Justia Civil Rights Opinion Summaries

=O.B. who was attending the University on a football scholarship, repeatedly and violently assaulted Plaintiff, his fellow student, in an off-campus house where O.B. was living with other university football players. At the time of the assault, university officials knew that O.B. had repeatedly and violently assaulted two other female undergraduates the previous year. Plaintiff sued the University under Title IX. The district court granted summary judgment to the University.   The Ninth Circuit reversed the district court’s summary judgment. The en banc court held that to obtain damages under Title IX for student-on-student harassment, a plaintiff must show (1) that the educational institution had substantial control over both the harasser and the context in which the known harassment occurs; (2) that the harassment was so severe, pervasive, and objectively offensive that it denied its victims the equal access to education that Title IX is designed to protect; (3) that a school official with authority to address the alleged discrimination and to institute corrective measures has actual knowledge of the discrimination; (4) that the school acted with deliberate indifference to the harassment; and (5) that the school’s deliberate indifference must cause students to undergo harassment. The en banc court held that evidence in the record would support a conclusion by a reasonable factfinder that University officials had actual knowledge or notice of O.B.’s violent assaults and that Erika Barnes, the University’s Title IX liaison within the Athletics Department, was an official who had authority to address O.B.’s assaults and to institute corrective measures. View "MACKENZIE BROWN, ET AL V. STATE OF ARIZONA, ET AL" on Justia Law

Creighton Preparatory School expelled Plaintiff after he made lewd remarks about a teacher. Plaintiff sued Creighton under Title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972 on the theory that the school had discriminated against him by failing to perform an “adequate and impartial investigation.” The district court granted Creighton’s motion to dismiss. It first dismissed the Title IX claim because Plaintiff had failed to “allege [that] his sex played any part in the disciplinary process at all.” Then, with the federal question gone, it declined to exercise supplemental jurisdiction over Plaintiff’s breach-of-contract claim.The Eighth Circuit affirmed. The court explained that Plaintiff does not allege that Creighton faced external pressure to punish male students, much less gave in by expelling him. The court reasoned that without an allegation of that kind, the complaint fails to plausibly allege the sort of “causal connection between the flawed outcome and gender bias” required to make an erroneous outcome theory work.Further, the court wrote that treating men and women differently can support an inference of sex discrimination, but it requires identifying a similarly situated member of the opposite sex who has been “treated more favorably.” For Plaintiff, he had to find “a female accused of sexual harassment” who received better treatment. There are no female students at Creighton, an all-boys school, let alone any who have faced sexual-misconduct allegations. The court explained that to the extent that Plaintiff argues that believing them over him raises an inference of discrimination, there is nothing alleged that the school did so because of his sex. View "Elijah Wells v. Creighton Preparatory School" on Justia Law

Biggs served as interim principal of Burke Elementary School on an at-will basis. Under the Chicago Public Schools (CPS) Transportation Policy, no CPS school employee may drive a student in a personal vehicle without written consent from the school’s principal and the student’s legal guardian. The principal must retain copies of the driver's license and insurance documentation. An investigation revealed that for many years, Biggs had directed her subordinates to mark late students as tardy, rather than absent, regardless of how many instructional minutes they received in a day, which likely skewed Burke’s attendance data. Biggs admitted that she had ordered Burke employees to pick up students in personal vehicles without written parental consent and did not keep copies of the drivers’ licenses or insurance documentation. Biggs was fired and designated Do Not Hire. The designation does not necessarily prevent the employee from being hired at a non-CPS school. It was disclosed at community meetings that Biggs’s firing was “about integrity” and a redacted copy of the report was read aloud.Biggs sued, 42 U.S.C. 1983, alleging deprivation of her liberty to pursue her occupation without due process, citing "stigmatizing public statements" in connection with her termination. The Seventh Circuit affirmed the summary judgment rejection of the suit. No reasonable jury could find that Biggs had suffered a tangible loss of employment opportunities within her occupation; she experienced nothing more than the customary difficulties and delays that individuals encounter when looking for a new job, especially after being fired. View "Biggs v. Chicago Board of Education" on Justia Law

The University of Iowa expelled graduate student John Doe after investigating two accusations of sexual misconduct brought against him by different complainants. The Iowa Board of Regents affirmed the decision. Doe sued the University and University officials, claiming, in part, discrimination on the basis of sex under Title IX, 20 U.S.C. Section 1681(a), and procedural due process violations, 42 U.S.C. Section 1983. The district court granted qualified immunity to the University officials, dismissed the procedural due process claims against them, and granted the University summary judgment on the remaining claims.   The Eighth Circuit affirmed. The court explained that it is not convinced that institutional efforts to prevent sexual misconduct on campus, including educational programs that challenge students to evaluate the impact of gender norms on rape culture, amount to evidence of external pressure on the University that supports an inference of bias. The court held that Doe failed to provide “sufficient evidence to allow a reasonable jury to find that [the University] disciplined him on the basis of sex.” Accordingly, the court affirmed the district court’s grant of summary judgment on Doe’s Title IX claim. Further, the court explained that the University provided adequate notice of the charges. Therefore, the court wrote that because Doe failed to show the University officials’ conduct violated his federal rights, it affirmed the district court’s dismissal of Doe’s claims against the University officials. View "John Doe v. University of Iowa" on Justia Law

A nine-year-old girl took her own life after a classmate repeatedly delivered racist insults to her. The girl's mother and grandmother sought to hold the school system and several school officials accountable for her death. The family filed a lawsuit asserting claims arising under federal and state law against the school system and the school officials. The district court granted summary judgment to the school system and its officials, concluding that the family failed to satisfy various elements of their federal statutory claims and that qualified immunity barred at least one of the claims. The court concluded that the state law claims failed on immunity grounds. The family appealed.The Eleventh Circuit affirmed. Although the response of the school system and its officials was "truly discouraging," the standard for relief in cases of student-on-student harassment was not met. The court explained that a reasonable jury could not find that DCS acted with deliberate indifference, that it intentionally discriminated against the girl, or that Defendants' actions were arbitrary or conscience-shocking. Thus, the district court did not err in granting summary judgment to the defendants on the family's Title IX, Title VI, equal protection, and substantive due process claims. View "Jasmine Adams, et al v. Demopolis City Schools, et al" on Justia Law

Plaintiff brought an action against Defendants-Appellees Holy Cross College, Inc. and Congregation of Holy Cross Moreau Province, Inc. (collectively, “Holy Cross”) in the district court. Plaintiff alleged that he suffered from sexual abuse carried out by Holy Cross teacher on two separate occasions while attending summer camp at Holy Cross as a 10- or 11-year-old boy in either 1968 or 1969. Plaintiff asserted that Holy Cross is liable for the teacher’s conduct under the doctrine of respondeat superior. At the time of the alleged abuse, such an offense was subject to a one-year liberative prescriptive period. Plaintiff invoked the Revival Provision as his basis to bring a suit. The district court granted Holy Cross’s motion and dismissed Plaintiff’s complaint.   The Fifth Circuit vacated and remanded. The court explained that while the appeal was pending, the Louisiana Supreme Court issued its decision in T.S v. Congregation of Holy Cross Southern Province, Inc., 2023 WL 4195778. The court wrote that with the benefit of the T.S. decision, the court is now certain as to how this case should be resolved under Louisiana law. As previously noted, the facts of both cases are nearly identical. Therefore, it is apparent that the district court should not have ruled on the Revival Provision’s constitutionality. Instead, it is now clear that the Revival Provision’s wording makes it inapplicable to Plaintiff’s claims. Accordingly, his complaint should be dismissed for that sole reason. The court directed that on remand, the district court may consider whether Plaintiff should be provided with leave to amend his complaint. View "Lousteau v. Holy Cross College" on Justia Law

The Center for Scientific Integrity (CSI) was an organization that reported on academic retractions and accountability. CSI wrote an article about plaintiff-respondent Constance Iloh, a professor at the University of California, Irvine (UCI), after several academic journals retracted articles Iloh had written due to concerns about possible plagiarism or inaccurate citation references. In a follow-up to that article, CSI sent UCI a records request under the California Public Records Act (CPRA) requesting Iloh’s postpublication communications with the journals and UCI. Iloh petitioned for a writ of mandate, declaratory relief, and injunctive relief against UCI to prevent disclosure of her communications, and later added CSI as a real party in interest. She then filed a motion for preliminary injunction to prevent disclosure. Meanwhile, CSI filed a motion to strike Iloh’s petition under the anti-SLAPP (strategic lawsuit against public participation) statute. The Court of Appeal’s first opinion in this case concerned Iloh’s motion for preliminary injunction. The trial court denied that motion on the grounds that Iloh had not established a likelihood of prevailing on the merits, and the Court affirmed that order. In this case, the Court considered CSI’s anti-SLAPP motion. The trial court denied the motion, finding that although protected activity may have led to the petition, it was not the “basis” for the petition. To this, the Court disagreed: in issuing the CPRA request, CSI was engaging in newsgathering so it could report on matters of public interest, such as how a public university funded largely by taxpayer dollars resolved quality or integrity problems in its professors’ publications. CSI was therefore engaged in protected activity when it issued the CPRA request. Iloh filed her petition for mandamus relief to prevent UCI from complying with the CPRA request. “This is the type of lawsuit the anti-SLAPP statute is designed to address, and it should be stricken if Iloh cannot demonstrate a probability of prevailing on her petition.” The Court of Appeal found the trial court had not performed the second prong of the anti-SLAPP analysis. Therefore, the Court reversed the order denying CSI’s anti-SLAPP motion and remanded this case with directions that the trial court consider prong two of the anti-SLAPP statute. View "Iloh v. Regents of the University of California" on Justia Law

Doe, a University of Michigan student, was accused of sexual assault in 2018. Before the University’s investigation had concluded, he sued. alleging that the University’s disciplinary procedures for cases involving sexual assault violated his due process rights. The district court granted him a preliminary injunction preventing the disciplinary process from proceeding. The Sixth Circuit remanded for reconsideration in light of “Baum,” in which it held that the University’s disciplinary procedures violated due process and in light of the University’s new disciplinary policy implemented in response to that decision.The district court granted in part and denied in part the University’s motion to dismiss and granted in part Doe’s motion for partial summary judgment. The University appealed again, renewing its jurisdictional arguments. Before the appeal was heard, the complainant decided she no longer wished to participate. The Sixth Circuit determined that the appeal had become moot and vacated the summary judgment order. Doe then sought attorney fees, which the district court granted.The University appealed again. The Sixth Circuit vacated, noting that issues of ripeness, standing, and mootness have gone unaddressed through more than five years of litigation. Doe had standing to sue to seek the release of his transcript but that the district court lacked jurisdiction over his remaining claims. Doe was the prevailing party only as to his due process claim seeking the release of his transcript. View "Doe v. University of Michigan" on Justia Law

Louisiana State University (“LSU”) (collectively “the Professors”) appealed the district court’s denial of qualified immunity after Plaintiff alleged that they violated his Fourteenth Amendment right to due process by conspiring to prevent his continued enrollment in Louisiana State University’s (“LSU”) theatre program.   The Fifth Circuit reversed the district court’s determination that they were not entitled to qualified immunity and dismissed Plaintiff’s claims. The court held that the Professors lacked adequate notice that their conduct was violative of Plaintiff’s constitutional rights, and because they did not have this notice, they are entitled to qualified immunity. The court explained that the clearly established standard requires more than that—there must be a “high degree of specificity” between the alleged misconduct and the caselaw purporting to clearly establish the violation. Without it, the requisite “fair warning” required under the clearly established inquiry is absent. View "Babinski v. Sosnowsky" on Justia Law

Idaho enacted the Fairness in Women’s Sports Act, Idaho Code §§ 33-6201–06 (2020) (the “Act”), a first-of-its-kind categorical ban on the participation of transgender women and girls in women’s student athletics. Elite athletic regulatory bodies also had policies allowing transgender women athletes to compete if they met certain criteria. The Act, however, bars all transgender girls and women from participating in, or even trying out for, public school female sports teams at every age. At issue is whether the federal district court for the District of Idaho abused its discretion in August 2020 when it preliminarily enjoined the Act, holding that it likely violated the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment.   The Ninth Circuit affirmed the district court’s order. The panel held that the district court did not abuse its discretion when it found that plaintiffs were likely to succeed on the merits of their claim that the Act violates the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. Because the Act subjects only women and girls who wish to participate in public school athletic competitions to an intrusive sex verification process and categorically bans transgender women and girls at all levels, regardless of whether they have gone through puberty or hormone therapy, from competing on female, women, or girls teams, and because the State of Idaho failed to adduce any evidence demonstrating that the Act is substantially related to its asserted interests in sex equality and opportunity for women athletes, the panel held that plaintiffs were likely to succeed on the merits of their equal protection claim. View "LINDSAY HECOX, ET AL V. BRADLEY LITTLE, ET AL" on Justia Law