By: Carrie Bennice / Date: 20, September 2017
Giasson Aerospace Sci. Inc., et al. v. RCO Eng’g Inc., No. 16-1769 (GRIFFIN, Norris, Suhrheinrich). Giasson and RCO were in business together, trying to secure a contract to sell airline seats to a luxury jet manufacturer. Giasson sued RCO after RCO allegedly cut Giasson out of the deal, and the parties settled for a fixed amount, determined in part on RCO’s estimation of its gross sales price per seat. After settlement, Giasson learned that RCO had increased its gross sales… Read more
By: Carrie Bennice / Date: 20, September 2017
U.S. v. $31,000.00, et al., No. 16-4279 (BATCHELDER, Cole, Moore). A Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) search of two men at Cleveland Hopkins International Airport revealed that each were carrying tens of thousands of dollars in cash, which the men claimed to own but about which they could not provide details. After a drug dog alerted to the scent of drugs on each man’s cash, the DEA seized the money and the government filed for forfeiture of the cash. Both men… Read more
By: Carrie Bennice / Date: 20, September 2017
Islamic Center of Nashville v. State of Tennessee, et al., No. 17-5045 (MOORE, Merritt, Rogers). An Islamic Center filed suit in federal court, alleging constitutional, federal statutory, and state statutory claims that it alleged relieved it of its obligation to pay a property tax assessed against it during the time period the property was legally owned by a bank pursuant to an ijara agreement. In an ijaraagreement, a financial institution purchases an asset, retains title, and then leases it to… Read more
By: Carrie Bennice / Date: 15, September 2017
Mullendore v. City of Belding, Mich., et al., No. 16-2198 (BATCHELDER, Merritt, Clay). The City Manager of Belding filed suit against the City and City Council members under the Family and Medical Leave Act after the Council voted to terminate her employment while she was out of work following a surgery. The district court granted summary judgment for the defendants, and the City Manager appealed. The Sixth Circuit affirmed, holding that the fact that an adverse employment action occurred while… Read more
By: Carrie Bennice / Date: 15, September 2017
Flannery | Georgalis resigned as federal prosecutors from the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Northern District of Ohio and were presented with plaques to recognize their distinguished years of federal service.
By: Carrie Bennice / Date: 14, September 2017
U.S. v. Cox, No. 16-2404 (KEITH, Batchelder, Sutton). The defendant was sentenced to 2,880 months in prison for child exploitation and child pornography offenses. He appealed, alleging—among other things—trial errors in violation of the Confrontation Clause of the U.S. Constitution and the Federal Rules of Evidence. The Sixth Circuit affirmed the convictions and sentence. The Sixth Circuit affirmed the district court’s decision to allow two of the victim-children to testify by closed-circuit television. Reviewing for clear error, the Court found… Read more
By: Carrie Bennice / Date: 13, September 2017
U.S. v. Coleman, No. 16-3972 (SUHRHEINRICH, Norris, Griffin). The defendant-appellant was convicted of being a felon in possession of a firearm and sentenced to 36 months in prison. He appealed his conviction, arguing that the district court should have ordered sua sponte a competency evaluation because throughout the trial and other proceedings the defendant espoused sovereign citizen and other fringe legal theories. For instance, he referred to himself as a “flesh and blood living being,” contested the district court’s jurisdiction… Read more
By: Carrie Bennice / Date: 12, September 2017
Beydoun, et al. v. Sessions, et al., Nos. 16-2168/2406 (CLAY, Griffin, Thapar). The plaintiffs-appellants are Michigan residents who were subjected to repeated secondary screenings before flying at airports across the U.S.. They believe that they are on the “Selectee List”—a subset of the Terrorist Screening Database—but their attempts to use Dept. of Homeland Security procedures to get their names removed were futile and the government did not confirm or deny whether they were on the list at all. The plaintiffs… Read more
By: Carrie Bennice / Date: 11, September 2017
In re Coley, Nos. 17-3071/3815 (Siler, Sutton) (Per Curiam) (Merritt, dissenting). The petitioner is on death row in Ohio, and filed a second habeas petition under 28 U.S.C. § 2254, arguing that Hurst v. Florida, 136 S. Ct. 616 (2016), announced a new rule of constitutional law requiring juries to make specific findings about mitigating evidence during capital sentencing. He argued that in light of Hurst, Ohio’s capital-sentencing scheme is unconstitutional. The district court transferred the petition to the Sixth… Read more
By: Carrie Bennice / Date: 11, September 2017
Moody, et al. v. Mich. Gaming Control Bd., et al., Nos. 16-2244/2369 (MOORE, Cole, Batchelder). The Michigan Gaming Control Board suspended the licenses of four horse-racing drivers and excluded them from a racetrack after the drivers invoked their Fifth Amendment right and refused to answer questions during an investigation into an illegal race-fixing scheme. The drivers filed suit, alleging violations of their procedural due process and Fifth Amendment rights. At the summary-judgment stage, the district court denied qualified immunity on… Read more