Justia Civil Rights Opinion Summaries

The Fifth Circuit affirmed the district court's dismissal of plaintiff's First Amendment claim alleging political retaliation. Plaintiff was the Crime Victims Unit (CVU) Coordinator for the 229th Judicial District Attorney's Office and defendant was her boss, the District Attorney.As a preliminary matter, the court rejected plaintiff's claim that the district court erred by disposing of the complaint at the Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 12(c) stage. On the merits, the court held that plaintiff's employment was not shielded by the First Amendment and the district court correctly concluded that she was subject to the patronage dismissal exception to First Amendment retaliation claims. In this case, plaintiff's position as CVU Coordinator is a confidential or policymaking role, and one for which "party affiliation is an appropriate requirement for effective performance." The court also held that because plaintiff has not plausibly alleged a constitutional claim, her municipal liability claim was also properly dismissed. View "Garza v. Escobar" on Justia Law

After the City of Austin denied applications to digitize existing billboards, Reagan and Lamar filed suit alleging that the distinction in the City's Sign Code between on-premises and off-premises signs violates the First Amendment.The Fifth Circuit held that the City's Sign Code's on-premises/off-premises distinction is content based and the commercial speech exception does not apply. The court held that the Sign Code runs afoul of the First Amendment because the relevant provisions of the Sign Code are not narrowly tailored to serve the compelling government interest of protecting the aesthetic value of the City and public safety. In this case, the ordinance is underinclusive. Accordingly, the court reversed the district court's decision to the contrary and remanded. View "Reagan National Advertising of Austin, Inc. v. City of Austin" on Justia Law

The Fifth Circuit affirmed the district court's dismissal of plaintiff's complaint alleging retaliation under Title VII, based on lack of statutory standing. Plaintiff was employed by Prelle Financial Group as a third-party wholesaler of life-insurance products to clients of UBS. Plaintiff alleged that he was the intentional target of the retaliation against his daughter, who was an employee of UBS.The court agreed with the district court and held that plaintiff's nonemployee status forecloses his statutory standing to sue because Title VII claims require an employment relationship between plaintiff and defendant. The court held that plaintiff's daughter's status as an employee is not enough to deposit plaintiff into federal court. Rather, plaintiff must show that his personal interests are arguably covered, which he has failed to do. View "Simmons v. UBS Financial Services, Inc." on Justia Law

Plaintiff filed suit against a correctional officer and several staff members and administrators under 42 U.S.C. 1983, as well as state tort law, for allegedly failing to protect him from an attack by another inmate in violation of the Eighth Amendment. After defendants successfully moved to dismiss for failure to state a claim under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 12(b)(6), the district court denied plaintiff's motion to alter or amend the judgment under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 59(e).The Fifth Circuit affirmed, holding that plaintiff failed to allege that the correctional officer was negligent, much less that he consciously disregarded any risk of serious harm when the inmate attacked plaintiff. In this case, plaintiff moved to alter or amend the judgment based on the affidavit of a fellow inmate who claimed to have witnessed at least one food-slot attack a week, and often more than one a day, over the past fifteen years. The court held that the inmate's claim to have witnessed roughly a thousand food-slot assaults was not credible and that even if it was, it did not demonstrate that defendants were aware of a specific danger to plaintiff. Finally, the court denied all pending motions as moot. View "Torres v. Livingston" on Justia Law

Almost three years after a federal district court declared that Texas Senate Bill 8 placed an undue burden on a woman's right to access a previability abortion and enjoined its enforcement, the State seeks to stay the judgment.The Fifth Circuit denied the state's motion for a stay and held that June Medical Servs. LLC v. Russo, 140 S. Ct. 2103 (2020), has not disturbed the undue-burden test, and Whole Woman's Health v. Hellerstedt, 136 S. Ct. 2292 (2016), remains binding law in this circuit. Under this circuit's reading of the Marks principle, that the challenged Louisiana law posed an undue burden on women seeking an abortion is the full extent of June Medical's ratio decidendi. The court stated that the decision does not furnish a new controlling rule as to how to perform the undue-burden test. Therefore, the court held that Hellerstedt's formulation of the test continues to govern this case, and because the district court correctly applied Hellerstedt's balancing test, remand is not warranted.The court also held that the state's law is patently procedurally defective where the state's failure to show the impracticability of moving first in the district court under Federal Rule of Appellate Procedure 8(2) is sufficient grounds to deny its motion. View "Whole Woman's Health v. Paxton" on Justia Law

Plaintiffs filed suit challenging the efforts of New Jersey's Attorney General and others to thwart plaintiffs' distribution of materials related to the 3D printing of firearms, alleging infringement of plaintiffs' First Amendment rights and state law claims. The district court granted the Attorney General's motion to dismiss for lack of personal jurisdiction, relying on Stroman Realty, Inc. v. Wercinski, 513 F.3d 476 (5th Cir. 2008).The Fifth Circuit held that the Attorney General has established sufficient minimum contacts with Texas to subject him to the jurisdiction of Texas' courts. The court held that Stroman is distinguishable from this case in at least two key respects: first, many of plaintiffs' claims are based on the Attorney General's cease-and-desist letter; and second, the Attorney General's assertion of legal authority is much broader than the public official in Stroman. Furthermore, the Attorney General failed to timely raise arguments regarding whether judgment in plaintiffs favor would offend traditional notions of fair play and substantial justice. The court applied the principles discussed in Wien Air Alaska, Inc. v. Brandt, 195 F.3d 208 (5th Cir. 1999), and Calder v. Jones, 465 U.S. 783, 104 S. Ct. 1482 (1984), and held that jurisdiction over the Attorney General is proper. Accordingly, the court reversed and remanded for further proceedings. View "Defense Distributed v. Grewal" on Justia Law

The Fifth Circuit affirmed the district court's denial of a petition for habeas relief under 28 U.S.C. 2241. Petitioner claimed that he was improperly denied release to home confinement under the First Step Act's Elderly Offender Home Detention Program.The court liberally construed the petition as asserting a Bivens civil rights claim and held that Congress has vested the executive branch, not the judicial branch, with the power to decide which prisoners may participate in the Program. In this case, petitioner argued in the district court that defendant wrongly declined petitioner's request for participation in the Program based on a prior disciplinary proceeding for which he was sanctioned for "attempted escape." The court explained that petitioner's claim would have required the district court to assess his prior actions and make a determination as to whether those actions constituted an escape attempt. However, only defendant had authority to make that determination for purposes of petitioner's eligibility for the Program. The court stated that 34 U.S.C. 60541(g) does not give federal courts the power to do so. The court held that petitioner did not raise a due process argument involving his prior disciplinary proceedings in the district court and may not raise them for the first time on appeal. View "Melot v. Bergami" on Justia Law

The Fifth Circuit affirmed the district court's judgment that petitioner's Rule 60(b) motion was a successive habeas petition. The court held that when a court order disposes of a habeas claim on procedural and, in the alternative, substantive grounds, a Rule 60(b) motion contesting this order inherently presents a successive habeas petition. In this case, petitioner's Rule 60(b) motion—facially challenging a procedural ruling and implicitly challenging a merits determination—presents a habeas claim. Therefore, the district court correctly held that it lacked jurisdiction to consider the motion under the Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act.The court also affirmed the denial of petitioner's inherent-prejudice claim where petitioner identifies no clearly established law that the CCA misapplied, nor any unreasonable factual determinations on which that court based its holding. View "Will v. Lumpkin" on Justia Law

Plaintiff challenged the district court's summary judgment dismissal of her action for intentional discrimination under 42 U.S.C. 1983 and Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, as well as retaliation under Louisiana's Whistleblower Statute (LWS).The Fifth Circuit affirmed the district court's dismissal of plaintiff's discrimination claims, rejecting plaintiff's claim of intentional discrimination rooted in Christwood's failure to timely list her with the state as a director, claim of discriminatory pay, claim of discriminatory demotion, and claim of constructive discharge. The court reversed the district court's dismissal of plaintiff's whistleblower claim, holding that Christwood was plaintiff's employer. Because the district court concluded that Christwood was not an employer, it failed to address the remainder of plaintiff's LWS claim. Therefore, the court vacated the dismissal of the LWS claim and remanded for further consideration. View "Sanders v. Christwood" on Justia Law

Plaintiff filed suit against Wal-Mart for retaliation and wrongful termination and an assistant manager at Wal-Mart for tortious interference with an employment contract. Plaintiff alleged that she was fired after she reported her supervisor for sexually harassing other Wal-Mart employees. Wal-Mart alleged that plaintiff was terminated because she violated Wal-Mart’s Investigation and Detention of Shoplifters Policy.The Fifth Circuit affirmed the district court's grant of summary judgment for defendants, holding that plaintiff has met her prima facie burden of causation by showing close enough timing between the protected activity and the adverse employment action. However, the temporal proximity between plaintiff's protected activity and her termination is relevant to, but not alone sufficient to demonstrate, pretext. The court also held that a reasonable jury could not find that the supervisor's actions were the but-for cause of Wal-Mart's termination of plaintiff based on the record. View "Brown v. Wal-Mart Stores East, LP" on Justia Law