Short Circuit: An inexhaustive weekly compendium of rulings from the federal courts of appeal

Solar panels, campus protests, and not much due process.

Please enjoy the latest edition of Short Circuit, a weekly feature written by a bunch of people at the Institute for Justice.

Hey, neat: Both The New York Times and The Washington Post featured stories about IJ client George Retes—a U.S. citizen and Iraq combat veteran beaten up by ICE and detained incommunicado for three days—this week. And don't sleep on ProPublica's coverage from last week.

New Short Circuit Live at GMU's Antonin Scalia Law School: A D.C. Circuit-focused episode with tales of the unitary executive, freedom of the press, and making bank after blowing the whistle.

1. Jewish students sue MIT, alleging that the school violated federal civil rights law by failing to crack down on antisemitic protests. First Circuit: Technically they were anti-Zionist protests, but even if they weren't, the school's gradually escalating actions were reasonable.
2. After man drops knife he'd been holding to his own throat, a Newton, Mass. officer attempts to fire a "usually less-than-lethal" beanbag round from close range. The officer's gun clicks loudly but does not fire. District court: And since the man then picked the knife back up and advanced toward an officer, qualified immunity for shooting him dead with regular rounds. First Circuit: Did he pick the knife back up? To discovery this must go. Partial dissent: The beanbag violated clearly established law; we should have undismissed that as well.
3. New York allows Medicaid beneficiaries that need help with daily living to hire assistants with public money. The program used to be administered by around 600 private "fiscal intermediaries," but in 2024 the state replaced them with a single state-run intermediary. Private intermediaries: It's a taking! An interference with obligations of contract! Irrational! Second Circuit: It is none of those things.
4. Solar panel scammers fraudulently convince New Jersey woman she can get free solar panels, then sign her up for a 25-year, $100k loan without her knowledge or permission. She sues the scammers and the scam-adjacent lender but later drops the scammers and focuses on the lender. Third Circuit: Boy, we wish you hadn't done that.
5. Pro tip: If planning to leave 60+ threatening, profanity-laced voicemails for the Franklin County, Ohio judge presiding over your drunk-driving case, be sure to identify yourself by name, leave your phone number, and advise her that you're located in a different state and that the federal authorities alone have the power to arrest you. Also consider calling in bomb threats to a local bar, a Home Depot, a Best Western, and two nearby schools. And phoning the local sheriff's office 100 times to advise them (among other disobliging things) that one of their dispatchers is "probably fat as fuck." Sixth Circuit (unpublished): Conviction affirmed.
6. This Seventh Circuit decision about the due-process rights of inmates placed in segregation is worth a read if you like that sort of thing. (Bottom line: the process due is … not much.) But for your summarist, the most interesting part is the revelation that some gangs require their members to fill out questionnaires identifying themselves, their offenses, their affiliations, and other data. Dissent: "I believe this court is losing its way on prisoner due process claims." (Shout-out to Judge Rovner, by the by, for the piquant diamond-shape dinkuses in her dissent.)
7. Minnesota mom works at a bank with a branch inside the local high school. She's fired after heated interactions with school officials criticizing a mandatory masking policy in 2021. She sues, claiming school and bank conspired to retaliate against her speech. Eighth Circuit: The First Amendment doesn't require being Minnesota nice, and a jury should decide this case under the same constitutional standard that would apply to any private citizen. Concurrence: I would instead apply the balancing test for public employees, but you betcha a jury should do that balancing.
8. Homeless, sexagenarian woman builds home on vacant strip of public land, which she keeps spick and span. District court: And it may well violate due process for Vallejo, Calif. officials to evict her without finding a suitable place for her to go. PI granted. Ninth Circuit (unpublished): And since she's now in a suitable place, the case is moot.
9. In 1995, a pair of teens (16 and 14 years old) are arrested for King County, Wash. property crimes. Police probe to see if they'd also stabbed a man whose body was found nearby. They interrogate the older one, who states that he aspired to be a Crip and had killed 13 gangsters in the past (a statement no one believed). He also confesses to the murder but with significant discrepancies from the evidence. Nevertheless, he's tried as an adult, convicted, and sentenced to 46 years in prison. Twenty years later, DNA testing excludes him. He's released and sues for various constitutional violations, all of which the district court rejects. Ninth Circuit (unpublished): A jury needs to consider if a detective fabricated evidence.
10. Several months after California inmate sues guards over 2016 beating, the state files criminal charges against the inmate for resisting the guards. After receiving assurances that it won't affect his civil suit, the inmate pleads "no contest" to the criminal charges. Ninth Circuit (over a dissent): The plea was not an admission of guilt, so the civil suit can proceed. Case undismissed.
11. Life tip from Utah: If you've got a ne'er-do-well brother, don't lend him half a mil. He might commit wire fraud to avoid paying you back. While serving a home-custodial sentence for healthcare fraud. And while awaiting trial on the wire fraud, he might be convicted of being a felon in possession of ammo. (Possibly, he might be involved in animal cruelty.) Tenth Circuit (over a partial dissent): Wire fraud conviction affirmed.
12. And in en banc news, the Third Circuit will not rehear an earlier panel decision striking down Pennsylvania's requirement that mail-in ballots be dated next to the voter's signature. Newly appointed Judge Emil Bove pens his first dissental, arguing that the First and Fourteenth Amendments do not prohibit a decades-old requirement that, "[f]or a voter with a functioning pen, sufficient ink, and average hand dexterity . . . should take less than five seconds."
13. And in more en banc news, the Ninth Circuit will not reconsider its opinion that the NLRB can award consequential damages. Six judges dissent from the denial and tie a bow around some glittering prose that packages the Seventh Amendment with the nation's largest department store. It's perfect for friends, relatives, or underneath the tree.

Cert denied! Less than a week after they bought their new home, IJ clients Corrine and Douglas Thomas were fined over $1 mil because Humboldt County, Calif. officials believe the prior owner grew cannabis there. And while the county doesn't care that Corrine and Doug are innocent, we think a Humboldt County jury might. So we asked the Supreme Court to revisit a 1916 decision holding that the Seventh Amendment's civil jury trial right does not apply to the states. Sadly, the petition was denied this week, but Justice Gorsuch sees room for a rethink: "Surely, those who founded our Nation considered the right to trial by jury a fundamental part of their birthright." Hear, hear. And fear not, other constitutional claims in the case are alive and well at the district court. Onward! Click here to learn more.