The Volokh Conspiracy Archive

A short excerpt from Judge Julia Munley's long decision last month in Vespico v. Kass-Gerji (M.D. Pa.) (note that the quote from the title and the subtitle is from the court opinion, which in turn cites a transcript of an anti-stalking order hearing):

Each June, the Miss Pennsylvania competition is held in York at the Appell Center for the Performing Arts. The winner goes on to represent the Commonwealth in the Miss America pageant. Leading up to the 2024 competition, what may have started as a backstage rivalry escalated into something uglier.

According to Defendant Robyn Kass-Gerji, it was the plaintiff, Victoria Vespico, whose conduct went beyond the pale. Kass-Gerji claims she was subjected to months of harassing text messages and threats against her life. According to Kass-Gerji, Vespico also threatened to kill her mother, her boyfriend, and her dog.

Vespico tells a very different story. She insists that she never sent a single message and paints Kass-Gerji as the true aggressor. That is, Vespico describes Kass-Gerji as someone willing to fabricate evidence, file a fraudulent petition for a protection order, and lie under oath.

Days before the contestants took the stage at the Miss Pennsylvania pageant, a hearing was convened—not before a pageant director, but a judge of the Superior Court of the District of Columbia. The subject matter was credibility, not congeniality.

From Monday's order by Judge Brett Ludwig in Schmidt v. Naqvi (E.D. Wis.):

Plaintiff Dale Schmidt is … the elected sheriff of Dodge County, Wisconsin…. Defendant Kevin Morrison is … a prior candidate for the United States House of Representatives [and currently a Cook County, Ill. Commissioner -EV]. Schmidt is suing [Sundas] Naqvi, Morrison, and unidentified Doe Defendants for falsely claiming that Naqvi was illegally detained at Dodge County Jail from March 5, 2026 through March 7, 2026.

Schmidt maintains that Naqvi was never booked or detained at Dodge County Jail. He alleges that, in actuality, Naqvi arrived at O'Hare International Airport on March 5, 2026, checked into a Hampton Inn & Suites located in Rosemont, Illinois, and, in the early morning hours of March 7, 2026, was dropped off at a Holiday Inn Hotel in Beaver Dam, Wisconsin.

Schmidt seeks leave from the Court to conduct limited, expedited discovery to subpoena T-Mobile, Naqvi's cellphone provider, to produce text messages, call details, and records. He also seeks to subpoena the relevant hotels for exterior and lobby video surveillance, limited in date and times. For the reasons discussed below, Schmidt's motion will be granted….

From today's Coble v. Ballentine, by N.C. Court of Appeals Judge Jefferson Griffin, joined by Judges John Arrowood and April Wood:

Although Defendant and Plaintiff were originally friendly with each other, their relationship deteriorated upon the death of Defendant's father. Defendant has not directly contacted Plaintiff since 2022.

Defendant and Plaintiff are active in local politics and use their social media accounts to express their political views. While both associate with the Randolph County Republican Party, Defendant and Plaintiff have supported opposing candidates in the past.

In March 2024, Plaintiff announced on Facebook that she would run for mayor of Randleman in the 2025 election. Later that year, in response to Plaintiff's candidacy announcement, Defendant made a Facebook page titled "Anybody But Coble." Additionally, Defendant later created a website, www.AnybodyButCoble.org. On these platforms, Defendant wrote articles opposing Plaintiff's mayoral candidacy. Facially, Defendant created "Anybody But Coble" to assist voters in their mayoral candidate selection for Randleman….

[Around the start of 2025], Plaintiff stated online that she would no longer run for mayor. Nevertheless, the mayoral candidate filing period remained open until July 2025. Despite Plaintiff's online statement that she would not run for mayor, Defendant did not remove the content on his platforms concerning his opposition to Plaintiff's mayoral candidacy.

Plaintiff sought a "no-contact order against Defendant," and the trial court "ordered Defendant to refrain from publicly writing, printing, or speaking Plaintiff's name in any manner as well as going within fifty yards of Plaintiff." The appellate court reversed:

From yesterday's longish decision by Judge Robert Pitman (W.D. Tex.) in Qaddumi v. Davis:

Qaddumi challenges his suspension (and the ongoing disciplinary record resulting from it) from UT as a violation of his First Amendment rights. The parties cite record evidence of the following facts. Qaddumi was involved in planning a protest, to include a "walk out of class," "guest speaker," and two "teach-in[s]," against ongoing violence in Gaza in April 2024 as a member of the Palestine Solidarity Committee ("PSC"). The planned protest activities were peaceful in nature.

UT, however, preemptively ordered the protest cancelled the night before it was scheduled to occur. UT alleges that it understood PSC to have the same plans for its protest as those organized at other universities by Students for Justice in Palestine ("SJP"), a separate national group, of which PSC is not a chapter. UT says it observed indicators that PSC aimed to set up tents and stay overnight in the outdoor areas of campus, in violation of UT rules. UT cites statements made in PSC's social media posts about intending to "occupy" campus, and the fact that at other universities around the country, SJP protesters had set up encampments causing, in UT's view, substantial disruption to those campuses.

More specifically, then-UT Austin President Jay Hartzell instructed UT staff members to email PSC leadership directing them to cancel the protest. PSC responded to the email, noting that their demonstration would comply with UT rules and would not involve an overnight encampment. Also, on April 23, 2024, the Texas Department of Public Safety, when considering its response to the event, conducted an analysis of the planned protest and found that there were "no indicators of planned or potential disruptive activity or credible threats at this time."

From S. Fla. Muslim Fed., Inc. v. Atrium Trs I, LP, decided Jan. 27 by Judge Raag Singhal (S.D. Fla.), but only recently posted on Westlaw; an appeal is pending:

Plaintiff, South Florida Muslim Federation, Inc. ("SFMF") describes itself as "an umbrella organization representing over thirty South Florida entities serving religious and secular Muslims, including Islamic centers, schools, and other similar community organizations, and over 200,000 Muslims in South Florida." It operates "a resource-sharing hub" that connects the South Florida Muslim community with "both religious and secular businesses, goods and services." SFMF sponsors an annual conference for the South Florida Muslim community and presents matters of religious, social, and political interest as well as a bazaar of community owned businesses.

"The vast majority of SFMF's membership identify as and are perceived as being of Middle Eastern, North African, and South Asian ('MENASA') ethnic descent and having a shared ancestry associated with majority-Islamic countries in Africa and Asia." "The overwhelming majority of SFMF's executive leadership, including its President… are of MENASA ethnic descent."

SFMF was scheduled to hold its second annual conference at the Coral Springs Hotel & Convention Center (the "Hotel") on January 12, 2024. It had signed a Group Sales Agreement (the "Contract') with Atrium TRS I, LP ("Atrium"), the franchisee and operator of the Hotel. The Hotel cancelled the contract at the last minute, citing "significant undesirable interest."

The undesirable interest arose from a "public pressure campaign" allegedly conducted by Defendants Middle East Forum [and others]. The public pressure campaign began "soon after" October 7, 2023, which the Court notes is the date of the attacks in southern Israel by Hamas and other militant groups.

SFMF accuses Defendants of meeting with the Hotel's general manager, publishing negative articles, promoting an email campaign to the public, and threatening boycotts of the Hotel if the conference were to take place as scheduled. A week before the conference was scheduled to start, the Hotel cancelled the conference citing "significant undesirable interest." After the Hotel cancelled the conference, the non-Hotel Defendants variously claimed credit for causing the cancellation.

SFMF rejected plaintiffs' claims for violations of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, which provides for injunctions against racial and religious discrimination in certain places of public accommodations, but "does not authorize a cause of action for damages":

4/15/1931: Stromberg v. California argued.

It just started a couple of days ago; our tech people are looking into it, and I hope it will be fixed soon.

An excerpt from D.C. Circuit Judge Cornelia Pillard, joined by Judges Karen LeCraft Henderson and J. Michelle Childs in today's Khalid v. TSA:

Saad bin Khalid, a United States citizen, is on the No Fly List. As a result, he is barred from boarding any planes that fly in U.S. airspace. Believing that placement to be in error, Khalid sought redress through an administrative appeal process run by the Transportation Security Administration (TSA). The TSA Administrator, after reviewing Khalid's submissions and the nonpublic recommendations of the government's Threat Screening Center, determined by order that Khalid should remain on the list.

Khalid now petitions for review of the TSA Administrator's order. He raises statutory and constitutional challenges to his placement on the No Fly List and the adequacy of the redress process. We dismiss one of Khalid's challenges for lack of standing and deny the rest on their merits….

Congress has charged the Transportation Security Administration to "use information from government agencies to identify individuals on [airline] passenger lists who may be a threat to civil aviation or national security" and, if appropriate, require air carriers to "prevent [such] individual[s] from boarding an aircraft." In addition, Congress instructed TSA to "establish a procedure to enable airline passengers" who are "prohibited from boarding a flight" because "they might pose a security threat" to "appeal [that threat] determination."

Some short excerpts from the 35K words of opinions in the very long In re Trump, decided today by the D.C. Circuit; first, the majority by Judge Neomi Rao, joined by Justin Walker:

More than a year ago, the President invoked the Alien Enemies Act against members of Tren de Aragua, a Venezuelan criminal gang and foreign terrorist organization, and ordered that they be detained and removed from the United States. In a series of fast-moving events on March 15, 2025, the government placed a group of alleged gang members, including plaintiffs in this case, on planes to El Salvador. After the planes took off and left the country, the district court ordered the government not to remove the plaintiffs from the United States.

The Supreme Court vacated the district court's order because it was premised on a legal error and the plaintiffs' suit was brought in the wrong court. Nonetheless, the district court threatened to hold government officials in criminal contempt unless they complied with the now-vacated order by, for instance, taking back custody of the plaintiffs. We issued a writ of mandamus vacating the court's first contempt order.

Undeterred, the district court is proceeding with criminal contempt for the government's decision to transfer the plaintiffs to the custody of El Salvador. To cooperate, the government identified then-Secretary of Homeland Security Kristi Noem as the official responsible for the transfer decision. The district court previously said this was the only information it required to make a referral for prosecution. But the district court has now expanded its inquest and ordered hearings to extract more information from government counsel about exactly what happened last March. The government petitions for mandamus.

The widening gyre of the district court's investigation again calls for the extraordinary remedy of mandamus to halt the judicial "impairment of another branch in the performance of its constitutional duties." The district court proposes to probe high-level Executive Branch deliberations about matters of national security and diplomacy. These proceedings are a clear abuse of discretion, as the district court's order said nothing about transferring custody of the plaintiffs and therefore lacks the clarity to support criminal contempt based on the transfer of custody. Moreover, the government has already provided the name of the responsible official, so further judicial investigation is unnecessary and therefore improper. In these circumstances, mandamus is appropriate to prevent the district court from assuming an antagonistic jurisdiction that encroaches on the autonomy of the Executive Branch….

From Judge Walker's concurrence:

From the N.Y. Workers' Compensation Board in Buffalo Municipal Housing Authority, decided last week (opinion by Board Members Steven A. Crain, Renee L. Delgado, and Mark D. Higgins):

The claimant filed a C-3 (Employee Claim) on January 8, 2025, setting forth that she suffered an exacerbation of severe mental illness due to exposure of a racially insensitive wooden item in another staffer's office on January 25, 2023….

At a hearing on March 7, 2025, the claimant testified that she was employed as a property manager on January 25, 2023 and was out of work at the time because in July 2021 there was a shooting at one of the units where a 3-year-old child was killed and she felt responsible for the death.

She stated that on January 25, 2023 she came to work and was sitting in the office, and she was told that a Mammy doll which depicts slavery was in the garage of the building where they worked. She indicated that the Mammy doll was not removed from the garage and she asked to go see it in the garage so she could remove it.

She stated that when she saw the doll she was overcome with emotions because it was so humiliating. She stated that she could not control her emotions and could not think clearly. She stated that the garage was the entryway to the building and was usually open and is often used as an entranceway from where an employee parks and comes into the building.

On cross-examination, the claimant testified that her office was not located in the garage which was used for storage and lockers for the maintenance people. She stated that her job was to inspect apartment units and serve as a liaison between the tenants and her employer. On redirect, the claimant testified that the Mammy doll at work indicated that her employer allows discrimination and hatred….

At the hearing on March 7, 2025, Tamara Van Wey, director of management, testified that she was told that the claimant saw a Mammy doll on January 25, 2023 in the garage and that it was leaning on the window of the garage. She stated that she did not see the Mammy doll herself so she does not know if there was other nicknacks on the windows of the garage….

The administrative law judge had "found that the claimant sustained an exacerbation of adjustment disorder and depression due to a work-related incident," but the Board disagreed:

The officials alleged that he had "sent repeated harassing and threatening emails" to them, and the trial court issued a stalking no contact order, apparently in part because of that. But the "no naming" order covered all speech about the officials (to the public and to third parties), not just threatening speech. And the officials' concerns were apparently in part about the man's "unsupported and outlandish allegations," and his "smearing the name[s]" of the officials, not just about threats.

An excerpt from the long Skertich v. Luffman, decided last week by the Illinois Appellate Court (Justice Michael McHaney, joined by Justices Mark Boie and Mark Clarke):

Mark B. Skertich (Petitioner) … filed a verified petition for stalking no contact order (petition), against the Respondent on behalf of Petitioner and two other protected parties: Laura Bauer and Brad Hyre…. In an attachment to the petition, Petitioner alleged that Respondent had "engaged in escalating and repeated harassing communication and videos towards" Petitioner, Bauer, and Hyre, all of whom were employees of Collinsville CUSD No. 10 (school district), with Petitioner serving as Superintendent, Bauer serving as Principal, and Hyre serving as Assistant Superintendent….

The attachment alleged that Respondent's behavior "caus[ed] extreme concern for [the] safety" of the protected parties and caused "emotional distress." The attachment alleged that on December 16, 2024, Respondent was barred from school district property "for aggressive, intimidating and harassing behavior towards" the protected parties. The attachment specified "aggressive and harassing language" found in "at least 75 emails" sent by Respondent to the protected parties, and detailed the language allegedly used by Respondent in a phone call with Bauer.

The attachment alleged Respondent had "sent repeated harassing and threatening emails totaling 1465 email exchanges on 262 threads to" the protected parties. The attachment further alleged Respondent had (1) sent "repeated emails to multiple federal and state agencies filing complaints with unsupported and outlandish allegations;" (2) sent multiple "emails with harassing allegations" to school district legal counsel, "smearing the name[s]" of the protected parties "and causing significant distress;" and (3) sent copies of the emails to media outlets, elected officials, and others…. The attachment alleged Respondent had received two citations from Collinsville police, one "for online harassment through electronic communications," and one for trespassing on school district property after Respondent was barred from being present on that property.

From Doe v. Univ. of S. Ind., decided yesterday by Judge David Hamilton, joined by Chief Judge Michael Brennan and Judge Amy St. Eve:

Plaintiff-appellant "John Doe" was a student at the University of Southern Indiana (USI) in the 2020–21 academic year. He was the subject of a Title IX complaint accusing him of sexually assaulting another student. A hearing panel heard testimony from John, from the complaining student (we call her "Jane Doe"), and several other witnesses. The panel wrote that the issue was "whose version of events is more credible, as the details of each are irreconcilable." The panel found that Jane's account was more credible—in part because, in the panel's view, her account had been "consistent over time" while John's account had changed. The panel found by a preponderance of the evidence that John had committed "Rape and Forcible Fondling." John was suspended from the university for three semesters in 2021. He has not returned since and has no intention of returning in the future.

After the hearing panel's decision, John quickly filed this lawsuit, which defendants removed to federal court. He has alleged that USI discriminated against males, including him, in violation of Title IX; that USI and other defendants deprived him of protected liberty and property interests without due process; and that defendants intentionally inflicted emotional distress on him through outrageous conduct. The district court denied John's request for a preliminary injunction, and this court affirmed.

John then learned through discovery that Title IX officials at USI created memoranda of early conversations with John and Jane. Those memoranda showed at least arguably (1) that John's account actually was consistent over time and (2) that Jane's account was not consistent over time. USI had not disclosed those records to John or to any Title IX decisionmakers, thus calling into question the foundation for the hearing panel's decision on the merits. In Title IX cases, however, federal courts do not conduct any direct appellate review of such decisions by educational institutions. The district court ultimately granted summary judgment for defendants on all of plaintiff's claims….

Before we issue any decision on the jurisdictional or merits issues, we must confront the logically prior procedural issue: whether plaintiff may proceed under the John Doe pseudonym or whether he must instead proceed in this court using his real name….

In October, I wrote a column in Civitas Outlook about how President Trump was refighting the wars that the Watergate Congress waged against President Nixon. That piece concerned the spending power. In a follow-up column, I write about a recent opinion from the Office of Legal Counsel concerning the Presidential Records Act. Here too, Trump continues that fight.

In our current chaotic legal order, it is easy to get lost amid short-term controversies that will likely not endure beyond the present moment. Other far more enduring issues, however, often fly below the radar and garner little interest. Specifically, tensions between the legislative and executive departments persist regardless of which political party is in power. In modern American history, the greatest realignment of powers occurred in the wake of Watergate. Congress responded to President Nixon's actions by imposing greater oversight over the executive branch and the political process more generally. Presidents Gerald Ford and Jimmy Carter acquiesced to these restrictions. And the Burger Court, stacked with four Nixon appointees, upheld these expansions of legislative authority. In a Civitas Outlook essay from October, I explored how President Trump was refighting the "war" that Congress and the Burger Court "waged" against President Nixon in the context of presidential spending. The latest front in this war centers on presidential records.

Most law students learn that the Supreme Court ordered President Nixon to turn over his secret Oval Office recordings to the Watergate Special Prosecutor. United States v. Nixon (1974) directly led to the president's resignation two weeks later. But far fewer students study the fights over the recordings after Nixon resigned. Congress asserted control over all of Nixon's records and those of all future Presidents. However, a recent opinion from the Office of Legal Counsel argues that these five-decade-old laws were unconstitutional. Going forward, Trump will assert his own authority over his own papers, notwithstanding how the Watergate Congress tried to hamstring Nixon.

From the conclusion:

This opinion, by itself, has no immediate legal effect. Again, the PRA only has a meaningful effect after a President leaves office. (Unsurprisingly, there is already litigation afoot to try to halt this policy.) But the upshot of this opinion is that President Trump and his administration will not feel compelled to comply with the PRA. He will keep whichever documents he preserves, perhaps to be maintained at the future skyscraper Presidential Library in downtown Miami. It will turn to a future administration to decide whether to launch a Jack Smith redux and prosecute a predecessor President. The better course would be for future administrations to agree that PRA is unconstitutional and let these matters go. OLC's opinion will frustrate, rather than extend, the dangerous cycle of presidential lawfare.

I just came across this recent statute, Cal. Gov. Code § 6218 et seq.:

(b) (1) A person … shall not publicly post … the personal information [including just the name, see below] or image of a designated health care services provider, employee, volunteer, or patient if that individual … has made a written demand of that person … to not disclose the personal information or image. A written demand made under this paragraph shall include a statement declaring that the individual is subject to the protection of this section and describing a reasonable fear for the safety of that individual or of any person residing at the individual's home address, based on a violation of subdivision (a).

(2) A designated health care services provider, employee, volunteer, or patient whose personal information or image is made public as a result of a failure to honor a demand made pursuant to paragraph (1), or any individual, entity, or organization authorized to act on their behalf, may bring an action seeking injunctive or declarative relief in any court of competent jurisdiction. If a jury or court finds that a violation has occurred, it may grant injunctive or declarative relief and shall award the successful plaintiff court costs and reasonable attorney's fees.

(3) This subdivision [b] does not apply to a person or entity defined in Section 1070 of the Evidence Code [a publisher, editor, reporter, or other person connected with or employed upon a newspaper, magazine, or other periodical publication, or by a press association or wire service, or any person who has been so connected or employed]….

Subdivision (a), referenced above, provides:

From Lupton v. Kardash, decided Thursday by the Hawaii Intermediate Court of Appeals (Judges Keith K. Hiraoka, Clyde J. Wadsworth, and Kimberly T. Guidry):

Following a bench trial, the District Court enjoined Kardash from, among other things, contacting, threatening, or harassing his neighbor [Lupton] … for a period of three years…. The uncontested FOFs [Findings of Fact] … stated:

[25.] [Lupton] testified that after [Kardash] moved in [Kardash] installed security floodlights which were directly aimed into [Lupton]'s residence and were continually kept on during hours of darkness ….

[26.] [Lupton] testified that the effect of the security floodlights from [Kardash]'s home caused [Lupton]'s bedroom to be lit up which makes it extremely difficult for [Lupton] to sleep at night …. [Lupton] testified that she asked [Kardash] at the outset if he could direct his security floodlights so that it was not pointed directly into her home and [Kardash] replied that [Lupton] should "buy some black out curtains." ….

[32.] [Lupton] testified that [Kardash]'s extremely loud piano playing would sometimes last for 3 to 4 hours and would occur at all times of the day and night to include 7:00 am in the mornings on holidays and as late at night as 10:30 and 11:00 pm.

[33.] [Lupton] testified that she worked at home remotely during the pandemic and that her work required the constant and consistent use of her telephone. Callers commented that they could not hear [Lupton] clearly over the telephone because of [Kardash]'s piano playing in the background and consequently, [Lupton] was called back to work at the office and could not work remotely.

4/14/1873: The Slaughter-House Cases argued.

The Volokh Conspiracy

"I Swear, if You Don't Drop Out of Miss Pennsylvania, I Will Come to Your Home and Set It on Fire"

Expedited Discovery Allowed in Sheriff's Defamation Case, Which Alleges Claims of Unwarranted ICE-Related Detention were a Hoax

Court Ordered Critic of Ex-Mayoral Candidate to Stop "Publicly Writing, Printing, or Speaking [Ex-Candidate's] Name"

Claim That U Texas Engaged in Viewpoint Discrimination in Forbidding 2024 Palestine Solidarity Committee Protest Can Go Forward

Lawsuit by Muslim Group, Over Alleged Public Pressure Campaign That Caused Cancellation of Conference, Dismissed

Today in Supreme Court History: April 15, 1931

Open Thread

Open Thread

Sorry About the Doubled Daily Open Thread Glitch

D.C. Circuit Opinion About the No Fly List

D.C. Circuit (2-1): Contempt Proceedings Regarding Tren de Aragua Deportations "Are a Clear Abuse of Discretion"

Workers' Comp Claim for "Exacerbation of Severe Mental Illness Due to Exposure of a Racially Insensitive Wooden Item"

Court Upholds Order Barring Man from Naming Three School Officials in Social Media Posts

Seventh Circuit Reaffirms: No Pseudonymity in Title IX Suits Claiming Wrongful Discipline

New in Civitas Outlook: Trump Refights the "War" That Congress and the Burger Court "Waged" Against President Nixon's Tapes

California Law Restricts Naming Abortion/Gender-Affirming Care Providers/Patients (+ Soon Immigration Support Services Providers?) …

Enough with the Piano!

Today in Supreme Court History: April 14, 1873

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