Justia U.S. 7th Circuit Court of Appeals Opinion Summaries

Perez‐Gonzalez pleaded guilty to first-degree murder for his role in a gang‐related killing and agreed to cooperate. His plea agreement stated: Any deviation from that truthful [testimony against a co-defendant] will be grounds for the [state] at [its] sole discretion–to withdraw its agreement to delete reference to a firearm as well as to withdraw its agreement to vacate the 15‐year add‐on. In such event, the defendant would then be required to serve the terms of the initial agreement. It makes no reference to refusal to testify. More than one year later, as the trial of a co‐defendant approached, Perez‐Gonzalez declined to testify. He was convicted of contempt of court, resulting in an additional 10‐year sentence. After exhausting his state court remedies, Perez‐Gonzalez sought habeas corpus relief, asserting the state breached the plea agreement by requesting the contempt sanction. The Seventh Circuit affirmed the denial of relief, rejecting an argument that the plea agreement immunized Perez-Gonzalez from contempt proceedings. Although he presented a reasonable interpretation of the agreement, he has not proved that the state appellate court’s alternative interpretation was unreasonable; the agreement contained no express or implied promise that the state would not bring contempt charges. Perez‐Gonzalez must do more than provide an alternative reading of the plea agreement. View "Perez-Gonzalez v. Lashbrook" on Justia Law

Milwaukee County hired Thicklen in 2012 as a jail corrections officer. A zero-tolerance policy forbids corrections officers from having any sexual contact with inmates. The county repeatedly instructed Thicklen not to engage in any such contact and trained him to avoid it. Thicklen gave answers to quizzes indicating he understood the training. He nonetheless raped Shonda Martin in jail. Martin sued him and sued the county for indemnification under Wisconsin Statute 895.46. A jury awarded her $6,700,000 against the county, finding that the assaults were in the scope of employment. The Seventh Circuit reversed. Even viewing the evidence in the light most favorable to Martin and the verdict, no reasonable jury could find the sexual assaults were in the scope of Thicklen’s employment; that the sexual assaults were natural, connected, ordinary parts or incidents of contemplated services; that the assaults were of the same or similar kind of conduct as that Thicklen was employed to perform; or that the assaults were actuated even to a slight degree by a purpose to serve County. No reasonable jury could even regard the sexual assaults as improper methods of carrying out employment objectives. Martin presented no evidence that his training was deficient or that Thicklen did not understand it. View "Martin v. Milwaukee County" on Justia Law

Hennen worked as a sales specialist for NCR, 2010-2012, and was covered by long-term disability insurance under a group policy provided by MetLife. She sought treatment for a back injury. When physical therapy and surgery failed to resolve her injury, Hennen applied for long-term disability benefits. Acting as plan administrator, MetLife agreed that Hennen was disabled and paid benefits for two years. The plan has a two-year limit for neuromusculoskeletal disorders, subject to exceptions, including on for radiculopathy, a “Disease of the peripheral nerve roots supported by objective clinical findings of nerve pathology.” After MetLife terminated Hennen’s benefits, she sued under the Employee Retirement Income Security Act of 1974, 29 U.S.C. 1001 (ERISA), arguing that MetLife’s determination that she did not have radiculopathy was arbitrary and capricious. The district court granted MetLife summary judgment. The Seventh Circuit reversed. MetLife acted arbitrarily when it discounted the opinions of four doctors who diagnosed Hennen with radiculopathy in favor of the opinion of one physician who ultimately disagreed, but only while recommending additional testing that MetLife declined to pursue. View "Hennen v. Metropolitan Life Insurance Co." on Justia Law

In 2008, Mayberry was convicted in Wisconsin state court of multiple counts of second-degree sexual assault and one count of false imprisonment. Mayberry unsuccessfully challenged his convictions on both direct and collateral review in Wisconsin state court. After having one federal habeas corpus petition, 28 U.S.C. 2254, dismissed as premature, Mayberry fully exhausted his state-court remedies and refiled his petition in the district court. By this point, however, the one-year statute of limitations in the Anti-Terrorism and Effective Death Penalty (AEDPA), 28 U.S.C. 2244(d), had expired, so the district court dismissed Mayberry’s petition as untimely. Mayberry argued that he is entitled to equitable tolling on account of his history of mental illness, illiteracy, and lack of counsel to assist him, or, alternatively, that the district court should have held an evidentiary hearing to determine whether his mental limitations warranted equitable tolling. The Seventh Circuit affirmed. Mayberry failed to meet the “high bar” necessary to qualify for equitable tolling. Although Mayberry’s mental limitations undoubtedly made filing a petition for habeas corpus difficult, he failed to show how those difficulties affected him during the relevant time period to such an extent that he qualifies for the extraordinary remedy of equitable tolling. View "Mayberry v. Dittmann" on Justia Law

Regional transmission organizations manage the interstate grid for electricity, conduct auctions through which many large generators of electricity sell most or all of their power, and are regulated by the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) Illinois subsidizes nuclear generation facilities by granting “zero emission credits,” which generators that use coal or gas to produce power must purchase from the recipients at a price set by the state. Electricity producers and municipalities sued, contending that the price‐adjustment aspect of the system is preempted by the Federal Power Act because it impinges on the FERC’s regulatory authority. They acknowledge that a state may levy a tax on carbon emissions; tax the assets and incomes of power producers; tax revenues to subsidize generators; or create a cap‐and‐trade system requiring every firm that emits carbon to buy credits from firms that emit less carbon. They argued that the zero‐emission‐credit system indirectly regulates the auction by using average auction prices as a component in a formula that affects the credits' cost. The Seventh Circuit affirmed summary judgment for the defendants. Illinois has not engaged in discrimination beyond that required to regulate within its borders. All Illinois carbon‐emitting plants need to buy credits. The subsidy’s recipients are in Illinois. The price effect of the statute is felt wherever the power is used. All power (from inside and outside Illinois) goes for the same price in an interstate auction. The cross‐subsidy among producers may injure investors in carbon‐ releasing plants, but only plants in Illinois. View "Village of Old Mill Creek v. Star" on Justia Law

More than 20 current and former employees at ConAgra’s Rensselaer, Indiana microwave popcorn plant sued various manufacturers and suppliers of butter flavorings that contained the chemical diacetyl, which if inhaled can cause a respiratory disease called “popcorn lung.” All defendants were dismissed except Givaudan. a long‐time supplier to the plant, which faced claims under Indiana product liability law for strict liability, failure to warn, negligence, and design defect. The district court granted Givaudan summary judgment in full. The Seventh Circuit affirmed as to most of the claims but remanded the claim that Givaudan failed to warn plaintiffs that its products contained a dangerous substance. Whether an exception to that duty to warn—the sophisticated intermediary doctrine— applies to the employer ConAgra and exonerates Givaudan is a fact question. View "Aregood v. Givaudan Flavors Corp." on Justia Law

In 2015, Wis. Stat. 111.01, changed many provisions of state labor laws. One provision purported to change the rules for payroll deductions that allow employees to pay union dues through dues‐checkoff authorizations. By signing an authorization, the employee directs the employer to deduct union dues or fees routinely from the employee’s paycheck and to remit those funds to the applicable union. The union itself is not a party to the authorization, which is effective if and only if the employee wishes. Federal law allows unions to bargain collectively with employers over the standard terms of dues‐checkoff authorizations: the authorization must be individual for each employee, in writing, and irrevocable for no longer than one year, 29 U.S.C. 186(a)(2), (c)(4). Wisconsin attempted to shorten this maximum period to 30 days. The district court found the matter preempted by federal law and issued a permanent injunction barring enforcement of the provision. The Seventh Circuit affirmed, citing the Supreme Court’s summary affirmance in a case finding a nearly identical state law preempted. Wisconsin’s attempt to short‐circuit the collective bargaining process and to impose a different dues‐checkoff standard is preempted by federal law. View "International Association of Machinists District 10 v. Allen" on Justia Law

Liberty PAC sued Illinois officials under 42 U.S.C. 1983 alleging that campaign contribution limits set by the Illinois Disclosure and Regulation of Campaign Contributions and Expenditures Act, violated the First Amendment. Invoking the intermediate-scrutiny framework, Liberty PAC challenged specific provisions as not closely drawn to prevent quid pro quo corruption or its appearance. The Act sets lower contribution limits for individuals than for corporations, unions, and other associations; allows political parties to make unlimited contributions to candidates during a general election; lifts the contribution limits for all candidates in a race if one candidate’s self-funding or support from independent expenditure groups exceeds $250,000 in a statewide race or $100,000 in any other election; and allows certain legislators to form “legislative caucus committees,” which, like political party committees, are permitted to make unlimited contributions during a general election. The district judge dismissed the first three claims as foreclosed by Supreme Court precedent. After a bench trial, the judge held that legislative caucus committees are sufficiently similar to political party committees to justify their identical treatment. The Seventh Circuit affirmed. Supreme Court campaign-finance cases plainly foreclose any argument that the contribution limits for individual donors are too low or that the limits for other donors are too high. The court rejected an argument that the Act is fatally underinclusive by favoring certain classes of donors. View "Illinois Liberty PAC v. Madigan" on Justia Law

Reynolds claimed that the law firm (H&L) gave bad advice that led him to violate federal disclosure laws when he drafted his LLCs’ financial statements. The district court granted H&L summary judgment, stating that Reynolds could not bring a malpractice suit on his own behalf because he did not have a personal attorney-client relationship with H&L. The Seventh Circuit affirmed. Although H&L had an attorney-client relationship with the LLCs that Reynolds co-owned and managed, and it was in his capacity as a managing member of these LLCs that Reynolds communicated with, and was advised by, H&L, Illinois courts consistently have held that neither shared interests nor shared liability establish third-party liability. For third-party liability in Illinois, Reynolds must have been a direct and intended beneficiary; simply because the officers of a business entity were at risk of personal liability does not transform the incidental benefits of the law firm’s representation of the business entity into direct and intended benefits for the officers. View "Reynolds v. Henderson & Lyman" on Justia Law

D.D.B., then under 18 years of age, with an adult accomplice robbed a pharmacy and was charged with acts of juvenile delinquency that, if committed by an adult, would be robbery, 18 U.S.C. 1951(a), and carrying, using, and brandishing a firearm during a robbery, 18 U.S.C. 924(c)(1)(A)(ii). Transfer to adult proceedings is mandatory if the juvenile committed the underlying act after his sixteenth birthday; the charged offense is a felony that “has as an element thereof the use, attempted use, or threatened use of physical force against the person of another”; and the juvenile has previously been found guilty of a crime that “has as an element thereof the use, attempted use, or threatened use of physical force against the person of another,” 18 U.S.C. 5032. The government alleged that D.D.B. had convictions for Indiana attempted robbery and burglary, Class B felonies, and for conspiracy to commit robbery. The district court addressed only the attempted robbery offense and concluded that it required transfer. The Seventh Circuit vacated. The court erred by assuming that any attempted violent felony is itself a violent felony and failed to consider the lack of an intent requirement in Indiana’s crime of attempted robbery. No finder-of-fact found that D.D.B. had an intent to use, attempt to use, or threatened the use of physical force against a person. On remand, the government may raise the other predicate crimes of burglary and conspiracy to commit robbery. View "United States v. D. D. B." on Justia Law