This case involved a Chapter 7 bankruptcy trustee's appeal from a bankruptcy court order allowing debtors to claim a vacant adjacent parcel as part of their homestead exemption. The district court affirmed the bankruptcy court's ruling and dismissed the appeal. The court found that Michigan law defines a homestead to include up to 40 acres of land with a dwelling and appurtenances, and that the principal residence exemption under the General Property Tax Act extends to unoccupied contiguous property classified as residential. The bankruptcy court's factual findings established that the two parcels had no separating boundaries, were both zoned agricultural residential, received homestead tax treatment, and were used by the debtors in a manner consistent with residential purposes rather than commercial activity.
The case involves an antitrust lawsuit by the United States and Michigan against Blue Cross Blue Shield of Michigan, alleging that the insurer's use of most-favored-nation (MFN) clauses in contracts with hospitals violated Section 1 of the Sherman Act and Michigan's antitrust law by restraining competition in health insurance and hospital services markets. Blue Cross moved to dismiss, claiming immunity under state regulation and other defenses. The court denied the motion to dismiss, ruling that Michigan statutes did not sufficiently regulate the MFN practices to displace federal antitrust enforcement and that the complaint adequately stated a claim for unreasonable restraints on trade. The court also addressed related procedural motions, including granting production of certain documents and denying a stay of discovery.
The case concerned Lamar Advertising's challenge to the City of Utica's zoning ordinance regulating nonaccessory signs (billboards), which limited size, location, and spacing but was amended in 2008 to allow waivers of those limits only for signs on city-owned property. Lamar had its applications for larger billboards on private C-2 zoned land denied while a competitor received approval for a similar sign on city property, leading to claims that the ordinance imposed unconstitutional restrictions on commercial and noncommercial speech and constituted an invalid prior restraint. The court denied the city's motion for summary judgment, granted the plaintiff's motion in part, and declared Section 1507 unconstitutional on the ground that it was not narrowly tailored to the city's asserted interests in public health and safety, while finding a triable issue of fact on whether the ordinance contained sufficiently objective criteria to avoid constituting a prior restraint. The ruling was based on the ordinance's text, amendment history, and application to the parties' proposals.
This habeas corpus case under 28 U.S.C. § 2254 was brought by Michigan prisoner Frederick Thomas Freeman, who was convicted of first-degree murder in the 1986 shooting death of Scott Macklem and sentenced to life imprisonment. Freeman raised multiple claims, including ineffective assistance of trial and appellate counsel, prosecutorial misconduct, trial court errors regarding evidence and jury instructions, and actual innocence. The district court conditionally granted the petition for writ of habeas corpus, ordering Freeman's release unless the state retries him within a specified period. The court's reasoning focused on constitutional violations during the trial, particularly counsel's performance deficiencies and the impact of perjured witness testimony that undermined the reliability of the conviction.
This case concerned whether the U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the Eastern District of Michigan could include provisions in standardized Chapter 13 confirmation orders requiring the Internal Revenue Service to redirect debtors' tax refunds to Chapter 13 trustees rather than to the debtors themselves. The district court granted the IRS's petition for a writ of mandamus, declaring that trustees could not enforce such provisions and prohibiting the bankruptcy court from issuing orders containing them. The court reasoned that these injunctive provisions violated the IRS's sovereign immunity and that the bankruptcy court lacked jurisdiction and authority under relevant statutes to compel the IRS in this manner.
The case involves Michigan prisoner Ronald Simpson's pro se petition for a writ of habeas corpus under 28 U.S.C. § 2254, challenging his 1986 convictions for assault with intent to murder a police officer and felony firearm possession following a jury trial that used dual juries and involved evidence of an alleged armed robbery. Petitioner raised claims including denial of his state motion for relief from judgment, use of dual juries, non-disclosure of evidence, ineffective assistance of counsel, sentencing errors, and prosecutorial misconduct. The court conditionally granted the petition, ordering that the state provide a new trial within 90 days or release the petitioner. The core reasoning was that cumulative trial errors created grave doubt as to whether they had a substantial and injurious effect on the jury's verdict, warranting relief under the Brecht standard.
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