Justia U.S. 5th Circuit Court of Appeals Opinion Summaries

Police officers filed suit under 42 U.S.C. 1983, 1988, alleging, inter alia, that the Lafayette PD Defendants imposed a "code of silence" to prevent police officers from reporting certain civil rights abuses and corruption within the police department and that these defendants retaliated against them for objecting to these practices. On appeal, police officers challenged the district court's grant of a protective order requiring, among other things, that a particular website they operated be "taken down" in its entirety, which was issued at the request of officials and entities within the Lafayette PD. Concluding that the court had appellate jurisdiction over the appeal, the court held that the district court erred in concluding that the entirety of the website was substantially likely to cause prejudice; the district court's determination that the entire website demonstrated a substantial likelihood of impacting the jury venire was overbroad and clearly erroneous; and, therefore, the court vacated and remanded for further proceedings. View "Marceaux, et al. v. Lafayette City-Parish Con. Gov't, et al." on Justia Law

Plaintiffs filed suit against the Secretary of the Department of the Army, alleging age discrimination and retaliation claims. As a threshold matter, the court concluded that the Age Discrimination in Employment Act's (ADEA), 29 U.S.C. 621 et seq., federal sector provision applied here, and the court need not decide whether a federal plaintiff must prove but-for-causation or some lesser standard under 29 U.S.C. 633a because plaintiffs' complaint stated a claim for relief under the heightened, but-for standard in Gross v. FBL Financial Services, Inc. On the merits, the court concluded that the district court plaintiffs have stated a claim for which relief could be granted under section 633a where plaintiffs were within the protected class under the ADEA, plaintiffs were qualified for the two newly-created positions at issue; plaintiffs were not selected for the positions; a "substantially younger" employee was selected for one of the positions instead; and one of the officials with decision-making authority over the younger employee's selection said that the department needed "new blood." Accordingly, the court reversed the district court's dismissal of plaintiffs' age discrimination claims and remanded for further proceedings. The court affirmed in all other respects. View "Leal, et al. v. McHugh" on Justia Law

Plaintiff, a former assistant attorney general for the Louisiana DOJ, claimed that LDOJ discriminated against her by declining to provide a free on-site parking space to accommodate her disability in violation of the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA), 42 U.S.C. 12101 et seq., and violated the ADA and Title VII of the Civil Rights Act, 42 U.S.C. 2000e-1 et seq., by terminating her employment in retaliation for charges she filed with the EEOC. The court concluded that, because the district court erred in requiring a nexus between the requested accommodation and the essential functions of plaintiff's position, the court vacated the judgment and remanded for further proceedings. The court affirmed the summary judgment dismissal of the retaliation claim because the LDOJ has offered a non-retaliatory explanation for plaintiff's dismissal and because plaintiff has presented no evidence of pretext. View "Feist v. State of Louisiana" on Justia Law

Trout Point sought to enforce a defamation-based default judgment that they obtained against defendant in Nova Scotia, Canada. Defendant, owner and operator of a public affairs blog, published entries on his blog alleging a link between Aaron Broussard, the former Parish President of Jefferson Parish, Louisiana, and Trout Point Lodge and others. At issue was the newly-enacted Securing the Protection of our Enduring and Established Constitutional Heritage Act (SPEECH Act), 28 U.S.C. 4102. The court affirmed the district court's determination that Trout Point could not satisfy its burden under the SPEECH Act of showing that either (A) Nova Scotian law provided at least as much protection for freedom of speech and press in defendant's case as would be provided by the First Amendment and relevant state law, or (B) defendant would have been found liable for defamation by a Mississippi court. View "Trout Point Lodge, Ltd., et al. v. Handshoe" on Justia Law

Louisiana's Patient's Compensation Fund served two objectives: (1) fostering a stable market for affordable insurance and (2) ensuring that victims of malpractice could recover for their injuries. Louisiana's Act 825 provided that any person who performed an abortion was liable to the mother of the unborn child for any damage occasioned or precipitated by the abortion. Plaintiffs, three healthcare providers, challenged the constitutionality of Act 825 facially, as applied to physicians enrolled in the Fund "who face or will face medical malpractice claims related to abortion," and as applied under the circumstances of this case. The court concluded that plaintiffs lacked standing to challenge subsection (A) of Act 825; plaintiffs had standing to challenge subsection (C)(2); the case was not moot; and the Eleventh Amendment did not bar plaintiffs' challenge to subsection (C)(2). On the merits, the court concluded that Act 825 did not violate the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment where subsection (C)(2) was rationally related to the promotion of informed consent. Accordingly, the court reversed the judgment of the district court striking down subsection (C)(2). The court vacated its judgment regarding subsection (A) and dismissed the claim for want of jurisdiction. View "K. P., et al. v. LeBlanc, et al." on Justia Law

Plaintiff filed suit against his employer, W-G, under the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA), 42 U.S.C. 12101 et seq., and the Family Medical Leave Act, 29 U.S.C. 2601 et seq., after W-G terminated his employment. The court affirmed the district court's grant of summary judgment for W-G on the ADA claim, concluding that plaintiff was "currently engaging" in illegal drug use and was fired "on the basis of such use," and that plaintiff did not qualify for the safe harbor under section 12114(b). The court also affirmed summary judgment in favor of W-G on plaintiff's FMLA claim where no reasonable jury could find that he was denied reinstatement for any reason other than his refusal to continue his FMLA leave period for the express purpose for which it was taken, which was completing his drug dependency treatment. View "Shirley v. Precision Castparts Corp., et al." on Justia Law

Plaintiff filed suit under 42 U.S.C. 1983 after the City's police sergeant sexually abused her. Defendants are state officers involved in the investigation and arrest of the sergeant. The court concluded that plaintiff failed to state a claim under either her deliberate indifference or bystander liability theory against defendants. Consequently, there was no constitutional violation for which Defendants Hanna and Bullock would need qualified immunity. Finally, the district court correctly denied plaintiff's motion to amend her complaint where amendment would be futile. Accordingly, the court affirmed the judgment. View "Whitley v. Hanna, et al." on Justia Law

The Government filed three applications under section 2703 of the Stored Communications Act (SCA), 18 U.S.C. 2701-2712, seeking evidence relevant to three separate criminal investigations. At issue on appeal was whether court orders authorized by the Act to compel cell phone service providers to produce the historical cell site information of their subscribers were per se unconstitutional. The court concluded that cell site data are business records and should be analyzed under that line of Supreme Court precedent; because the magistrate judge and district court treated the data as tracking information, they applied the wrong legal standard; using the proper framework, the Act's authorization of section 2703(d) orders for historical cell site information if an application meets the lesser "specific and articulable facts" standard, rather than the Fourth Amendment probable cause standard, was not per se unconstitutional; and as long as the Government met the statutory requirements, the Act did not give the magistrate judge discretion to deny the Government's application for such an order. Accordingly, the court vacated and remanded with instructions to grant the applications. View "In re: Application of the U.S. for Historical Cell Site Data" 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

Plaintiff, an employee of the Hays County Sheriff's Office for over twenty years, filed suit alleging constitutional violations against Hays County; the Sheriff's Office; and Sheriff Gary Cutler, in his official and individual capacities. Plaintiff claimed that the comments he made during the Sheriff's Election motivated his demotion. The court found that defendants failed to show that they would have terminated plaintiff in the absence of his protected speech and, in the alternative, plaintiff was speaking as a citizen and his letter to the editor was protected speech under the First Amendment. The court concluded that plaintiff had presented sufficient evidence to raise a genuine dispute as to a material fact relating to his claim of First Amendment retaliation and that defendants were not entitled to summary judgment on the basis of qualified immunity. Accordingly, the court reversed the district court's grant of summary judgment and remanded for further proceedings. View "Haverda v. Hays County, et al." on Justia Law