Justia Civil Rights Opinion Summaries

Plaintiff appealed the district court’s judgment granting summary judgment in favor of Defendants County of Suffolk, Suffolk County District Attorney’s Office Division Chief Edward Heilig, and Suffolk County District Attorney’s Office Special Investigations Bureau Chief Joseph Carroll. Plaintiff was a Clerk Typist in the District Attorney’s Office from 2008 until her employment in the Special Investigations Bureau was terminated in 2015. She alleged that defendants discriminated against her based on her disability and retaliated against her for seeking an accommodation for that disability, in violation of the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990, the New York State Human Rights Law, N.Y. Exec. Law Section 296, and 42 U.S.C. Section 1983. On appeal, Plaintiff argued that the district court erred in granting summary judgment on her reasonable accommodation and retaliation claims.   The Second Circuit affirmed the district court’s judgment as to Plaintiff’s Section 1983 claim and vacated the district court’s judgment with respect to the reasonable accommodation and retaliation claims. The court agreed with Plaintiff that the district court erred in granting summary judgment on her reasonable accommodation and retaliation claims. The court explained that construing the evidence most favorably to Plaintiff, a rational jury could find that archiving was not an essential function of Plaintiff’s position and that defendants failed to provide a reasonable workplace accommodation for her disability. The court similarly concluded that disputed issues of material fact preclude summary judgment on Plaintiff’s retaliation claim. View "Tafolla v. Heilig" on Justia Law

Plaintiff painted two large murals directly onto the walls inside a building on the campus of Defendant-Appellee Vermont Law School, Inc. The work stirred controversy, which eventually prompted the law school to erect a wall of acoustic panels around the murals to permanently conceal them from public view. Kerson brought suit against the law school, alleging that obscuring his work behind a permanent barrier violated his rights under the Visual Artists Rights Act of 1990 (“VARA”), which creates a cause of action for artists to prevent the modification and, in certain instances, destruction of works of visual art.   The Second Circuit affirmed. The court held that merely ensconcing a work of art behind a barrier neither modifies nor destroys the work, as contemplated by VARA, and thus does not implicate VARA’s protections. The court explained that this case presents weighty concerns that pin an artist’s moral right to maintain the integrity of an artwork against a private entity’s control over the art in its possession. On the facts presented here, the court resolved this tension by hewing to the statutory text, which reflects Congress’s conscientious balancing of the competing interests at stake.  Because mere concealment of the Murals neither “modifies” nor “destroys” them, the Law School has not violated any of VARA’s prohibitions. As such, VARA does not entitle Plaintiff to an order directing the Law School to take the barrier down and continue to display the Murals. View "Kerson v. Vermont Law School, Inc." on Justia Law

Petitioner is a former employee of International Business Machines Corporation (“IBM”) who signed a separation agreement requiring confidential arbitration of any claims arising from her termination. Petitioner arbitrated an age-discrimination claim against IBM and won. She then filed a petition in federal court under the Federal Arbitration Act (“FAA”) to confirm the award, attaching it to the petition under seal but simultaneously moving to unseal it. Shortly after she filed the petition, IBM paid the award in full. The district court granted Petitioner’s petition to confirm the award and her motion to unseal. On appeal, IBM argued that (1) the petition to confirm became moot once IBM paid the award, and (2) the district court erred in unsealing the confidential award.   The Second Circuit vacated the district court’s confirmation of the award and remanded with instructions to dismiss the petition as moot. The court reversed the district court’s grant of the motion to unseal. The court explained that Petitioner’s petition to confirm her purely monetary award became moot when IBM paid the award in full because there remained no “concrete” interest in enforcement of the award to maintain a case or controversy under Article III. Second, any presumption of public access to judicial documents is outweighed by the importance of confidentiality under the FAA and the impropriety of Petitioner’s effort to evade the confidentiality provision in her arbitration agreement. View "Stafford v. Int'l Bus. Machs. Corp." on Justia Law

Plaintiff appealed the district court’s judgment dismissing her claims of age, race, and gender discrimination and retaliation under the Age Discrimination in Employment Act, 29 U.S.C. Section 621 et seq., Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, 42 U.S.C. Section 2000e et seq., and the Civil Rights Act of 1866, 42 U.S.C. Section 1981. On appeal, Plaintiff argued that the district court applied an incorrect legal standard to her retaliation claim and that it erroneously concluded that she had failed to demonstrate that Defendants’ race-neutral explanations for not selecting her for two internal promotions were pretextual.   The Second Circuit affirmed. The court held that Plaintiff has not demonstrated that Defendants’ explanations for her non-promotions were pretextual. Second, the court held that although the district court applied an incorrect standard to her retaliatory hostile work environment claim, Plaintiff has nevertheless failed to make out a prima facie case of retaliation and did not demonstrate that her employer’s non-retaliatory explanations were pretextual. The court explained that Defendant’s evidence supporting summary judgment established that Plaintiff received negative performance evaluations because she was not adequately or timely completing her duties and had become increasingly challenging to work with. The court wrote that Plaintiff has not rebutted this showing with evidence demonstrating that the reasons the NYCTA provided for the poor performance reviews were pretextual. Instead, she argues that the performance reviews must have been retaliatory due to their temporal proximity to her complaints. But she offers nothing more to establish causation. View "Carr v. New York City Transit Authority" on Justia Law

In 2005, a federal district court entered a permanent injunction against several pro-life advocates enjoining them from entering the public sidewalk within fifteen feet of the entrance of any abortion clinic in the Western District of New York. Twelve years later, in 2017, Plaintiff, who was not a named party to the 2005 permanent injunction, started sidewalk counseling near the Planned Parenthood facility in Rochester, New York. After Defendants, the New York Attorney General and the City of Rochester decided that Plaintiff was bound by the 2005 permanent injunction, he sued, seeking a declaratory judgment that he was not bound by the injunction. He also moved for a preliminary injunction to prevent Defendants from applying the injunction to his counseling activities. The district court dismissed his suit for failure to state a claim and denied his motion for a preliminary injunction.   The Second Circuit reversed the judgment of the district court insofar as it dismissed Plaintiff’s complaint and vacated the judgment insofar as it denied Plaintiff’s motion for a preliminary injunction. The court remanded for further proceedings. The court held that a person who is not a named party to an injunction or legally identified with a named party is bound by the injunction only from acting for the benefit of, or to assist, an enjoined party in violating the injunction. The allegations in Plaintiff’s complaint do not establish that he so acted and therefore state a claim for declaratory relief. View "Havens v. James" on Justia Law

Plaintiffs are twenty-six former employees of International Business Machines Corporation (“IBM”) who signed separation agreements requiring them to arbitrate any claims arising from their termination by IBM. The agreements set a deadline for initiating arbitration and included a confidentiality requirement. Plaintiffs missed the deadline but nonetheless tried to arbitrate claims under the Age Discrimination in Employment Act of 1967 (“ADEA”). Their arbitrations were dismissed as untimely. They then sued IBM in district court, seeking a declaration that the deadline is unenforceable because it does not incorporate the “piggybacking rule,” a judge-made exception to the ADEA’s administrative exhaustion requirements. Shortly after filing suit, Plaintiffs moved for summary judgment and attached various documents obtained by Plaintiffs’ counsel in other confidential arbitration proceedings. IBM moved to seal the confidential documents. The district court granted IBM’s motions to dismiss and seal the documents. On appeal, Plaintiffs argued that (1) the filing deadline in their separation agreements is unenforceable and (2) the district court abused its discretion by granting IBM’s motion to seal.   The Second Circuit affirmed. The court first wrote that the piggybacking rule does not apply to arbitration and, in any event, it is not a substantive right under the ADEA. Second, the court held that the presumption of public access to judicial documents is outweighed here by the Federal Arbitration Act’s (“FAA”) strong policy in favor of enforcing arbitral confidentiality provisions and the impropriety of counsel’s attempt to evade the agreement by attaching confidential documents to a premature motion for summary judgment. View "In re IBM Arb. Agreement Litig." on Justia Law

Plaintiff Jane Doe alleged that for a period of seven years, she suffered sexual, physical, and psychological abuse at the hands of an Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officer. Four years after the alleged abuse ended, Doe brought this action against the officer, the United States, the Department of Homeland Security, and two senior DHS officials, asserting various federal and state claims. The district court granted Defendants’ motions for summary judgment based on the applicable statutes of limitations and denied Doe’s request for equitable tolling.   The Second Circuit vacated the district court’s ruling and held that the district court erred in granting summary judgment because the evidence in the record could have allowed it to conclude that the prerequisites for equitable tolling were met. The court explained that the record makes plausible the inferences that years of violent sexual abuse and threats to Doe’s life constituted an extraordinary circumstance preventing Doe from sooner pursuing her claims and that she acted with reasonable diligence. View "Doe v. United States" on Justia Law

Plaintiff appealed the district court’s judgment dismissing for failure to state a claim his suit against Defendant-Appellee New York State Department of Corrections and Community Supervision (“DOCCS”) for attorneys’ fees and costs under 20 U.S.C. Section 1415(i)(3)(B)(i), the fee-shifting provision of the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (“IDEA”).   The Second Circuit reversed and remanded. The court explained that the relevant provision permits a court, in its discretion, to award reasonable attorneys’ fees and related costs to “a prevailing party who is the parent of a child with a disability.” 20 U.S.C. Section 1415(i)(3)(B)(i)(I). The IDEA defines “parent” broadly to include, inter alia, foster parents, guardians, individuals “acting in the place of a natural or adoptive parent . . . with whom the child lives,” and “individual[s] who [are] legally responsible for the child’s welfare.” On de novo review, the court concluded that the IDEA permits a court to award fees and costs to J.S. as “an individual who is legally responsible for the child’s welfare” because, as an adult “child with a disability” and without representation by a guardian, natural parent, or appointed individual, he prevailed in his action on his own behalf seeking required educational services from DOCCS. View "J.S. v. DOCCS" on Justia Law

The Second Circuit vacated and remanded the district court’s ruling granting summary judgment for Defendants, a former Immigration and Customs Enforcement officer. Plaintiff, Jane Doe, alleged she was sexually and psychologically abused by Defendant, a former Immigration and Customs Enforcement officer. Four years after the abuse ended, Doe initiated this action against Rodriguez and various government defendants. Defendants moved for summary judgment, arguing Doe’s claims were untimely. Doe asked the district court to equitably toll the applicable statutes of limitations. The court granted summary judgment to Defendants.   The Second Circuit vacated and remanded. The court explained that in this case, the district court denied equitable tolling as a matter of law, purporting to draw every inference in favor of Doe. The court vacated its judgment because the record allows for a finding that Doe faced extraordinary circumstances and acted with reasonable diligence. On remand, the district court should act in a fact-finding capacity and determine whether Doe has demonstrated extraordinary circumstances and reasonable diligence. The court explained that if the court determines that she has established these prerequisites for equitable tolling, then it should engage in the discretionary determination of whether to grant her request for equitable tolling. View "Doe v. United States" on Justia Law

Plaintiffs, who operate small venue theaters in New York City, brought claims for declaratory and injunctive relief and nominal damages, alleging that the City’s Key to NYC program—which required certain indoor venues to check the COVID-19 vaccination status of patrons and staff before permitting entry—violated their rights to free speech and equal protection under the First and Fourteenth Amendments. Following the expiration of the Key to NYC program, the district court dismissed as moot Plaintiffs’ claims for declaratory and injunctive relief. The district court also dismissed Plaintiffs’ claim for nominal damages for lack of standing, concluding that Plaintiffs failed to plausibly allege an injury in fact. Plaintiffs now appeal that order.   The Second Circuit concluded that Plaintiffs have plausibly alleged Article III standing. However, the court affirmed the judgment of dismissal on the alternative ground of failure to state a claim. The court explained that Key to NYC does not impair a fundamental right because it does not violate Plaintiffs’ First Amendment rights. Nor does it target a suspect class. These are locations where large numbers of unassociated individuals are likely to gather and spend significant amounts of time exposed to one another, thereby posing a relatively high risk of spreading COVID-19. Requiring individuals in those settings to be vaccinated mitigated that risk and incentivized vaccination among the people most likely to be in a position to spread the virus. Accordingly, Plaintiffs have not plausibly alleged an equal protection violation. View "Clementine Co. v. Adams" on Justia Law