472 results for 'court:"USDC District of Columbia"'.
J. AliKhan largely grants the employer's motion for summary judgment and denies the employee's cross-motion for partial summary judgment in her suit alleging that the employer failed to accommodate her disabilities and cut her hours and threatened to terminate her for taking medical leave. Summary judgment is denied to the employer as to claims related to failures to provide an ergonomic chair and desk and related to the employer's requirement that the employee recertify her FMLA leave. It is otherwise granted.
Court: USDC District of Columbia, Judge: AliKhan, Filed On: May 3, 2024, Case #: 1:19cv1766, NOS: Employment - Civil Rights, Categories: Employment, Employment Discrimination, Employment Retaliation
J. Lamberth finds the Islamic Republic of Iran liable for $18,780,353.09 in compensatory damages and $56,341,059.27 in punitive damages after finding that it materially supported attacks on U.S. troops in Iraq during the U.S. occupation of that country.
Court: USDC District of Columbia, Judge: Lamberth, Filed On: April 30, 2024, Case #: 1:17cv131, NOS: Other Personal Injury - Torts - Personal Injury, Categories: International Law, Terrorism
J. Lamberth finds the Islamic Republic of Iran liable for $56,068,379.74 in compensatory damages and $168,205,139.22 in punitive damages, having already found it responsible for attacks on American servicemembers during the U.S. occupation of Iraq.
Court: USDC District of Columbia, Judge: Lamberth, Filed On: April 30, 2024, Case #: 1:17cv131, NOS: Other Personal Injury - Torts - Personal Injury, Categories: International Law, Tort
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J. Cobb grants the American oil company's motion for default judgment and to confirm an arbitration award in its action against the Iranian oil company alleging that natural gas it purchased was never delivered. This court has subject matter jurisdiction over the dispute, since the parties agreed to arbitrate this dispute in a New York Convention signatory country and it is commercial in nature, and personal jurisdiction over the Iranian company since the American company successfully accomplished service when it received a "read" receipt of a service email. The American company has also satisfied procedural requirements for enforcement, and there is no reason to deny them confirmation.
Court: USDC District of Columbia, Judge: Cobb, Filed On: April 30, 2024, Case #: 1:22cv1361, NOS: Arbitration - Other Suits, Categories: Arbitration, International Law, Jurisdiction
J. Boasberg partially grants the Justice Department's motion for summary judgment in the public-policy organization's Freedom of Information Act suit seeking the release of communications regarding a dismissed FBI agent alleged to have leaked information to the media and improperly discredited information about Hunter Biden. He also partially grants the organization's cross-motion for summary judgment. While the Bureau is correct that some of the requested records are subject to FOIA exemptions for law-enforcement records and invasions of privacy interests, the balance of interests favors release of non-law-enforcement records containing the agent's last name and the term "whistleblower," or the agent's last name with the last name of his accuser, "Grassley."
Court: USDC District of Columbia, Judge: Boasberg, Filed On: April 29, 2024, Case #: 1:23cv1148, NOS: Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) - Other Suits, Categories: Government, Public Record
J. Walton partially grants the employer's motion to dismiss the employee's suit alleging nonpayment of wages, failures to pay correct overtime rates for overtime hours and employee misclassification. The employee's misclassification claims under the McNamara-O'Hara Service Contract Act fail because the Act does not create a private right of action for such claims, but her claims independent of that Act survive.
Court: USDC District of Columbia, Judge: Walton, Filed On: April 26, 2024, Case #: 1:22cv3094, NOS: Fair Labor Standards Act - Labor, Categories: Employment, Labor
J. Chutkan denies a motion to reconsider a determination that a search warrant, which led officers to search a house where the suspect they were seeking did not live, was valid. The court's decision not to grant the searched civilians' request for an adverse inference based on the absence of a report from the database a detective said he searched before seeking the warrant was not "outcome determinative," a school employee's statement to the detective has not been shown to be inadmissible hearsay, a form used to confirm the address was not inadmissible by reason of being unauthenticated, and the searched civilians did not timely raise issues with testimony that another officer conducted a second database search, the admission of which would have been harmless error if it was error at all.
Court: USDC District of Columbia, Judge: Chutkan, Filed On: April 26, 2024, Case #: 1:17cv1046, NOS: Other Civil Rights - Civil Rights, Categories: Civil Rights, Constitution
J. Howell grants the employer's motion for summary judgment in the employee's suit alleging failures to provide a computer with enlarged font after the surgical removal of her eye and to grant her adequate leave during the Covid-19 pandemic, along with a failure to promote her which she argues was discriminatory. The employee has not shown that the employer's stated reason for failure to promote her, namely a poor interview performance, was pretextual, nor that its reason for terminating her, namely repeated failures to provide medical documentation required for accommodations including leave, was pretextual. The employee's failure-to-accommodate claims also fail, since the employee has not alleged that, when told that the computer they provided was inadequate, her supervisors refused or failed to follow up on her objections or that it did not engage in a good-faith dialogue with the employee as to her leave requests.
Court: USDC District of Columbia, Judge: Howell, Filed On: April 26, 2024, Case #: 1:23cv1507, NOS: Employment - Civil Rights, Categories: Employment, Employment Discrimination
J. AliKhan grants summary judgment to the FBI in the information seekers' Freedom of Information Act suit related to the 2012 attacks on the U.S. Embassy in Benghazi, Libya. The FBI has adequately established that withheld records are part of an ongoing investigation of the attacks, and existing public accounts of the attacks do not undermine the agency's concerns about interference with that investigation.
Court: USDC District of Columbia, Judge: AliKhan, Filed On: April 26, 2024, Case #: 1:14cv1589, NOS: Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) - Other Suits, Categories: Administrative Law, Public Record, Agency
J. Boasberg largely grants the employer and co-worker's motion for summary judgment in the employee's suit against them alleging that his hours were cut and he was terminated after objecting to discriminatory comments by the coworker. The employee has adequately pleaded that the employer's stated reason for a reduction of overtime opportunities was pretextual, but has not made that same showing for his other claims.
Court: USDC District of Columbia, Judge: Boasberg, Filed On: April 25, 2024, Case #: 1:23cv275, NOS: Employment - Civil Rights, Categories: Employment, Employment Retaliation
J. Cooper partially grants the television network's motion to dismiss its former Capitol Hill producer's suit alleging that he was fired for opposing false reporting of voter fraud and inaccurate coverage of the January 6, 2021 riot at the U.S. Capitol. The producer has not plausibly alleged that he was discriminated against because of his political affiliation, since a D.C. law barring such discrimination narrowly defines "political affiliation" as membership in or endorsement of a political party. He also has not alleged that he was terminated as a reprisal for political activity, nor cited an established policy that the network violated by firing him. While he purports that the network's stated reason for firing him, failing to show up to work when he called in sick, was pretextual, he has plausibly stated a claim of retaliation under the Sick Leave Act because of that stated reason for termination.
Court: USDC District of Columbia, Judge: Cooper, Filed On: April 24, 2024, Case #: 1:23cv3401, NOS: Employment - Civil Rights, Categories: Employment, Employment Discrimination, Employment Retaliation
J. Lamberth grants the contractor's motion for sanctions in the subcontractor's suit against it stemming from a dispute over a renovation of the Latvian Embassy. The contractor is awarded attorney's fees and costs and the subcontractor is prohibited from introducing evidence relating to costs incurred on the project and opposing the contractor's expert's cost opinions, as sanction for repeated and flagrant failures to follow court orders and produce required discovery.
Court: USDC District of Columbia, Judge: Lamberth, Filed On: April 24, 2024, Case #: 1:22cv1643, NOS: Other Contract - Contract, Categories: Sanctions, Discovery, Contract
J. Moss partially grants the FDA's motion for summary judgment and the tobacco vaporizer maker's cross-motion for summary judgment in a Freedom of Information Act suit brought by the vape maker seeking information on its denied premarket tobacco applications. The FDA's withholding of records under an exemption for "inter-agency or intra-agency memorandums or letters" was proper because those documents were part of the deliberative process, regardless of the vape maker's various arguments that they were produced after the agency's decisions were made, because they were nevertheless produced before those decisions were finalized and published. Memos summarizing scientific data also are not privilege-free scientific reports in this case, since they were compiled for deliberative purposes. The agency has also established that the release of withheld memos would cause foreseeable harm and would chill the ongoing supervisory review process.
Court: USDC District of Columbia, Judge: Moss, Filed On: April 23, 2024, Case #: 1:22cv2853, NOS: Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) - Other Suits, Categories: Administrative Law, Government, Public Record
J. Cooper grants the employer's motion for partial summary judgment and denies the employee's motion for summary judgment in a suit alleging that the employee reneged on an obligation to return a bonus when she left her role as the employer's subsidiary's president. The pay schedule provisions of the employee's bonus contract is enforceable, and the employee breached them by failing to return an accelerated payment. The doctrine of unclean hands also does not apply in this case. The employer's request for fees incurred in summary judgment briefing as a sanction for the employee's litigation conduct is denied.
Court: USDC District of Columbia, Judge: Cooper, Filed On: April 23, 2024, Case #: 1:22cv2574, NOS: Insurance - Contract, Categories: Employment, Choice Of Law, Contract
J. Moss denies the state of Florida's motion seeking a stay of an injunction entered in a suit brought under the Endangered Species Act pending appeal. Staying the decision would, in effect, deny the environmental groups the preliminary injunctive relief they sought, so the public interest and risk of injury to those groups weigh against a stay. Florida, meanwhile, has not demonstrated that it is likely to suffer an irreparable injury absent a stay, nor that it is likely to prevail on appeal.
Court: USDC District of Columbia, Judge: Moss, Filed On: April 23, 2024, Case #: 1:21cv119, NOS: Environmental Matters - Other Suits, Categories: Civil Procedure, Environment
J. Boasberg denies the union's former national secretary-treasurer's motions for a new trial and attorney fees in his suit against the union alleging that he was improperly disciplined for sending a campaign email to members in his run for the union's presidency. The jury's verdict, which found the union liable for the secretary-treasurer's first removal from office but not his second and awarded him no damages, does not represent an impermissible compromise since there is no inherent conflict between the liability finding and the decision not to award damages. The court also did not err in issuing an instruction requiring that he prove by a preponderance of the evidence that the union removed him from his position because of protected speech, and the court's decision not to issue a nominal-damages instruction did not preclude a finding of nominal damages. That issue was also not preserved. Evidence of reputational harm was not improperly excluded, or indeed excluded at all. Finally, attorney fees are not appropriate because, whether or not he could be counted as "successful" in this suit, members of the union were not benefited by that victory and the secretary-treasurer has repeatedly engaged in vexatious litigation behavior.
Court: USDC District of Columbia, Judge: Boasberg, Filed On: April 22, 2024, Case #: 1:17cv1867, NOS: Labor/Management Relations - Labor, Categories: Employment, Labor / Unions
J. Cobb grants the Campaign for Accountability’s cross-motion for summary judgment in its suit seeking to require the Department of Justice, Office of Legal Counsel to make certain records available to the public under the “reading-room” provision of the Freedom of Information Act. Deliberative process privilege “does not categorically protect the OLC’s formal written opinions resolving interagency disputes.” Thus, those opinions are subject to the “affirmative disclosure requirements of FOIA’s reading-room provision.
Court: USDC District of Columbia, Judge: Cobb, Filed On: April 19, 2024, Case #: 1:16cv1068, NOS: Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) - Other Suits, Categories: Government
J. Contreras grants the secretary of the Treasury’s partial motion to dismiss a suit brought by individuals and business entities over the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control’s designation of the individuals as “specially designated nationals” on the “specially designated nationals and blocked persons list.” The court dismisses two counts asserting the department did not act within its authorities.
Court: USDC District of Columbia, Judge: Contreras, Filed On: April 19, 2024, Case #: 1:24cv285, NOS: Other Statutory Actions - Other Suits, Categories: Agency
J. Boasberg denies the apartment manager's motion for judgment on the pleadings in the driver's suit alleging that its privately hired "special police officers" improperly assaulted him and pepper sprayed him while he was handcuffed, threatening to take his children away before determining that they did not have authority to make traffic stops or probable cause to arrest him. The driver's first amended complaint does not "necessarily rely" on the existence of a contract between it and its security contractor, and therefore the contract was not incorporated by reference into the complaint and need not be considered at this time. He has adequately argued vicarious liability for the purposes of this motion, though he may not for a summary judgment motion. A motion to amend is granted as to certain clarifying amendments, but the driver is not granted leave to add new entities as defendants. He may add certain additional claims against the security contractor.
Court: USDC District of Columbia, Judge: Boasberg, Filed On: April 17, 2024, Case #: 1:22cv3098, NOS: Other Civil Rights - Civil Rights, Categories: Civil Rights, Tort, Premises Liability
J. Moss denies the state of Florida's motion for a stay of a prior order granting partial summary judgment to environmental groups in a suit alleging that federal regulators improperly delegated permitting authority to Florida regulators, and denies its motion for final judgment while granting its alternative request for relief in the form of partial final judgment. A limited stay in this case “is neither workable nor desirable,” and would require the Court to develop a program splitting work between different agencies over those agencies’ objections and result in needless redundancy. The final judgment motion is denied because one count, regarding the Army Corps of Engineers’ retained waters list, has remaining controversies to resolve. This count, however, is substantially distinct from the other counts in its legal theory and the administrative record it involves, so final, appealable judgment is entered as to the other counts.
Court: USDC District of Columbia, Judge: Moss, Filed On: April 12, 2024, Case #: 1:21cv119, NOS: Environmental Matters - Other Suits, Categories: Administrative Law, Civil Procedure, Environment
J. Boasberg grants the National Labor Relations Board's motion to dismiss the Starbucks employees' action challenging procedures that protect against the removal of Board members. The employees have not shown that they have suffered an injury because of the protections, which are intended to maintain the independence of the agency, and their claims that the protections violate the Constitution's separation-of-powers guarantees also fail on their merits.
Court: USDC District of Columbia, Judge: Boasberg, Filed On: April 10, 2024, Case #: 1:23cv2954, NOS: Other Statutory Actions - Other Suits, Categories: Constitution, Government, Labor / Unions