Susan Kellar sued her employer, Summit Seating, under the Fair Labor Standards Act, alleging she was entitled to overtime pay for work she performed before her official shift start time, such as preparing workstations and reviewing schedules. The district court granted summary judgment to Summit, and the Seventh Circuit affirmed. Although the court disagreed that the pre-shift activities were merely preliminary or de minimis, it held that Summit was not liable because it neither knew nor had reason to know that Kellar was performing compensable work before her shifts, as she never reported the overtime, followed policies against unapproved overtime, and supervisors arrived later. Kellar's related state law claim under Indiana's Wage Payment Statute also failed as derivative of the FLSA claim.
Krysten Overly sued her employer KeyBank and affiliates in state court under Title VII, alleging gender discrimination, hostile work environment, constructive discharge, and retaliation for complaining about gender discrimination; the case was removed to federal court. The district court granted KeyBank's motion for summary judgment on both the discrimination and retaliation claims. On appeal, the Seventh Circuit affirmed, holding that Overly failed to show genuine issues of material fact on her claims. The court found no circumstantial evidence pointing to a discriminatory reason for the employer's actions regarding her use of scanned signatures and related procedures, and no causal link between her HR complaint and any adverse actions such as territory reassignments, which aligned with a neutral business plan. The judgment in favor of KeyBank was therefore affirmed.
Bruce Barton, an employee at Zimmer, Inc., sued his employer under the Age Discrimination in Employment Act (ADEA) and the Family Medical Leave Act (FMLA) after his supervisor reduced his job duties, allegedly due to his age, and after he took medical leave and received a new assignment upon return. The district court granted summary judgment for Zimmer, and the Seventh Circuit affirmed. The court held that while evidence showed the supervisor discriminated based on age, it caused no compensable loss and was not linked to Barton's later retirement or psychological issues. There was also no evidence of retaliation by other managers for Barton's complaints, and Zimmer restored him to equivalent duties after FMLA leave without regard to the leave itself.
Troy Banister sued Chicago police officer Craig Burton and the City under 42 U.S.C. § 1983, claiming that Burton unlawfully shot him six times during an undercover drug operation in 2006. Banister testified he was unarmed and shot without provocation while Burton described Banister pulling a gun and threatening him, leading to Burton firing in self-defense; a gun was recovered near the scene. A jury returned a verdict for the defendants, and Banister appealed the admission of testimony from his treating physician Dr. Fishman regarding whether Banister could have thrown the gun or crawled, the City's failure to submit an expert report under Rule 26, and a remark in closing argument. The Seventh Circuit affirmed, holding that Dr. Fishman testified as a treating physician rather than a retained expert so no report was required, any nondisclosure was harmless because Banister knew of the opinions from a prior state trial, and the closing remark was promptly corrected and addressed by a curative jury instruction.
This case involved Grazyna Pawlowska, a Polish citizen placed in removal proceedings after participating in "Operation Durango," a sting where she paid $5,000 to an undercover agent posing as a corrupt immigration official to obtain fraudulent permanent resident stamps. She requested a continuance to pursue adjustment of status via a family visa petition and alternatively sought voluntary departure, but the immigration judge denied both on discretionary grounds due to her conduct in the scheme, and the Board of Immigration Appeals affirmed. The Seventh Circuit dismissed the petition for review, concluding that the court lacked jurisdiction to review the discretionary denials of relief and that attempts to recast the claims as legal questions did not overcome statutory jurisdictional bars.
The case involved Robert Cantrell, a longtime Indiana public official, who was convicted by a jury on eleven counts including honest services mail fraud under 18 U.S.C. §§ 1341 and 1346 for steering township contracts in exchange for kickbacks, insurance fraud under § 1341, and filing false tax returns under 26 U.S.C. § 7206(1) by failing to report the kickbacks. Cantrell appealed, challenging the honest services convictions as based on an unconstitutionally vague statute and arguing that his 78-month within-guidelines sentence was improper because the district court used the wrong Sentencing Guideline (§ 2C1.1 instead of § 2B1.1) and did not adequately address his arguments for leniency based on age and other factors. While the appeal was pending, the Supreme Court decided Skilling v. United States, which narrowed § 1346 to cover only bribery and kickback schemes; the Seventh Circuit held that Cantrell's conduct clearly fell within that narrowed scope, so the convictions were valid. The court further found no plain error in the guideline selection or in the district judge's explanation of the sentence, which explicitly considered Cantrell's age, accomplishments, and other mitigation arguments before rejecting them. The judgment was affirmed.