Justia Civil Rights Opinion Summaries

After 15-year-old B.K. was barred from showing livestock at 4-H exhibitions, B.K.'s father filed suit under 42 U.S.C. 1983 against the unincorporated 4-H Association and two 4-H officials. The district court granted preliminary injunctive relief from the claimed denial of B.K.'s constitutional right to procedural due process. The court inferred that 4-H membership and participation was a "right or status" open to all South Dakota children interested in a career in agriculture, subject to reasonable, non-discriminatory terms; the record clearly demonstrated that the ban deprived B.K. of the opportunity to participate in a public program that was important to her education and career development and from which she obtained significant personal income; and, therefore, the district court did not abuse its discretion in concluding that B.K. had a fair chance of proving that defendants published a defamatory ruling that deprived her of a right or status conferred by state law and that she was entitled to the constitutional protection of the Due Process Clause. Further, B.K. was not afforded minimal procedural due process protection; there was a sufficient showing of the threat of irreparable injury; and the balance of the equities and the public interest supported the issuance of the injunction. Accordingly, the court affirmed the judgment of the district court. View "Kroupa v. Nielsen, et al." on Justia Law

This case arose out of the handcuffing and removal from school of then eleven-year-old C.B. by Sonora Police officers. The district court rendered a verdict ostensibly in favor of defendants, but the district court concluded that the verdict was incomplete and inconsistent and directed them to re-deliberate. On appeal, the court concluded that the unscripted supplemental jury instructions, together with the problematic verdict form, gave the jury the misimpression that its initial answers to Questions 1, 3, 5, 6, 7, and 8 were internally inconsistent and needed to be revised. The court also concluded that Officers McIntosh and Prock were entitled to qualified immunity with regard to plaintiff's claims under 42 U.S.C. 1983 because the law was, and still is, not "clearly established" that handcuffing and driving a juvenile from school to a relative's place of business implicated Fourth Amendment rights. Accordingly, the court vacated the verdict and judgments, remanding for further proceedings. The district court was instructed to enter judgment as a matter of law in favor of individual defendants McIntosh and Prock as to the 1983 claims. The court did not address whether defendants were entitled to an offset of the amount paid in settlement by the school district and one of the school's teachers. View "C. B. v. City of Sonora, et al." on Justia Law

Plaintiff, a professor, filed suit alleging that university administrators retaliated against him in violation of the First Amendment for distributing a short pamphlet and drafts from an in-progress book. The court held that there was an exception to Garcetti v. Ceballos for teaching and academic writing. Pickering v. Board of Education governed such teaching and writing by publicly employed teachers. The court affirmed the district court's determination that plaintiff prepared and circulated his pamphlet pursuant to official duties; reversed its determination that the pamphlet did not address matters of public concern; concluded that there was insufficient evidence to show that the in-progress book triggered retaliation; and held that defendants were entitled to qualified immunity given the uncertain state of the law in the wake of Garcetti. The court remanded for further proceedings. View "Demers v. Austin" on Justia Law

Landon Wynar, a sophomore high school student, was suspended from school after he made a string of increasingly violent and threatening instant messages sent from home to his friends. Landon and his father sued the school district and others (collectively, "Douglas County") for violations of Landon's constitutional rights under 42 U.S.C. 1983, as well as for negligence and negligent infliction of emotional distress. The court held that, when faced with an identifiable threat of school violence, schools could take disciplinary action in response to off-campus speech that met the requirements of Tinker v. DesMoines. In this instance, the court concluded that it was reasonable for Douglas County to interpret the messages as a real risk and to forecast a substantial disruption. Further, Landon's messages threatening the student body as a whole, and targeted specific students by name, impinged on the rights of the students to be secure and to be let alone. Accordingly, the court held that Douglas County's actions did not violate the First Amendment. The court also held that Landon received adequate due process before both his 10-day suspension and his 90-day expulsion. The court rejected plaintiffs' remaining claims and affirmed the district court's grant of summary judgment for the school district. View "Wynar v. Douglas Cnty. Sch. Dist." on Justia Law

This case concerned Hawaii's "Act 163," Haw. Rev. Stat. 302A-1134(c), which barred students from attending public school after the last day of the school year in which they turned 20. At issue was whether state-funded high school diploma programs for adults who never graduated from high school were a form of "public education" under the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA), 20 U.S.C. 1412(a)(1)(B)(I). The Community Schools for Adults offers "free public education" to students who did not require IDEA services. The Department offers, at taxpayer expense, the opportunity for nondisabled 20- and 21-year-olds to complete their secondary educations and earn high school diplomas. Providing IDEA services to disabled children of those ages would therefore be consistent with "State law or practice... respecting the provision of public education," so the state must do so. Accordingly, the court reversed the district court's judgment for the State on the IDEA claim, holding that Act 163 violated federal law. The court affirmed the district court's judgment on plaintiffs' remaining claims. View "E.R.K. v. State of Hawaii Dep't of Educ." on Justia Law

Plaintiff, a severely disabled student, filed suit arguing that he was entitled to remain at a private school he had been attending since the age of seven. The Department issued a formal notice that plaintiff's special education placement at the school would end when he turned 20 years old. Plaintiff argued that he was entitled to remain at the school until he was 22 years old. At issue on appeal was whether the "stay put" provision in the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA), 20 U.S.C. 1415j, applied to a student who has exceeded a state-imposed age limit on eligibility for public education. The court affirmed the judgment of the district court, concluding that the district court correctly granted plaintiff's motion for stay put. Plaintiff was entitled to remain at the school as his stay-put placement from the date he filed his administrative complaint and he was entitled to remain there until his case was finally resolved. View "A.D. v. State of Hawaii Dep't of Educ." on Justia Law

In these consolidated appeals, plaintiffs principally claimed that their school districts have an obligation under the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA), 42 U.S.C. 12101 et seq., to provide them with a word-for-word transcription service so that they can fully understand the teacher and fellow students without undue strain and consequent stress. The court held that courts evaluating claims under the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA), 20 U.S.C. 1400, and Title II must analyze each claim separately under the relevant statutory and regulatory framework. In these cases, the district courts legally erred in granting summary judgment by holding that plaintiff's Title II claim was foreclosed as a matter of law by the failure of her IDEA claim. Accordingly, the court reversed the grants of summary judgment on the ADA claims in both cases and on the Unruh Act, Cal. Civ. Code 51, 52, claim in K.M. v. Tustin, remanding for further proceedings in both cases. View "K. M. v. Tustin Unified Sch. Dist." on Justia Law

Keep A Breast Foundation educates young women about breast cancer and believes that negative body image inhibits awareness. To “start a conversation about that taboo in a lighthearted way” and break down inhibitions keeping young women from performing self-examinations, the Foundation began its “I [heart] Boobies!” initiative, which included selling bracelets emblazoned with that motto, KEEP A BREAST” and “check yourself!” The School District banned the bracelets. The district court issued a preliminary injunction against the ban. The Third Circuit affirmed, finding that Supreme Court precedent does not sustain the ban. Under those decisions plainly lewd speech, which offends for the same reasons obscenity offends, may be categorically restricted regardless of whether it comments on political or social issues; speech that does not rise to the level of plainly lewd but that a reasonable observer could interpret as lewd may be categorically restricted if it cannot plausibly be interpreted as commenting on such issues; and speech that does not rise to the level of plainly lewd and that could plausibly be interpreted as commenting on such issues may not be categorically restricted. The bracelets are not plainly lewd and comment on a social issue. The District did not show that the bracelets threatened to substantially disrupt school. View "B.H. v. Easton Area Sch. Dist." on Justia Law

Plaintiffs sued the school district over an alleged violation of First Amendment rights because plaintiffs' third-grade son was prevented from distributing a "candy cane ink pen" with a laminated card containing a religious message. The court concluded that it had jurisdiction because it was well-established under Texas law that the district's governmental immunity was not a mere defense to suit but rather was complete immunity from suit. And because governmental immunity from suit defeated a trial court's jurisdiction, whether a trial court had jurisdiction was a question of law subject to de novo review. Section 110.06 of the Texas Religious Freedom Restoration Act (TRFRA), Tex. Civ. Prac. & Rem. Code 110.001-110.012, required pre-suit notice in the form of certified mail, return receipt requested. The court concluded that the district's governmental immunity was not waived because it was undisputed that plaintiffs' demand letter did not comply with the jurisdictional pre-suit notice requirements. View "Morgan, et al. v. Plano Indep. Sch. Dist." on Justia Law

Plaintiffs filed a due-process complaint against the DOE seeking tuition reimbursement after plaintiffs enrolled their autistic child in a private school because the DOE failed to provide the child with a free and appropriate public education under the Individuals with Disabilities Education Improvement Act (IDEA), 20 U.S.C. 1400 et seq. The court affirmed the state review officer's determination that the hearing record did not support the impartial hearing officer's determination that the lack of a functional behavior assessment (FBA) rose to the level of denying the child a free and appropriate public education (FAPE) where the individualized education program (IEP) addressed behavioral needs. Further, the IEP's failure to include parental counseling did not deny the child a FAPE; the SRO did not rely upon impermissible retrospection and the court deferred to her analysis; and the court found plaintiffs' remaining arguments to be without merit. Accordingly, the court affirmed the grant of summary judgment in favor of defendants. View "M.W. v. New York City Dep't of Educ." on Justia Law