Criminal Law Library Blog
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April 12 -16, 2010:
U.S. 1st Circuit Court of Appeals, April 15, 2010 Foley v. Kiely , No. 09-1250 In plaintiff’s 42 U.S.C. section 1983 claim against Massachusetts State Troopers and a police sergeant, claiming the troopers unconstitutionally seized and arrested him, district court’s grant of summary judgment in favor of defendants is affirmed, as the troopers did not violate plaintiff’s constitutional rights in detaining and subsequently arresting him.
U.S. 6th Circuit Court of Appeals, April 15, 2010 American Booksellers Found. for Free Expression v. Strickland, No. 07-4375 In plaintiffs’ suit claiming that Ohio Revised Code section 2907.31(D)(1), criminalizing sending juveniles material that is harmful to them, is unconstitutional under the First Amendment and Commerce Clause, district court’s judgment for the plaintiffs and its order permanently enjoining enforcement of the statute as applied to internet communications on the basis that it is overbroad, is reversed and vacated, as the statute does not violate the First Amendment or the Commerce Clause because the scope of the statute is limited to personally directed electronic communications, as currently available or developed in the future. .
U.S. 7th Circuit Court of Appeals, April 16, 2010 Evans v. Poskon , No. 09-3140 In a prisoner’s 42 U.S.C. section 1983 suit, claiming that his fourth amendment rights were violated when the officers used excessive force during and after his arrest, district court’s grant of summary judgment in favor defendants on the ground that Heck v. Humphrey, 512 U.S. 477 (1994) bars defendant’s claim because his assertion that he did not oppose being taken into custody contradicts his conviction for resisting arrest is reversed as, Wallace v. Kato, 549 U.S. 384 (2007) holds that a claim that accrues before a criminal conviction may and usually must be filed without regard to the conviction’s validity, and that a claim asserting that a search or seizure violated the fourth amendment accrues immediately. Therefore, his claim that he did not resist being taken into custody is incompatible with his conviction and any proceedings based on this contention must be stayed or dismissed, but defendant’s claims that the police used excessive force to effect custody and that t! he police beat him severely even after reducing him to custody are consistent with a conviction for resisting arrest and may thus proceed.
U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals, April 13, 2010 Black Star Farms LLC v. Oliver, No. 08-15738 In an action by a Michigan winery claiming that certain provisions of Arizona’s statutory scheme regulating the direct shipment of wine from wineries – whether located in-state or out-of-state – to Arizona consumers violated the dormant Commerce Clause, summary judgment for defendant is affirmed where Arizona’s statutory exceptions to its three-tier distribution system, which treated similarly situated in-state and out-of-state wineries the same and imposed no new impermissible burdens on out-of-state wineries, did not have the practical effect of favoring in-state economic interests over out-of-state interests.