Richard A. Paez

Matthew Silva, a Washington prisoner, filed a pro se civil rights suit under 42 U.S.C. § 1983 against prison officials, a private corrections company, and a state attorney, alleging they violated his First and Fourteenth Amendment right of access to the courts, retaliated against him, and committed state-law conversion and fraud; he also asserted a RICO claim. The district court dismissed the action sua sponte, ruling that Silva’s prior dismissals triggered the Prison Litigation Reform Act’s three-strikes bar and prevented him from proceeding in forma pauperis. The Ninth Circuit reversed in part, affirmed in part, and remanded: it held that a dismissal does not count as a strike under 28 U.S.C. § 1915(g) until the time to appeal has expired or any appeal is resolved, so the district court improperly applied the bar; the panel therefore reinstated the access-to-courts, retaliation, and conversion claims while upholding dismissal of the RICO claim.

civil rightsprocedure

The case involved Winnie Viridiana, an Indonesian citizen of Chinese descent, who petitioned for review of the Board of Immigration Appeals' order affirming denial of her asylum and withholding of removal claims. The Immigration Judge found her asylum application untimely because it was filed more than one year after her arrival in the United States and determined that she had not shown an exception to the filing deadline. The Ninth Circuit held that fraudulent deceit by an immigration consultant can constitute an extraordinary circumstance excusing an untimely asylum application under the relevant statute and regulations, and it remanded for the agency to consider whether that exception applied here and whether the application was filed within a reasonable time thereafter. The court also remanded the withholding of removal claim for reconsideration in light of intervening precedent on claims involving membership in a disfavored group.

immigration

Alaimalo, a federal prisoner convicted in 1997 of importing methamphetamine, filed a habeas corpus petition under 28 U.S.C. § 2241 after prior unsuccessful challenges. The Ninth Circuit addressed whether it had jurisdiction to consider the petition without a certificate of appealability and whether doctrines of law of the case or abuse of the writ barred review of an earlier denial on the merits. The court held that it had jurisdiction because Alaimalo showed actual innocence that was unavailable on direct appeal or in his first § 2255 motion. It further held that neither procedural doctrine barred consideration of the petition and reversed the district court's dismissal with instructions to issue the writ and vacate the importation convictions.

criminal lawprocedure

This case involves a class action lawsuit by approximately 2,000 unlicensed junior accountants against PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC), alleging failure to pay mandatory overtime under California law. The district court granted partial summary judgment to the plaintiffs, ruling that PwC could not claim exemptions from overtime requirements. On appeal, the Ninth Circuit reversed, holding that unlicensed accountants are not categorically ineligible for the professional and administrative exemptions under California regulations. The court reasoned that whether the plaintiffs' work qualifies for these exemptions involves factual disputes that must be resolved at trial, rather than as a matter of law.

labor & employmentbusiness & regulatory

The case involved Northern California River Watch and an individual plaintiff suing private landowners and state officials under the Endangered Species Act (ESA) for allegedly removing endangered Sebastopol meadowfoam plants during development activities on private land containing wetlands. The district court granted summary judgment to the defendants, and the Ninth Circuit affirmed. The court held that the ESA's prohibition on taking listed plants in "areas under Federal jurisdiction" does not extend to all "waters of the United States" subject to Clean Water Act regulatory jurisdiction, as the statutory term is ambiguous and the Fish and Wildlife Service has not interpreted it to include such wetlands. The opinion reasoned that federal jurisdiction under the ESA requires more than adjacency to navigable waters or regulatory authority, such as actual federal ownership or control, and declined to adopt a broad reading without agency guidance.

environmentfederal power

The case involved Winnie Viridiana, an Indonesian citizen of Chinese descent, who petitioned for review of the Board of Immigration Appeals' decision affirming an Immigration Judge's denial of her asylum and withholding of removal claims based on alleged persecution due to her ethnicity. Viridiana had filed her asylum application more than one year after arriving in the United States, and the agency found no exception to the one-year filing deadline. The Ninth Circuit concluded that the delay was caused by extraordinary circumstances from fraudulent deceit by an immigration consultant, excusing the untimeliness, and granted the petition to remand for merits consideration of the asylum claim. The court also remanded the withholding of removal claim for further review under its intervening decision in Wakkary v. Holder.

immigration

The case concerned a challenge by non-union apprentices and apprenticeship committees to a project labor agreement between Rancho Santiago Community College District and construction unions that required union hiring halls, union membership, and adherence to union contracts for district construction projects funded by a bond measure. The plaintiffs argued the agreement was preempted by the NLRA and ERISA and violated their due process and equal protection rights. The district court granted summary judgment to the defendants. On appeal, the Ninth Circuit affirmed, holding that the agreement constituted permissible market participation by the district and thus was not subject to preemption, that the plaintiffs had shown no deprivation of protected liberty or property interests for their due process claims, and that the agreement was rationally related to the legitimate interest of avoiding labor disruptions for equal protection purposes; the court also rejected mootness and sovereign immunity defenses.

labor & employmentbusiness & regulatory

The case involved a class action lawsuit under the Fair and Accurate Credit Transactions Act (FACTA), where plaintiff Michael Bateman alleged that American Multi-Cinema, Inc. (AMC) willfully violated the statute by printing more than the last five digits of customers' credit or debit card numbers on receipts from automated box offices in late 2006 and early 2007. Bateman sought statutory damages of $100 to $1,000 per violation on behalf of a proposed class of over 290,000 individuals without proving actual harm. The district court denied class certification under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 23(b)(3), concluding that a class action was not superior due to the potential for enormous liability ($29 million to $290 million) disproportionate to any harm, the size of potential damages, and AMC's good-faith compliance after the complaint was filed. The Ninth Circuit reversed, holding that none of these grounds justified denying certification on superiority grounds and that the district court abused its discretion in relying on them. The court remanded for further proceedings, noting that considerations like manageability of a nationwide class could still be evaluated.

procedurebusiness & regulatory

Ivan Terrance Sapp, a California state prisoner, filed a § 1983 suit alleging deliberate indifference to his medical needs for an eye condition after prison officials screened out his administrative grievances seeking care. The district court dismissed the suit without prejudice for failure to exhaust administrative remedies under the Prison Litigation Reform Act. On appeal, the Ninth Circuit held that improper screening of grievances by prison officials can render administrative remedies unavailable and excuse the PLRA exhaustion requirement, but concluded that Sapp's grievances were not improperly screened and that no equitable exception applied. The court therefore affirmed the dismissal.

criminal lawcivil rightsprocedurehealthcare

This case involved Arvin Espinoza-Morales's appeal of a 57-month sentence for attempted reentry after deportation under 8 U.S.C. § 1326. The district court had applied a 16-level sentencing enhancement under U.S.S.G. § 2L1.2(b)(1)(A)(ii) based on his prior California convictions for sexual battery and penetration with a foreign object, treating them as crimes of violence. The Ninth Circuit held that neither conviction qualified as a crime of violence under the categorical approach, as the statutes did not necessarily involve the required elements, nor under the modified categorical approach, because the available documents did not establish that the convictions met the federal generic definition. The court therefore vacated the sentence and remanded for resentencing without the enhancement.

immigrationcriminal law

In this case, environmental group Northern California River Watch sued developers and state officials for removing endangered Sebastopol meadowfoam plants from private wetlands adjacent to navigable waters while preparing the land for development, alleging a violation of the Endangered Species Act's prohibition on taking listed plants in areas under federal jurisdiction. The district court granted summary judgment to the defendants, and the Ninth Circuit affirmed. The court held that the phrase "areas under Federal jurisdiction" in ESA § 9 is ambiguous but does not extend to privately owned lands subject only to the regulatory authority of the federal government under the Clean Water Act, such as wetlands designated as waters of the United States; instead, it requires more direct federal control like ownership or easements. The reasoning drew from the statutory structure distinguishing between federal areas and other areas where state law violations are needed for liability, and the lack of specific agency guidance warranting deference.

environmentfederal power

The case involved Jorge Farias's federal conviction for attempted entry after deportation under 8 U.S.C. § 1326 following his prior removal to Mexico. Farias appealed after the district court denied his request to represent himself, made during a pretrial hearing the day before trial, by stating that no continuance would be granted and the trial would proceed as scheduled. The Ninth Circuit reversed the conviction, concluding that the district court had violated Farias's Sixth Amendment right to self-representation under Faretta v. California because the request was timely, no findings were made that it was intended to cause delay, and the denial amounted to structural error requiring vacatur and remand for a new trial; the sentencing challenge was therefore moot.

criminal lawprocedurecivil rightsimmigration

In Advertise.com, Inc. v. AOL Advertising, Inc., the dispute centered on whether Advertise.com infringed AOL's trademark rights by using the designation ADVERTISE.COM, which AOL claimed was confusingly similar to its registered ADVERTISING.COM marks for internet advertising services. The district court granted AOL a preliminary injunction barring Advertise.com from using the ADVERTISE.COM name or any confusingly similar trade name or designation. The Ninth Circuit reversed and vacated that part of the injunction, concluding that AOL was unlikely to succeed on the merits because ADVERTISING.COM is generic as it merely identifies the genus of the services offered rather than conveying distinctive qualities or characteristics. The court left undisturbed the injunction against using stylized marks or logos confusingly similar to AOL's, noting that domain names formed from generic terms are not categorically ineligible for protection but that the record supported a finding of genericness here.

business & regulatoryprocedure

The case involved Lesly Yajayra Perdomo, a native of Guatemala, who petitioned for review of the Board of Immigration Appeals' denial of her applications for asylum, withholding of removal, and CAT relief. Perdomo claimed a well-founded fear of persecution on account of her membership in a particular social group consisting of young women in Guatemala, citing high rates of unsolved murders of women there. The immigration judge and BIA rejected the claim on the ground that groups defined as young women or all women in Guatemala were not cognizable particular social groups. The Ninth Circuit granted the petition and remanded, holding that the BIA had failed to properly apply its own precedents and Ninth Circuit case law defining particular social groups and had improperly rejected the proposed group solely because of its size or breadth.

immigration

The case concerned whether Rafael Padilla-Romero, a former lawful permanent resident removed in 1998 after alien smuggling attempts, remained eligible for cancellation of removal under 8 U.S.C. § 1229b(a) when he later faced removal proceedings in 2006, even though he had lost LPR status years earlier. The court held that he was statutorily ineligible because the provision requires current LPR status at the time of the application. The core reasoning interpreted the phrase "has been an alien lawfully admitted for permanent residence for not less than 5 years" in light of the statutory definition of LPR status (which specifies "such status not having changed") and rejected an alternative reading that would produce absurd results, such as allowing eligibility decades after loss of status or encouraging illegal reentry. The court reviewed the IJ's decision de novo on this legal question after the BIA affirmed without opinion.

immigration

The case concerned the constitutionality of a warrantless vehicle search incident to the arrest of occupant Ricardo Gonzalez and whether evidence from that search should be suppressed under the Fourth Amendment. After the Supreme Court decided Arizona v. Gant, which limited such searches, the Ninth Circuit panel denied Gonzalez's petition for rehearing and rehearing en banc, adhering to its post-remand decision applying Gant. The panel reasoned that Gant did not announce a new rule but corrected misinterpretations of New York v. Belton, and under retroactivity precedents the exclusionary rule applied because the benefits of deterring clearly unlawful searches outweighed the costs. The opinion distinguishes this from cases involving reliance on statutes and emphasizes that the issue involves the defendant's suppression rights rather than officer immunity.

criminal lawprocedure

The case involved a mother suing a California Highway Patrol officer under 42 U.S.C. § 1983 and state law after he shot and killed her son during a nighttime struggle following a bicycle stop, with claims of excessive force and wrongful death going to trial. The jury found for the plaintiff on one § 1983 claim and the wrongful death claim but awarded only nominal damages of one dollar each. The district court then awarded $136,687.35 in attorney fees under § 1988, and the Ninth Circuit affirmed, holding that the liability verdict was not merely technical under the Farrar v. Hobby factors because it vindicated the plaintiff's core contention of unconstitutional force and served a public deterrent purpose despite the limited damages. The court also upheld the reduced fee amount as within the district court's discretion after considering the degree of success achieved.

civil rightsproceduretorts & liability

This case arose after an Alameda County police officer interviewed a 14-year-old girl who reported physical and sexual abuse by her stepfather, then took her into protective custody without a warrant or contacting her non-custodial biological father. Her parents sued the officer and county under 42 U.S.C. § 1983, claiming violations of their constitutional right to familial association and failure to train officers on obtaining protective custody warrants. The Ninth Circuit affirmed summary judgment for the officer, holding that he was entitled to qualified immunity because he reasonably believed the child faced imminent harm and it was not clearly unlawful to proceed without contacting the non-custodial parent. The court vacated summary judgment for the county and remanded, noting that municipalities lack qualified immunity and that a triable issue existed regarding the non-custodial parent's rights, requiring further analysis of the Monell claim elements.

criminal lawcivil rightsfamily law

The case concerned a challenge to the denial of a motion to suppress a firearm found during a warrantless search of a vehicle after the arrest of a passenger, leading to Gonzalez's conviction under 18 U.S.C. § 922(g)(1). The court granted the motion to suppress and reversed the conviction. It reasoned that Arizona v. Gant overruled the prior broad interpretation of New York v. Belton and made the search unconstitutional because Gonzalez was secured and not within reaching distance of the vehicle. The court further held that Gant applies retroactively to cases on direct review under precedents like United States v. Johnson and Griffith v. Kentucky, precluding application of the good faith exception in this context.

criminal lawprocedure

The case involved Amanda Armstrong and other CNMI taxpayers who sued the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands to recover income tax rebates and interest under the Northern Mariana Territorial Income Tax (NMTIT) code, along with declaratory and injunctive relief on rebate administration. The district court dismissed the action for lack of subject matter jurisdiction under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 12(b)(1). On appeal, the Ninth Circuit affirmed, holding that the NMTIT is a local territorial tax system adopted via the Covenant to Establish a Commonwealth, not federal law, so claims under it do not arise under federal law for purposes of 28 U.S.C. § 1331 jurisdiction. The court further reasoned that the Covenant does not grant the district court original jurisdiction over such tax matters, unlike specific statutory provisions applicable to Guam or the Virgin Islands.

taxesfederal powerprocedure