James Parker Jones

In this products liability case, a five-year-old child sued Dorel Juvenile Group after suffering traumatic brain injuries in a car accident while seated in one of the company’s booster seats, claiming the seat’s defective design caused her permanent disabilities and seeking damages that included compensation for total loss of future earning capacity. The defendant moved in limine to exclude the opinions of the plaintiff’s vocational rehabilitation expert and economist, arguing that their projections were too speculative because they relied on generalized census statistics. The court denied the motion. Under Virginia law, lost-earning-capacity damages for an infant must be shown with reasonable certainty and must rest on facts specific to the individual rather than on membership in a statistical class alone. The experts satisfied that standard by combining individualized evidence—family academic history, school records, medical assessments, and interviews—with statistical tables to estimate the education level the child likely would have attained and the corresponding earnings, then reducing those figures to present value.

torts & liabilityprocedure

Kenneth Ray Stevens, a federal inmate, filed a pro se motion under 28 U.S.C. § 2255 to vacate his 2009 conviction and 211-month sentence after pleading guilty to drug conspiracy and firearm charges pursuant to a written Plea Agreement that waived his rights to appeal or collaterally attack his conviction or sentence. The government moved to dismiss based on the waiver. Following an evidentiary hearing on Stevens’s claims of ineffective assistance of counsel—including allegations that counsel delegated advice on the plea to a non-lawyer, failed to advise on enhancements or the waiver, did not research the firearm charge, and did not file a requested appeal—the court granted the government’s motion and denied relief. The court found that Stevens’s guilty plea was knowing and voluntary, that he had not shown prejudice under Strickland v. Washington and Hill v. Lockhart because he could not demonstrate a reasonable probability that he would have rejected the plea agreement or obtained a better outcome absent counsel’s alleged errors, and that the waiver therefore barred the motion.

criminal lawprocedure

In United States v. Doss, the defendant pleaded guilty to conspiracy to distribute controlled substances and possessing a firearm in furtherance of drug trafficking, and objected at sentencing to classification as a career offender under USSG § 4B1.1 based on his prior convictions. The court overruled the objection, holding that the defendant's 2001 Virginia conviction for assault and battery on a police officer qualified as a predicate "crime of violence." Applying the categorical approach under the residual clause of USSG § 4B1.2(a), the court reasoned that the offense, by its elements, inherently involves conduct presenting a serious potential risk of physical injury to another, distinguishing it from simple assault and battery due to the involvement of a law enforcement officer. The court relied on precedent interpreting similar language in the Armed Career Criminal Act and analogous decisions from other circuits.

criminal lawprocedure

In this diversity jurisdiction breach of contract case, Traxys North America sued Concept Mining, a coal producer, after Concept failed to deliver low-volatile metallurgical coal in 2009 and 2010 under a December 2007 supply agreement that included a two-year extension with a price collar mechanism allowing Traxys to purchase at up to $83 per ton. Following a two-day bench trial applying New York law, the court found that Traxys had validly exercised its option to buy the coal and that Concept breached by refusing to deliver or negotiate in good faith, leading to termination of the contract. The court awarded Traxys damages of $4,167,760 based on the difference between the collar price and prevailing market prices for comparable coal during the relevant periods.

business & regulatory

The case involved parents of public high school students affected by a school consolidation plan who sought a preliminary injunction against the Virginia High School League to permit immediate sports eligibility at a new school despite the League's Transfer Rule imposing a one-year ineligibility period for transfers without a change in parental residence. The court denied the motion for preliminary injunction. The plaintiffs did not demonstrate a likelihood of success on their claims alleging violations of substantive and procedural due process as well as equal protection, given the rule's exceptions for school closures, the availability of an appeals process, and the lack of a protected constitutional interest in athletic participation. The court also found insufficient evidence of irreparable harm from temporary ineligibility in interscholastic competitions.

civil rightsprocedure

In this criminal case, defendant Steven F. Riggs, II, was charged with conspiring to possess with intent to distribute oxycodone by arranging trips for drug users to obtain fraudulent prescriptions from doctors in Florida. Riggs entered a guilty plea without a plea agreement, but after the start of his sentencing hearing he moved to withdraw the plea based on testimony presented there. The court denied the motion under Federal Rule of Criminal Procedure 11(d)(2)(B), finding that Riggs had not shown a fair and just reason for withdrawal because the plea was knowing and voluntary, he had the close assistance of counsel, the evidence supported his guilt, and allowing withdrawal would prejudice the government and waste judicial resources after substantial delay.

criminal law

The case involved Francis Davis Sherman, charged under SORNA with failing to register as a sex offender after allegedly traveling from Virginia to Wyoming without updating his registration. Sherman moved to dismiss the charge, claiming that applying SORNA to his brief stay in Wyoming would violate his constitutional right to interstate travel, and alternatively sought a change of venue to Wyoming. The court denied the motion to dismiss because the Fourth Circuit had previously upheld SORNA against similar challenges and the facts regarding his time in Wyoming were not yet developed at trial. The court also denied the venue change, finding that venue was proper in the Western District of Virginia as the offense began there and considerations of convenience did not outweigh the costs of transfer at that stage.

criminal lawcivil rightsfederal powerprocedure

Buchanan County sued Equitable Production Company and related entities in Virginia state court to collect unpaid local license taxes on gas production under state severance tax rules. After the defendants removed the case to federal court on diversity grounds and the county's remand motion was denied, the county moved for voluntary dismissal without prejudice under Rule 41(a)(2) to refile in state court with additional non-diverse local defendants to prevent removal. The court denied the motion, holding that dismissal would cause legal prejudice to the defendants given the case's advanced stage after more than a year of litigation and the resources already expended. The court further reasoned that Virginia joinder rules, which require claims to arise from the same transaction or occurrence, would not support adding other taxpayers and would instead trigger extended procedural disputes over joinder, severance, and removal under the voluntary/involuntary rule and fraudulent joinder doctrine.

taxesprocedurebusiness & regulatory

In this criminal case, defendant Ronnie L. Robbins, a Vietnam-era Army veteran, was convicted by a jury of using a falsely altered military discharge certificate, falsely claiming military medals, making false statements to obtain veterans' benefits based on a fabricated PTSD stressor involving a friend's death, and related mail fraud. The defendant moved for judgment of acquittal under Rule 29, arguing insufficient evidence and renewing a First Amendment challenge to one count. The court denied the motion, holding that substantial evidence supported the verdicts when viewed in the light most favorable to the government, with credibility and factual inconsistencies properly resolved by the jury, and adhering to its prior rejection of the constitutional claim.

criminal lawfree speech

This diversity jurisdiction case involves a breach of contract claim by a coal purchaser against the seller for failing to deliver promised coal, with the seller counterclaiming for the buyer's alleged breach. The immediate issue was the buyer's pretrial motion to exclude the seller's expert witness on damages under Federal Rule of Evidence 702 and Daubert standards. The court denied the motion, reasoning that its gatekeeping role is relaxed in a bench trial where the judge can later assess the expert's reliability and relevance during trial rather than excluding the testimony pretrial.

business & regulatoryprocedure

In this criminal case, defendant Jimmy Scott Elkins was indicted under 18 U.S.C. § 922(g)(8) for possessing firearms while subject to a state-issued domestic protective order arising from allegations of family abuse against a former romantic partner with whom he shared a child. Elkins moved to dismiss the indictment, arguing that the statute infringed his Second Amendment rights as recognized in District of Columbia v. Heller. After an evidentiary hearing, the court denied the motion, holding that the statute constitutes a presumptively lawful restriction on firearm possession by individuals subject to qualifying protective orders and that it survives constitutional scrutiny because it advances the government's important interest in curbing domestic gun violence through a reasonable fit with the regulated conduct. The order in question had been issued after notice and a full hearing at which the petitioner proved family abuse by a preponderance of the evidence and which explicitly prohibited the use or threatened use of physical force.

gunscriminal law

The case involved a defendant charged under federal law with failing to register and update his status as a sex offender after traveling from Virginia to Wyoming and then to Canada. The defendant moved to dismiss the indictment, claiming it failed to state an offense, that he had no duty to notify authorities of his move abroad, and that the Sex Offender Registration and Notification Act (SORNA) was unconstitutional on delegation, ex post facto, and administrative procedure grounds. The court denied the motion, finding that the superseding indictment cured any defect, that evidence of the defendant's activities in Wyoming made the foreign travel argument premature, and that the constitutional challenges were foreclosed by circuit precedent or Supreme Court authority on similar registration laws.

criminal lawfederal powerprocedure

In this case, Buchanan County, Virginia, sued Equitable Production Company and related entities in state court, seeking a declaratory judgment that certain deductions were improper in calculating mineral severance taxes owed to the county, along with monetary relief for past taxes. The defendants removed the action to federal court based on diversity jurisdiction, and the county moved to remand, arguing that the Tax Injunction Act barred federal jurisdiction or that abstention and comity principles required declining it. The court denied the motion to remand, holding that the Tax Injunction Act does not apply to tax collection suits like this one, which seeks monetary relief rather than anticipatory relief to enjoin state tax collection, as confirmed by Supreme Court precedent in Jefferson County v. Acker. The court further found that abstention doctrines under Colorado River did not apply because no exceptional circumstances existed involving complex state policy issues, and comity principles were inapplicable since the suit did not challenge the constitutionality of state tax laws or seek to interfere with state tax administration.

taxesfederal powerprocedurebusiness & regulatory

In this diversity action, natural gas property owners sued their lessee, a gas production company, alleging underpayment of royalties due to improper deductions of post-production costs from gas sales. The defendant moved to certify to the Virginia Supreme Court the question of whether, under an oil and gas lease providing for a royalty of one-eighth of the proceeds or market value at the well, the lessee may deduct reasonable costs of gathering, compressing, and transporting the gas. The court denied the motion, reasoning that while the issue is unsettled under Virginia law, federal courts must predict state law when necessary, certification would impose unnecessary delay and expense, and precedents from other jurisdictions provide guidance for deciding the matter.

propertybusiness & regulatoryprocedure

In this criminal case, four defendants were convicted by a jury of conspiring to distribute controlled substances including cocaine, OxyContin, and Lortab as part of a larger drug trafficking operation in Tennessee and Virginia. The defendants filed post-verdict motions for judgment of acquittal and new trial, arguing insufficient evidence that they participated in the conspiracy as charged involving all drugs. The court denied the motions for three defendants, finding sufficient evidence of their involvement in the conspiracy with respect to the drugs attributed to them by the jury, but granted acquittal to defendant Hilton because the evidence only showed personal drug use rather than participation in distribution or the conspiracy. The court reasoned that the government was not required to prove each defendant's involvement with every drug listed in the indictment, as the jury's findings on attributable drugs were adequate for conviction.

criminal lawprocedure

In this ERISA case, plaintiff Marzetta Sue Smith sued AEGON USA, LLC after it denied her disability benefits under an employer-provided insurance policy from Monumental Life Insurance Company. The policy included a forum selection clause requiring any action to be brought in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, and AEGON moved to dismiss for improper venue under Rule 12(b)(3). Smith argued that ERISA's venue provision, 29 U.S.C. § 1132(e)(2), allowed suit where the breach occurred and that the clause was unreasonable due to overreaching and lack of notice. The court held that forum selection clauses in ERISA plans are enforceable because Congress did not prohibit them, they advance ERISA's goals of uniformity, and the clause here was not induced by fraud or fundamentally unfair, as participants received summaries of material modifications. Rather than dismiss, the court transferred the case to the Northern District of Iowa under 28 U.S.C. § 1406(a).

labor & employmentprocedure

This case arose from the 2009 arrest of plaintiff Larry David Jackson for obstruction of justice after he approached a Saltville police officer who was issuing a traffic citation to Jackson's son in the family's driveway. Jackson sued the arresting officer, the police chief, and the Town of Saltville under 42 U.S.C. § 1983, alleging constitutional violations, along with related state-law claims. The defendants moved to dismiss under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 12(b)(6). The court granted the motion in part and denied it in part, dismissing all claims against the chief and the town, the state false-arrest claim, and the request for injunctive relief, while allowing certain claims against the officer to proceed based on the facts alleged in the complaint. The court also granted in part a motion to strike extraneous allegations concerning nonparties and family members.

criminal lawcivil rightsprocedure

This case involved a criminal defendant charged under the Stolen Valor Act, 18 U.S.C. § 704(b), for falsely claiming receipt of military medals and decorations in campaign materials and to veterans' groups. The defendant moved to quash the indictment, arguing that the statute facially violates the First Amendment by restricting protected speech. The court denied the motion and upheld the statute. It reasoned that false statements of fact have no constitutional value and fall outside First Amendment protection, consistent with precedents such as Gertz v. Robert Welch and cases involving fraud or defamation, while distinguishing contrary rulings from other courts.

criminal lawfree speech

In Durham v. Horner, a police officer with a regional drug task force initiated criminal charges against the plaintiff for three drug sales based on identifications provided by confidential informants, though the plaintiff was innocent and had been confused with another individual sharing a similar name. The plaintiff was arrested in Tennessee and held in Virginia for over 90 days until alibi evidence led to the charges being dropped. The plaintiff then sued under 42 U.S.C. § 1983 alleging a Fourth Amendment violation from prosecution without probable cause, along with a state malicious prosecution claim. The court granted summary judgment to the officer, holding that qualified immunity applied because the officer's reliance on the informants' statements and limited database checks was objectively reasonable and did not violate clearly established rights.

criminal lawcivil rights

The plaintiff, a former hospital nursing director, sued under ERISA to challenge the insurer's termination of her long-term disability benefits under an employer-sponsored plan, which defined total disability first by inability to perform one's own occupation and later by inability to perform any occupation for which one is qualified. After initially approving benefits following a back injury and multiple spine surgeries, the insurer terminated them in 2008 based on a consultant's review concluding the plaintiff could perform sedentary work, despite earlier functional capacity evaluations indicating otherwise; the plaintiff appealed, citing ongoing pain, but the termination was upheld. The court denied both parties' summary judgment motions and remanded the case to the insurer for further development, holding that the administrative record was insufficient to determine the duration and scope of any post-surgery improvement, particularly because the insurer had sought but never obtained an updated functional capacity evaluation that its own process indicated was relevant. The decision applied an abuse-of-discretion standard to the plan administrator's discretionary authority, noting a conflict of interest but focusing on the adequacy of the evidence considered.

labor & employmenthealthcareprocedure