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

Before the warrantless seizure of a firearm from a car, the driver, defendant Manuel Chavez, had driven the car at least a couple hundred feet up a private,d irt roadway and parked it outside his isolated trailer home. The district court approved just one of the government’s asserted justifications for the seizure of the firearm (a .38 special caliber Amadeo Rossi S.A.), ruling that the deputy’s seizure of the firearm was reasonable as part of an inventory of the car’s contents in preparation for impounding it. But during the inventory, a woman emerged from the trailer and satisfied the deputy that she owned the car. So the deputy left the car with her where it was parked, mere feet from her and defendant’s trailer, but the deputy kept the firearm. In denying an ensuing motion to suppress, the district court held that the deputy could lawfully seize and keep the firearm, even without admissible evidence that anyone had illegally possessed or used it. The court did not evaluate whether it mattered that the deputy never in fact impounded the car. The Tenth Circuit rejected the district court’s denying the motion to suppress on inventory-impoundment grounds. Further, the Court rejected all the government’s other asserted bases to validate the deputy’s seizing and keeping the firearm. The district court erred by denying the motion to suppress, so the Tenth Circuit reversed. View "United States v. Chavez" on Justia Law

Kenneth Eugene Barrett moved under 28 U.S.C. 2255 to vacate his death sentence based on ineffective assistance of counsel in violation of the Sixth Amendment to the Constitution. Barrett’s death sentence was based on his intentionally killing a state trooper when drug task force officers attempted to execute a warrant at his home. The evidence at trial and at the sentencing hearing depicted him as having planned a lethal attack on police officers. In mitigation, defense counsel introduced testimony that he was a loved family member and good person who was sorry for his crime. But his counsel did not introduce evidence that he experienced abuse as a child; suffered from brain-damage, bipolar disorder, and post-traumatic stress disorder (“PTSD”); and struggled to exercise judgment in pressured situations. The jury recommended, and the court imposed, the death penalty. The district court denied Barrett's request to vacate his sentence. The matter was remanded for reconsideration of counsel's performance at sentencing; the district court found deficient performance but no prejudice, and again denied relief. The Tenth Circuit reversed and remanded for further proceedings. In reversing, the Court concluded that, viewing the totality of the evidence at trial, sentencing, and the postconviction hearing, there was a reasonable probability at least one juror would have recommended a life sentence. As noted, “[a] reasonable probability is less than a preponderance of the evidence” and need only “undermine confidence in the outcome.” Because Barrett’s postconviction evidence shifted the balance in favor of mitigation, the Tenth Circuit was not “confiden[t]” all twelve jurors would have recommended a death sentence had defense counsel introduced this evidence. View "United States v. Barrett" on Justia Law

Dustin Lance was denied medical treatment for priapsm at a detention center in McAlester, Oklahoma. He ultimately sued the sheriff and four jail guards; summary judgment was entered in favor of all defendants. After review of his appeal, the Tenth Circuit affirmed in part, and reversed in part. Like the district court, the Court concluded that one of the jail guards, Edward Morgan, had qualified immunity because he didn’t violate Lance’s constitutional right to medical care. But the Court concluded that qualified immunity was unavailable to the three other jail guards: Mike Smead, Dakota Morgan, and Daniel Harper. And the sheriff, Chris Morris, was not entitled to summary judgment in his official capacity because the factfinder could reasonably determine that the county’s policies had violated Lance’s constitutional right to medical care. View "Lance v. Board of County Commissioners" on Justia Law

Defendant Riordan Maynard, the former chief executive officer of two related companies, was convicted by a jury of twenty-six criminal counts arising out of his gross mismanagement of those companies. The district court sentenced Maynard to 78 months’ imprisonment. The district court also ordered Maynard to pay restitution to the Internal Revenue Service and to the employee-victims. On appeal, Maynard argued: argues that: (1) the district court misapplied the Sentencing Guidelines in calculating his offense level for Counts 1 and 2 (failure to pay corporate payroll taxes); (2) his convictions on Counts 14 through 26 were not supported by sufficient evidence (theft or embezzlement of employee health care contributions); (3) the district court erred in calculating the restitution award for Counts 4 through 13 (theft or embezzlement of employee benefit plan contributions); and (4) the district court plainly erred in calculating the restitution award for Counts 14 through 26. Rejecting these arguments, the Tenth Circuit affirmed Maynard's convictions and sentence. View "United States v. Maynard" on Justia Law

At the heart of this case was governmental jurisdiction over one percent of state- and privately owned land within the Grand Teton National Park’s exterior boundaries - collectively called “inholdings.” In consolidated appeals, the Tenth Circuit was tasked with resolving administrative challenges to two actions taken by Defendant-Appellee National Park Service (“NPS”) regarding the management of wildlife on the Park’s inholdings. Appellants challenged NPS’s 2014 determination that 36 C.F.R. 2.2 - a wildlife regulation that prohibited hunting in national parks - did not apply to the Park’s inholdings, based on what NPS had concluded was its lack of jurisdiction over wildlife management on those lands. The Appellants contended the NPS did possess such jurisdiction, and that its determination otherwise was contrary to law and arbitrary and capricious under the Administrative Procedure Act (the “APA”). The second agency action was challenged only by appellant Conservation Association, concerning the Joint Elk Reduction Program - a plan under the joint auspices of NPS and the State of Wyoming, aimed at controlling the Park's elk-herd population. The district court rejected both challenges to the two NPS actions, finding as an initial matter, that Appellants possessed standing to challenge both actions, but they failed to show that either of the contested actions was contrary to law or arbitrary and capricious, and therefore affirmed NPS’s actions in full. After review, the Tenth Circuit held: (1) NPS’s determination that 36 C.F.R. 2.2 did not apply to Park inholdings was not contrary to law or arbitrary and capricious; and (2) the Conservation Association lacked standing to challenge NPS’s approval of the 2015 Elk Reduction Program. Accordingly, the Court affirmed the district court with respect to NPS’s section 2.2 determination. Furthermore, the Court dismissed the portion of the appeal pertaining to NPS’s approval of the 2015 Elk Reduction Program, and remanded with instructions to the district court to vacate that portion of the judgment, and dismiss the Conservation Association’s claim thereof without prejudice. View "Defenders of Wildlife v. U.S. Dept. of Interior" on Justia Law

Plaintiff-appellant Antonio Hooks alleged Officers Chris Harding and James Irby of the Bethany, Oklahoma, Police Department, used excessive force against him in the course of an arrest, and, separately, that Officer Kayode Atoki exhibited deliberate indifference by failing to intervene during a vicious, gang-related jailhouse assault. The district court screened and dismissed Hooks’s excessive force claim prior to discovery. And after limited discovery, the district court granted Officer Atoki’s motion for summary judgment on the deliberate indifference claim. On appeal, the Tenth Circuit affirmed, in part and reversed, in part. Specifically, the Court reversed the district court’s dismissal of Hooks’s excessive force claim because some of his allegations were not barred by Heck v. Humphrey, 512 U.S. 477 (1994). The Court affirmed the district court’s grant of summary judgment to Officer Atoki on Hooks’s deliberate indifference claim. The Court also took the opportunity to clarify that its recent discussion of the deliberate indifference standard in Strain v. Regalado, 977 F.3d 984 (10th Cir. 2020), applied outside the medical context. View "Hooks v. Atoki" on Justia Law

Martin Crowson was an inmate at the Washington County Purgatory Correctional Facility (the “Jail”) when he began suffering from symptoms of toxic metabolic encephalopathy. Nurse Michael Johnson and Dr. Judd LaRowe, two of the medical staff members responsible for Crowson’s care, wrongly concluded Crowson was experiencing drug or alcohol withdrawal. On the seventh day of medical observation, Crowson’s condition deteriorated and he was transported to the hospital, where he was accurately diagnosed. After Crowson recovered, he sued Johnson, LaRowe, and Washington County under 42 U.S.C. 1983, alleging violations of the Eighth and Fourteenth Amendments. The district court denied motions for summary judgment on the issue of qualified immunity by Johnson and LaRowe, concluding a reasonable jury could find both were deliberately indifferent to Crowson’s serious medical needs, and that it was clearly established their conduct amounted to a constitutional violation. The district court also denied the County’s motion for summary judgment, concluding a reasonable jury could find the treatment failures were an obvious consequence of the County’s reliance on LaRowe’s infrequent visits to the Jail and the County’s lack of written protocols for monitoring, diagnosing, and treating inmates. Johnson, LaRowe, and the County filed consolidated interlocutory appeals, raising threshold questions of jurisdiction. Johnson and LaRowe challenged the denial of qualified immunity, while the County contended the Tenth Circuit should exercise pendent appellate jurisdiction to review the district court’s denial of its summary judgment motion. The Tenth Circuit exercised limited jurisdiction over Johnson’s and LaRowe’s appeals pursuant to the exception to 28 U.S.C. 1291, carved out for purely legal issues of qualified immunity through the collateral order doctrine. The Court held Johnson’s conduct did not violate Crowson’s rights and, assuming without deciding LaRowe’s conduct did, the Court concluded LaRowe’s conduct did not violate any clearly established rights. The Court's holding was "inextricably intertwined with the County’s liability on a failure-to-train theory," so the Court exercised pendent appellate jurisdiction to the extent Crowson’s claims against the County rested on that theory. However, under Tenth Circuit binding precedent, the Court's holdings on the individual defendants’ appeals were not inextricably intertwined with Crowson’s claims against the County to the extent he advanced a systemic failure theory. The district court's denial of summary judgment to Johnson, LaRowe, and the County on the failure-to-train theory was reversed, and the remainder of the County’s appeal was dismissed for lack of jurisdiction. View "Crowson v. Washington County State, Utah" on Justia Law

The City of Truth or Consequences converted a community center for senior citizens into a visitor center operated by Spaceport America. A local resident, Ron Fenn, unhappy with this change, publicly protested his opposition over a period of several years. Some of his protests were inside the building and included offensive behavior and unauthorized uses of the facility. Several tenants in the building, including Spaceport Director Daniel Hicks, complained to local law enforcement about Fenn’s behavior and presence at the Center. He was issued three no trespass notices pursuant to New Mexico law over that time. Finally, in June 2017, Fenn was arrested and charged with trespass. The charges were later dismissed. Fenn sued, asserting: (1) a 42 U.S.C. 1983 civil rights claim for First Amendment retaliation against Hicks, arresting officer Michael Apodaca, and Police Chief Lee Alirez; (2) a section 1983 claim for malicious prosecution against Apodaca and Alirez; (3) claims against the City for supervisory liability and under Monell v. Dep’t of Soc. Servs., 436 U.S. 658 (1978); (4) a section 1983 claim for supervisory liability against Alirez; and (5) a state law claim for malicious abuse of process against Apodaca and Alirez. The district court rejected Fenn’s claims on qualified immunity grounds, and the Tenth Circuit affirmed: the individual defendants were entitled to qualified immunity because no constitutional violation occurred. "And, in the absence of a constitutional violation by Apodaca or Alirez, there is no basis for the Monell and supervisory claims. Finally, the district court correctly dismissed Fenn’s state law claim for malicious abuse of process." View "Fenn v. City of Truth or Consequences" on Justia Law

Late one night, Fabian Sanchez was approached by two police officers who suspected him or attempting to break into a vehicle sitting the back area of a hotel parking lot. He was wearing a trench coat with a loaded gun in the pocket. After routine questioning, he was caught in a lie and fled. During the chase, his trench coat ended up on the ground after one of the officers unsuccessfully tased Sanchez, but he kept running. He eventually ran back toward his trench coat but was tackled by the officers before he could get there. Sanchez was arrested, and the loaded gun was discovered in his trench coat. Charged with being a felon in possession of a firearm, Sanchez moved to suppress the gun. The district court denied the motion and granted the government's motion in limine to admit an incriminating statement Sanchez made after his arrest. Sanchez pleaded guilty on the condition that he could appeal these rulings. He was then sentenced pursuant to the Armed Career Criminal Act (ACCA). On appeal, Sanchez argued: (1) the officers lacked reasonable suspicion to seize him and lacked probable cause to arrest him, violating his Fourth Amendment rights; (2) the officers searched his trench coat without a warrant even though he did not voluntarily abandon it, violating his Fourth Amendment rights; and (3) his incriminating statement was the product of custodial interrogation without Miranda warnings, violating his Fifth Amendment rights. Sanchez also contended his guilty plea was not knowing and voluntarily made, and that the district court erred in arriving at his sentence under the ACCA. Finding no reversible error, the Tenth Circuit affirmed the district court. View "United States v. Sanchez" on Justia Law

Defendant-appellant Robert Allen appealed his conviction for depredation of government property. arguing his conviction violated both the Fifth Amendment’s Due Process Clause and separation of powers principles. Allen also appealed the district court’s restitution order of $20,300, claiming the order included restitution for uncharged conduct, and that the district court erred in applying the procedural framework of the Mandatory Victim Restitution Act (MVRA) by placing the burden on him to disprove the amount of loss contained in the presentence report and by ordering a restitution amount unsupported by evidence. After the parties completed briefing on this case, the government filed a notice of concession, acknowledging that the restitution order was erroneous and suggesting remand for resentencing on restitution. The Tenth Circuit affirmed Allen’s conviction, vacated the district court’s restitution order, and remanded the case to the district court to recalculate restitution. View "United States v. Allen" on Justia Law