Taking Stock: A Review of Justice Stevens’s Last Book and an Appreciation of His Extraordinary Service on the Supreme Court

RODGER CITRON

Rodger D. Citron, the Associate Dean for Research and Scholarship and a Professor of Law at Touro College, Jacob D. Fuchsberg Law Center, comments on the late Justice John Paul Stevens’s last book, The Making of a Justice: Reflections on My First 94 Years. Citron laments that, in his view, the memoir is too long yet does not say enough, but he lauds the justice for his outstanding service on the Supreme Court.

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In re: Tribune Company Fraudulent Conveyance Litigation

Docket: 13-3992

Opinion Date: December 19, 2019

Judges: Winter, Droney

Areas of Law: Bankruptcy

Representatives of certain unsecured creditors of the Chapter 11 debtor Tribune Company appealed the district court's grant of a motion to dismiss their state law, constructive fraudulent conveyance claims brought against Tribune's former shareholders. The district court held that appellants lacked statutory standing under the Bankruptcy Code. The Second Circuit affirmed the dismissal of appellants' state law, constructive fraudulent conveyance claims on preemption grounds rather than standing grounds. The court held that appellants were not barred by the Bankruptcy Code's automatic stay provision from bringing claims while avoidance proceedings against the same transfers brought by a party exercising the powers of a bankruptcy trustee on an intentional fraud theory are ongoing, because appellants have been freed from its restrictions by orders of the bankruptcy court and by debtors' confirmed reorganization plan. However, the court held that appellants' claims were preempted by section 546(e) of the Bankruptcy Code, because this section shields certain transactions from a bankruptcy trustee's avoidance powers, including, inter alia, transfers by or to a financial institution in connection with a securities contract, except through an intentional fraudulent conveyance claim.

Congregation Rabbinical College of Tartikov, Inc. v. Village of Pomona

Docket: 18-0869

Opinion Date: December 20, 2019

Judge: Kaplan

Areas of Law: Civil Rights, Constitutional Law, Real Estate & Property Law, Zoning, Planning & Land Use

Plaintiffs filed suit challenging four amendments to the Village of Pomona's zoning law as violations of federal and New York law. The district court dismissed Tartikov's complaint in part and later resolved certain claims in defendants' favor. The remaining claims concluded with a verdict in favor of Tartikov. Defendants appealed the final judgment and Tartikov appealed the earlier orders dismissing certain claims. The Second Circuit held that Tartikov lacked Article III standing to pursue its free exercise, free speech,and free association claims under the federal and New York constitutions, Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act (RLUIPA) substantial burden and exclusion and limits claims, Fair Housing Act (FHA) claims, and common law claims related to the Berenson doctrine claims. Therefore, the court vacated the judgment with respect to those claims, remanding for instructions for dismissal. In regard to the remaining claims that went to trial, the court reversed the district court's judgment to the extent the claims invoke two of the challenged laws and affirmed insofar as the claims invoked the remaining two. Finally, the court affirmed the district court's dismissal of the as-applied challenges and challenges to the RLUIPA equal terms and total exclusion provisions.

United States v. Canteen

Docket: 17-1525

Opinion Date: December 19, 2019

Judge: Per Curiam

Areas of Law: Criminal Law

There is no error in applying the career offender enhancement under USSG 4B1.1, to a defendant convicted of racketeering conspiracy based on underlying predicate acts of racketeering that qualify as crimes of violence under USSG 4B1.2. The Second Circuit affirmed defendant's conviction and held that, even assuming defendant preserved his argument that the 2016 Guidelines should have been used, the district court did not err in concluding that defendant's conviction for federal racketeering conspiracy based on the predicate acts of racketeering is a crime of violence under section 4B1.1 of the 2016 Guidelines. Furthermore, the court held that defendant's prior New York state robbery convictions are clearly crimes of violence under the 2015 Guidelines. The court disposed of the consolidated appeals of defendant's co-defendants in a separate summary order.

United States v. Flores

Docket: 17-4039

Opinion Date: December 20, 2019

Judge: Amalya Lyle Kearse

Areas of Law: Criminal Law

Defendants Campo and Flores appealed their convictions and sentences for conspiracy to import five or more kilograms of cocaine into the United States. According to Campo, who from an early age was raised by Cilia Flores, the First Lady of Venezuela, and sometimes referred to her as his mother, defendants sought to raise $20 million in drug proceeds in order to fund Cilia Flores's 2015 campaign for a position in the Venezuelan National Assembly. The Second Circuit rejected defendants' claims of evidentiary errors; held that the evidence at trial was ample to permit the jury to find that defendants, if they lacked actual knowledge, deliberately avoided learning--or forming a belief--that their cocaine was to be bound for the United States; defendants' challenges to the instruction on conscious avoidance were without merit; and defendants' challenges to the sufficiency of the evidence of predisposition was without merit where, upon mention that the drugs would be sold in the United States, there was no semblance of any reluctance or hesitation by these defendants, who had spent the previous two months attempting to get partners for their plans to fly cocaine to other countries. Finally, the court rejected challenges to the district court's application of a two-step adjustment for defendants' roles in the conspiracy as supervisors or leaders of criminal activity under USSG 3B1.1(c), and a two-step enhancement for use of a private aircraft for importation under USSG 2D1.1(b)(3)(A). Accordingly, the court affirmed the convictions and sentences.

United States v. Wright

Docket: 17-2715

Opinion Date: December 19, 2019

Judge: Debra Ann Livingston

Areas of Law: Criminal Law

Defendant filed a notice of appeal more than three years after he was sentenced for two counts of assault on a law enforcement officer. The Second Circuit held that United States v. Fuller, 332 F.3d 60, 65 (2d Cir. 2003), was inapplicable in this case, because it was unclear whether defendant could have filed a timely petition for habeas relief in the district court at the time he filed his untimely notice of appeal with this court. Therefore, the court dismissed defendant's appeal as untimely, and remanded to the district court with instructions to convert his notice of appeal into a petition for habeas relief, assessing whether such petition would be timely under 28 U.S.C. 2255(f)(4).

Attipoe v. Barr

Docket: 18-204

Opinion Date: December 19, 2019

Judge: Pooler

Areas of Law: Immigration Law

The BIA must consider the principles of equitable tolling when an untimely appeal is filed and the petitioner raises the issue. The Second Circuit granted a petition for review of the BIA's decision refusing to accept petitioner's untimely appeal of an IJ's order of removal from Ghana. The court held that the BIA erred in refusing to consider whether the argument that the appeal deadline, which is nonjurisdictional, is subject to an equitable tolling exception. The court found that the appeal deadline is a claim‐processing rule amenable to equitable tolling and thus remanded to the BIA to develop standards for equitable tolling, determining whether petitioner qualified for such relief.