the defense available to him under federal law. The Tenth Circuit held that the application of McGirt did not constitute an impermissible retroactive application of a judicial decision. Further, the Court rejected defendant’s argument that his sentence was substantively unreasonable. View "United States v. Budder" on Justia Law

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Defendant-appellant Montgomery Akers appealed a district court order imposing upon him a $40,000 punitive sanction for advancing frivolous arguments and assertions in a request for release pending appeal (the “Motion”). “Akers is a chronic abuser of the federal court system.” Although he pleaded guilty in 2005 to one count of wire fraud and entered into a plea agreement that contained a waiver of his right to appeal or collaterally attack his sentence, he filed a number of appeals to the Tenth Circuit. Akers claims the district court erred in imposing any sanction given its determination the Motion was not wholly frivolous. Alternatively, he argued the district court erred when it failed to consider the reasonableness of the amount of the sanction. Finding only that the district court’s findings were insufficient with respect to the reasonableness of the sanction, the Tenth Circuit remanded for further proceedings. View "United States v. Akers" on Justia Law

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Plaintiff Zubair Kazi, through co-plaintiff KFC of Pueblo, Inc., owned the only Kentucky Fried Chicken restaurant in Pueblo, Colorado. In 2019 Defendant KFC US, LLC licensed a second Kentucky Fried Chicken restaurant in Pueblo. Kazi believed that KFC acted improperly in how it went about licensing this second restaurant and sued KFC for breach of contract, bad faith (breach of the implied covenant of good faith and fair dealing), promissory estoppel, and unjust enrichment. His lawsuit went to trial on his bad-faith claim only, and the jury found in his favor. KFC appealed. The Tenth Circuit held that Kazi’s claim for breach of the implied covenant of good faith and fair dealing was barred by Kentucky law because KFC’s alleged bad faith did not undermine any benefit or protection afforded to Kazi by his franchise agreement with KFC. The court therefore vacated the judgment and remanded for entry of judgment in favor of KFC and against Kazi and KFC of Pueblo, Inc. View "Kazi, et al. v. KFC US" on Justia Law

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Petitioner Dennis Arostegui-Maldonado, a citizen of Costa Rica and El Salvador, was removed from the United States in 2008. In 2021, he reentered. The Department of Homeland Security (“DHS”) reinstated his removal order. Arostegui-Maldonado told an asylum officer that he feared persecution or torture in Costa Rica and El Salvador. The officer referred his case to an Immigration Judge (“IJ”) for “withholding-only proceedings” to decide whether to forbid his removal to those countries. The IJ denied relief. The Board of Immigration Appeals (“BIA”) affirmed. Arostegui-Maldonado challenged the agency’s rulings on the merits, arguing: (1) the IJ misapplied the “under color of law” element to his Convention Against Torture (“CAT”) claim; (2) the BIA ignored his CAT claim; (3) the IJ failed to fully develop the record; and (4) the IJ and the BIA violated his due process rights. The Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals agreed with Arostegui-Maldonado that the IJ misapplied “under color of law” to his CAT claim, and granted the petition on that ground. The Court otherwise denied the petition and remanded for further proceedings. View "Arostegui-Maldonado v. Garland" on Justia Law

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In 2007, Defendant PHL Variable Insurance Company issued two life-insurance policies to Plaintiff Catholic Charities of Southwest Kansas, Inc. on the lives of Elwyn Liebl and John Killeen. Both policies guaranteed Plaintiff, as their named beneficiary, $400,000 upon the insureds’ death. Between 2013 and 2014, Defendant sent Plaintiff grace notices for both policies and demanded premium payments. Plaintiff believed the demanded premium payments were too high and that the grace notices were defective and untimely under the policies. So Plaintiff did not pay the requested premiums. Because Plaintiff did not pay the requested premiums, Defendant sent cancellation notices, informing Plaintiff that both policies had lapsed. In 2016, the insureds died. Plaintiff sought payment of benefits under both policies. Defendant declined, believing that it terminated Plaintiff’s policies for nonpayment of premiums two to three years earlier. In 2020, Plaintiff sued Defendant in the District of Kansas for failure to pay the death benefits under both policies. Defendant moved to dismiss both claims, arguing that Kansas’s five-year statute of limitations for breach of contract actions bars them. According to Defendant, the statute of limitations began to run in 2013 and 2014 when it informed Plaintiff that it was terminating the policies. In response, Plaintiff asserted that Defendant first breached both insurance contracts when it failed to pay the benefits upon the insureds’ death in 2016 because Defendant never successfully terminated the policies. The district court agreed with Defendant and dismissed Plaintiff’s claims as untimely. The appeal this case presented for the Tenth Circuit's review centered on a question of when the statute of limitations for a breach of contract claim alleging the wrongful termination of a life insurance contract began to run under Kansas law: if the limitations period began when Defendant acted to terminate Plaintiff’s policies, the district court correctly dismissed Plaintiff’s complaint; if the limitations period began when Plaintiff’s death benefits became due, the district court erred. Finding the district court did not err in dismissing Plaintiff's claims, the Tenth Circuit affirmed. View "Catholic Charities of Southwest Kansas v. PHL Variable Insurance Company" on Justia Law

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Under Colorado law, a change in law may offer a party a second opportunity to litigate an issue that a prior judgment otherwise precludes. "But this new legal condition must arise between the preclusive judgment and any subsequent action to have effect. Otherwise, the change cannot offer the second opportunity."Here, the timing requirement prohibited the Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals' review of one possible change in law. The Colorado Court of Appeals (“CCOA”) and Colorado Supreme Court issued decisions over the course of the parties’ litigation that Plaintiffs contended offered them the second opportunity. Because the Colorado Supreme Court’s decision postdated any of Plaintiffs’ complaints before the federal appellate court, the federal court could not review its potential change in law. The Court did address the CCOA’s decision because it predated Plaintiff’s third complaint. To this, the Court concluded that it did not change the law. The Court therefore affirmed the district court’s dismissal for lack of jurisdiction. View "Boulter, et al. v. Noble Energy, et al." on Justia Law

Posted in: Civil Procedure
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Defendant-Appellant Shannon Kepler appealed his conviction for causing death by discharging a firearm during a crime of violence. Kepler and his wife Gina Kepler both worked as officers for the Tulsa Police Department. During the summer of 2014, the Keplers began to experience conflict with their 18-year-old adopted daughter, Lisa. Kepler gained access to Lisa’s Facebook account to monitor her activity. Eventually, the Keplers kicked Lisa out of their home and dropped her off at a homeless shelter. Kepler continued to monitor Lisa’s Facebook account and discovered she was dating a man named Jeremey Lake. Using police department resources, Kepler obtained Lake’s address, phone number, and physical description. On the same day he obtained this information, Kepler armed himself with his personal revolver and drove his SUV to Lake’s address. He spotted Lisa and Lake walking together near the residence. Kepler stopped the SUV in the middle of the road, rolled down the window, and called out to Lisa. Lisa refused to talk to him and walked away. Kepler exited the vehicle to follow her. At that point, Lake approached Kepler to introduce himself and shake his hand. Kepler drew his revolver. Lake tried to run away. Kepler shot him, once in the chest and once in the neck. Kepler then turned and fired shots in the direction of Lisa and Lake’s half-brother, M.H., who was 13 years old. Kepler then fled. Witnesses called 911. Paramedics arrived and declared Lake dead. Later that night, Kepler turned himself in to the Tulsa Police Department. At trial, Kepler admitted he shot Lake. He did not contend that he acted out of anger, provocation, or passion. Instead, he said he responded in self-defense to Lake’s threatening him with a chrome pistol. He entered into evidence the pistol discovered in a nearby trashcan and suggested that one of the witnesses took the pistol from Lake’s body and smuggled it into the police station. The jury rejected Kepler’s self-defense argument, leading to the conviction at issue here. Though Kepler argued second-degree murder was not a "crime of violence" and not a predicate offense for his conviction, the Tenth Circuit found no reversible error and affirmed Kepler's convictions and sentence. View "United States v. Kepler" on Justia Law