Justia U.S. 1st Circuit Court of Appeals Opinion Summaries

Articles Posted in November, 2014
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Plaintiff and his wife purchased a home in Massachusetts that was encumbered by a mortgage. The mortgage was eventually assigned to Defendant CitiMortgage, Inc. Defendant ultimately invoked its statutory power of sale and sent a notice of foreclosure sale to Plaintiff’s home address. Plaintiff sued, alleging breach of contract, unjust enrichment, and breach of the covenant of good faith and fair dealing. A federal district court granted summary judgment for Defendant on all counts and denied Plaintiff’s motion for reconsideration. The First Circuit affirmed the district court’s denial of Plaintiff’s motion for reconsideration, holding that none of the grounds advanced by Plaintiff for reversal of the district court’s denial of reconsideration warranted relief. View "Biltcliffe v. CitiMortgage, Inc." on Justia Law

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During the underlying litigation, Attorney Jeffrey Ryan, counsel for the plaintiff, attempted to engage in allegedly surreptitious communication with his client while a question was pending at a deposition. The district court granted Defendants’ motion for discovery sanctions, concluding that Ryan did indeed attempt to communicate surreptitiously with his client, that Ryan manufactured false evidence, and that Ryan lied to the court. The court ordered Ryan to pay monetary sanctions and directed him to show cause why it should not revoke his permission to practice pro hac vice for the plaintiff for flagrant violations of the Massachusetts Rules of Professional Conduct. After considering Ryan's response and conducting a de novo review of the entire record, the district court again found that Ryan lied to the court and opposing counsel and submitted false evidence and issued an order revoking Ryan’s pro hac vice admission. The First Circuit affirmed the orders revoking Ryan’s pro hac vice admission and imposing monetary sanctions, holding that the court did not abuse its discretion in issuing the sanction for Ryan’s misbehavior. View "Ryan v. Astra Tech, Inc." on Justia Law

Posted in: Legal Ethics
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At issue in this case was whether New Hampshire law requires a foreclosing entity to hold both mortgage and note before it can exercise a power of sale under N.H. Rev. Stat. Ann. 479:25, which authorizes a mortgagee to conduct a non-judicial foreclosure where, as in this case, the mortgage document contains a clause allowing them. Plaintiff executed a promissory note and a mortgage. The note and mortgage document and the note were subsequently assigned to different entities. After Plaintiff failed to make mortgage payments, Defendant, the mortgagee, moved to foreclose. Defendant removed the case from New Hampshire state court to federal court. The district court allowed Defendant’s motion to dismiss, concluding that the parties’ intent to separate the mortgage and note at the beginning of the transaction trumped any common law rule requiring unity, and thus, Defendant could proceed with the foreclosure under section 479:25. Plaintiff appealed. Because controlling state precedent did not provide definitive guidance on how to resolve the questions of whether the common law or state statute mandates the unity of a mortgage and note, and if so, whether parties can override that rule by agreement, the First Circuit certified the questions to the New Hampshire Supreme Court. View "Castagnaro v. Bank of New York Mellon" on Justia Law

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In Puerto Rico, the Controlled Access Law (CAL) allows private citizens to protect themselves against violent crimes by maintaining gated residential communities that incorporate public streets. In 2004, two corporations operated by the governing body of the Jehovah’s Witnesses brought suit against municipal defendants alleging that the CAL unconstitutionally infringed on the Jehovah’s Witnesses’ right to engage in door-to-door ministry. The district court established a remedial scheme that attempted to balance the competing interests of the parties. Both the Jehovah’s Witnesses and the municipalities appealed. The First Circuit upheld the district court’s solution but modified it in some aspects, holding that the district court did not abuse its discretion in crafting the remedy at issue. View "Watchtower Bible & Tract Soc’y of N.Y., Inc. v. Colombani" on Justia Law

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Defendant pleaded guilty to travel with intent to engage in criminal sexual activity. Defendant lodged no written objection to the sentence recommendations contained in the ensuing presentence report, nor did he object during the sentencing hearing. The district court ultimately sentenced Defendant to seventy-eight months in prison plus five years of supervised release. Defendant appealed from the imposition of his sentence, arguing that the application of an enhancement based on “a pattern of activity involving prohibited sexual conduct” was improper and that the district court abused its discretion in failing to impose a sentence below the guidelines range. The First Circuit affirmed the sentence, holding that Defendant failed to demonstrate plain error justifying resentencing. View "United States v. Gaffney-Kessell" on Justia Law

Posted in: Criminal Law
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For more than twenty years, the Maine Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS) provided Medicaid coverage for nineteen- and twenty-year-old children whose families met low-income requirements. In 2012, Maine DHHS submitted a state plan amendment to the federal DHHS plan seeking to drop that coverage. The federal DHHS Secretary declined to approve the amendment because it did not comply with 42 U.S.C. 1396a(gg), which requires states accepting Medicaid funds to maintain their Medicaid eligibility standards for children until October 1, 2019. Maine DHHS petitioned for review, contending that the statute is unconstitutional under the Spending Clause and violates the doctrine of equal sovereignty as articulated in Shelby County v. Holder. The First Circuit affirmed, holding that the statute is constitutional as applied in this case, as (1) application of section 1396a(gg) in these circumstances does not exceed Congress’s power under the Spending Clause; and (2) the equal sovereignty doctrine of Shelby County is not applicable in this case, and any disparate treatment caused by section 1396a(gg) is sufficiently related to the problem the statute was designed to address. View "Mayhew v. Burwell" on Justia Law

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With the threat of foreclosure looming on his home, Plaintiff sued Bank for failing to consider him for a mortgage loan modification, which a California class action settlement agreement required Bank to do before attempting to foreclose on Plaintiff’s home. The complaint alleged breach of contract, violation of Mass. Gen. Laws ch. 244, 35A and 35B, violation of Mass. Gen. Laws ch. 93A, and breach of the implied covenant of good faith and fair dealing. The district court dismissed the complaint in its entirety. The First Circuit vacated in part and remanded Plaintiff’s claims for breach of contract and breach of the implied covenant of good faith and fair dealing, holding (1) Plaintiff’s statutory causes of action fell short of stating a cognizable claim; but (2) the district court improperly converted Bank’s motion to dismiss Plaintiff’s contract-based claims into a motion for summary judgment, warranting a remand of those claims. View "Foley v. Wells Fargo Bank, N.A." on Justia Law

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Pursuant to a plea agreement, Defendant entered guilty pleas to robbing an individual of a United States passport (count 1), brandishing a firearm during a crime of violence (count 2), and being a convicted felon in possession of a firearm (count 3). After Defendant was sentenced he appealed, arguing, inter alia, that the government breached the agreement, and therefore, he should be resentenced. The First Circuit affirmed Defendant’s sentence on counts 1 and 2 but ordered the lower court to enter a modified sentence on count 3, holding (1) the waiver-of-appeal clause contained in the agreement did not bar the Court’s review of Defendant’s claims of error; (2) considering the totality of the circumstances, no breach of the agreement was evident; and (3) Defendant’s sentence on the firearm possession charge exceeded the statutory maximum. View "United States v. Almonte-Nunez" on Justia Law

Posted in: Criminal Law
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Following a jury trial, Defendant was convicted of possession with intent to distribute both marijuana and cocaine. Defendant appealed, arguing, among other things, that the district court erred in denying his motion to suppress evidence seized by law enforcement personnel after observing him walking down a residential street at first empty-handed and then rolling a large black suitcase. The First Circuit affirmed, holding (1) the district court properly denied Defendant’s motion to suppress because the stop by law enforcement was permissible, as was the subsequent search of the suitcase; and (2) the evidence was sufficient to support the conviction; (3) the district court’s jury instructions regarding the consideration of expert testimony were not plainly erroneous; and (4) the district court did not err in imposing sentence enhancements and and did not improperly penalize Defendant for failing to admit that he knew what was in the suitcase. View "United States v. Fermin" on Justia Law

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After a jury trial, Defendant was convicted of conspiracy to distribute cocaine and heroin and possession with intent to distribute cocaine. Upon Defendant’s third sentencing, the district court found Defendant responsible for in excess of 150 kilograms of cocaine and resentenced him under 21 U.S.C. 841(b)(1)(A) to 280 months of imprisonment as to each count, to be served concurrently. Defendant appealed, arguing that the district court erred under Alleyne v. United States by applying a mandatory minimum sentence without the requisite drug quantity findings by the jury. The First Circuit affirmed Defendant’s convictions, vacated his sentence, and remanded for a fourth sentencing, holding that the district court (1) committed instructional Alleyne errors by failing to charge the jury on the essential element of individualized drug quantity for the conspiracy count and the essential element of drug quantity for the possession count before applying the section 841(b)(1)(A) statutory sentencing range that included a mandatory minimum sentence on each count, but the errors were harmless; and (2) overlooked the First Circuit’s prior remand order by refusing to conduct credibility assessments when calculating individualized drug quantity and by refusing to consider Defendant’s firearm enhancement arguments. View "United States v. Pizarro" on Justia Law