Justia U.S. 6th Circuit Court of Appeals Opinion Summaries

Springer, a Utah physician, began a fellowship at the Cleveland Clinic and enrolled his family in its employee benefit plan, administered by Antares. During the enrollment period, Springer had his 14-month-old son, J.S., transported from a Utah hospital to the Cleveland Clinic by Angel Jet’s air ambulance service. J.S. had been hospitalized since birth for multiple congenital abnormalities. He required a mechanical ventilator. J.S.’s physician prepared a letter of medical necessity for the service. Before the flight, Angel Jet contacted Antares, which was unable to confirm that Springer and his son were members of the plan and did not precertify the service. Angel Jet proceeded with the transportation and submitted a bill to Antares for $340,100. Antares denied it for failure to obtain precertification. The Plan affirmed the denial but paid $34,451.75, reflecting the amount their preferred provider would have charged. Angel Jet brought suit under the Employee Retirement Security Act. The district court dismissed the suit, finding that Springer had not properly assigned his rights under the plan to Angel Jet. Springer then brought his own claim under ERISA Section 502(a)(1)(B). The Sixth Circuit affirmed, first finding that Springer had standing despite having received the service and not being billed. The denial was not arbitrary and capricious because J.S.’s transportation was not an emergency or precertified as required for a nonemergency. View "Springer v. Cleveland Clinic Employee Health Plan Total Care" on Justia Law

After Maslonka robbed two banks to support his drug habit, he pleaded guilty in Michigan state court to armed robbery as a third habitual offender. During his plea-negotiation process, Maslonka began to cooperate with federal authorities in a separate federal investigation. Maslonka did not cooperate to the full satisfaction of the federal authorities. The state prosecutor withdrew the favorable plea offer. Maslonka brought a habeas corpus petition. The Sixth Circuit reversed the district court's grant of habeas relief. Even assuming Maslonka’s attorney was constitutionally deficient, Maslonka has not shown that this deficiency prejudiced him. Maslonka has not shown a reasonable probability that his counsel could have persuaded the state prosecutor not to cancel Maslonka’s plea. The court noted that the Supreme Court has not fully answered the “difficult question” of “the duty and responsibilities of defense counsel in the plea bargaining process” and rejected an argument that a counsel’s mere physical absence from a critical stage of a proceeding, based on the counsel’s own failure to be present rather than any denial by the state, can constitute a constructive denial of counsel under Supreme Court precedent. View "Maslonka v. Hoffner" on Justia Law

Michigan’s Medicaid waiver program provides individuals with developmental disabilities community-based services. Washtenaw County changed its budgeting method in 2015. Notices sent to recipients acknowledged that recipients would have to pay service-providers less in order to maintain their approved hours of service. The Association, a nonprofit community organization assisting individuals with developmental disabilities, joined with three individual plaintiffs to filed suit, alleging due process violations and seeking a preliminary injunction. The Association’s CEO testified that 169 individuals, including the three named plaintiffs, had received notices and that the three were Association members. The district court concluded that the Association lacked associational standing because the 169 people for whom it claimed associational standing were not shown to be members; the named members, in their individual capacities, were not entitled to injunctive relief because they had appealed the reductions and received favorable decisions so “there can be no irreparable harm suffered by the named Plaintiffs as a result of the inadequate notice.” The Sixth Circuit affirmed, noting that “standing is not dispensed in gross.” An individual must demonstrate standing for each claim he seeks to press and for each form of relief sought; an association that relies upon an individual member for standing purposes must do the same. The Association has not shown that any named member had standing to seek fresh notices and hearing rights when it filed its complaint.. View "Waskul v. Washtenaw County Community Mental Health" on Justia Law

Harrington was convicted in 2009 of seven drug offenses, including conspiring to manufacture, distribute, and possess with intent to distribute heroin and at least 50 grams of cocaine base, resulting in death (Count 1); and distributing heroin, resulting in death (Count 7). Citing 21 U.S.C. 841 and 851, the government filed notice that Harrington was subject to a mandatory sentence of life imprisonment by reason of a 2002 felony drug conviction. The district court sentenced Harrington to concurrent terms of life in prison on Counts 1 and 7, and 360 months on each remaining count. In 2014, the Supreme Court held, in Burrage, that where use of the drug distributed by the defendant is not an independently sufficient cause of the victim’s death or serious bodily injury, a defendant cannot be liable under the penalty enhancement provision unless such use was a but-for cause of the death or injury. Harrington unsuccessfully sought relief under 28 U.S.C. 2241. In 2017, Harrington filed a second petition. The district court dismissed. The Sixth Circuit vacated. Harrington’s claim is properly construed as one of actual innocence. Because Burrage is retroactive, Harrington is entitled to an evidentiary hearing to determine whether it is more likely than not that no reasonable juror would have convicted him, if given the proper jury instruction. View "Harrington v. Ormond" on Justia Law

Detroit residents voted to allow the school district to increase property taxes “for operating expenses.“ In 2013, the Downtown Development Authority (DDA) announced its intent to capture some of that tax revenue to fund the construction of Little Caesars Arena for the Red Wings hockey team. In 2016, the DDA revised its plan to allow the Pistons basketball team to relocate to Arena. The Detroit Brownfield Redevelopment Authority (DBRA) agreed to contribute to the $56.5 million expenditure, including reimbursing construction costs that private developers had already advanced. The project is largely complete. Plaintiffs requested that the school board place on the November 2017 ballot a question asking voters to approve or disapprove of the agencies' use of tax revenue for the Pistons relocation. The board held a special meeting but did not put the question on the ballot. Plaintiffs filed suit. Count VIII sought a declaratory judgment that the board had authority to place the question on the ballot. Count IX sought a writ of mandamus ordering the board to place it on the ballot. The court dismissed Counts VIII and IX, noting that Plaintiffs could have filed suit in 2013. The Sixth Circuit affirmed. Plaintiffs lack Article III standing. Failure to place Plaintiffs’ question on the ballot affects all Detroit voters equally; they raised only a generally available grievance about government. Michigan statutes do not give Detroit residents the right to void a Tax Increment Financing plan by public referendum, so a referendum would not redress Plaintiffs’ injury. View "Davis v. Detroit Public School Community District" on Justia Law

Atkins, a type II diabetic, occasionally suffers from low blood sugar. She must respond to these episodes by quickly consuming glucose to avoid seizing or passing out. She asked her Dollar General manager if she could keep orange juice at her cash register in case of an emergency. The manager refused. She suffered two episodes while working alone. Each time she responded by drinking orange juice from the checkout cooler, paying for it immediately, and reporting the incident to her supervisor. Dollar General fired Atkins. The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission filed suit under the Americans with Disabilities Act. A jury found that Dollar General had “discriminate[d] . . . on the basis of disability.” The Sixth Circuit affirmed. The claim was timely under 42 U.S.C. 2000e-5(e)(1), having been timely filed with a state agency that had authority to entertain it. Even if the company’s policy permitted alternative glucose sources, there was evidence suggesting that those options, though medically equivalent in the abstract, were not practically equivalent; the jury had a legally sufficient basis to conclude that Dollar General failed to provide Atkins reasonable alternatives. A company may not illegitimately deny an employee a reasonable accommodation to a general policy and use that same policy (the anti-grazing policy) as a neutral basis for firing him. View "Equal Employment Opportunity Commission v. Dolgencorp, LLC" on Justia Law

Auburn bought Chrysler parts for resale to Cypros, which then sold those parts to customers in the Middle East. The FBI raided Cypros’ warehouse and charged its president, Kilani, with trafficking in counterfeit goods. Unbeknownst to Auburn, Kilani had been obtaining counterfeit parts, mixing them with the legitimate Chrysler parts received from Auburn, and selling the commingled parts to customers. When Chrysler learned of the scheme, it terminated its relationship with Auburn. Auburn brought tortious interference claims and a breach of contract claim against Cypros that the district court dismissed, stating that Cypros did not specifically intend to interfere with Auburn’s relationship with Chrysler and that Cypros and Auburn did not have a written contract. The Sixth Circuit affirmed, holding that Michigan tortious interference law requires the specific intent to interfere with a business relationship and that the Michigan statute of frauds applied. View "Auburn Sales, Inc. v. Cypros Trading & Shipping, Inc." on Justia Law

Thomas is a Michigan state prisoner who was convicted of several crimes, including assault with intent to commit murder, after he participated in a violent 2005 home invasion. Thomas unsuccessfully challenged in state court his conviction for assault with intent to commit murder, arguing that there was insufficient evidence to support that conviction. He then filed a federal habeas corpus petition under 28 U.S.C. 2254, which the district court denied. The Sixth Circuit affirmed. The state presented sufficient evidence from which a rational jury could have found that Thomas assaulted Harrison, with an actual intent to kill Harrison, in circumstances where a successful killing would have been murder. The Michigan courts stated that “[n]o actual physical injury is required for the elements of the crime to be established,” and that “[a]n assault may be established by showing . . . an unlawful act that places another in reasonable apprehension of receiving an immediate battery.” Any inconsistency in interpreting Michigan law is not a ground for federal habeas relief. “Bottom line, Thomas’s case was not an “extreme malfunction[]” of the Michigan criminal justice system.” View "Thomas v. Stephenson" on Justia Law

From 2012-2015, Bradley and others drove patients to Detroit doctors, paid them for their prescription refills, and stored the pills in various places, including a house Bradley owned. Bradley recruited O’Neal to live in the stash house and accept pill deliveries. She received deliveries of 300 pills (usually oxycodone) every day. Other participants handled similar amounts. The group shipped pills to Buchanan in Nashville, who sold the pills to redistributors. Buchanan deposited the payments into bank accounts that belonged to Bradley, Bradley’s wife, and Jones. An indictment charged 18 individuals with conspiring to possess with intent to distribute oxycodone and oxymorphone, 21 U.S.C. 841(a)(1), 846. Count 2 charged Bradley, Buchanan, and two others with conspiring to launder the operation’s proceeds, 18 U.S.C. 1956(a)(1)(A)(i)(h). Bradley pleaded guilty. The court ordered Bradley to forfeit currency and real property that he used in the conspiracy and at least a million dollars in cash, 21 U.S.C. 853(d), reasoning that the gross proceeds of the drug-distribution and money-laundering schemes reached a million dollars. The order applied the million-dollar judgment jointly and severally to Bradley and his co-defendants. The court sentenced Bradley to 17 years. The Sixth Circuit upheld the reasonableness of his sentence and found no plain error in the drug-quantity determinations but concluded that precedent forbids the joint-and-several nature of the forfeiture order. View "United States v. Bradley" on Justia Law

The Tennessee Department of Transportation hired Jones to repair a collapsed portion of a state highway. The company drilled and blasted a pit less than a mile from the highway, extracting thousands of tons of graded solid rock to fill the collapsed bed that previously supported the highway. The Mine Safety and Health Administration imposed $2,940 in civil penalties on Jones for failing to comply with the agency's safety requirements. An ALJ for the Federal Mine Safety and Health Review Commission, an independent agency responsible for reviewing the Administration’s actions, 30 U.S.C. 823, upheld the penalties, agreeing that the site was “a coal or other mine” under the Administration’s jurisdiction. The Commission affirmed. The Sixth Circuit vacated because the administrative law judge was an inferior officer of the United States, and was not appointed by the President, a court of law, or the head of a department, as the Appointments Clause of the Constitution (art. II, sect. 2, cl. 2) demands. The ALJ was appointed by the Chief Administrative Law Judge. The court excused Jones’s failure to pursue the argument below. View "Jones Brothers, Inc. v. Secretary of Labor" on Justia Law