Transcript Can States be sued? - Vigo County School Corporation

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Supreme Court in
the News
Computer loss
Lethal injection Cruel
Oregon assisted suicide
Can States be sued
Computer loss
Will v. Hallock
Hallock sued Will and several other employees of the United States Customs
Service under the Federal Tort Claims Act (FTCA) for damages resulting from
the seizure of Hallock’s computer equipment in violation of the Fifth
Amendment. In a previous action, Hallock had sued the United States
government under the FTCA for the same Fifth Amendment violation.
Although the FTCA waives the government’s sovereign immunity, actions for
damage to goods seized by customs agents fall under an exception to the
FTCA, under which sovereign immunity is not waived. Thus, the district court
dismissed Hallock’s first suit for lack of subject matter jurisdiction.
Subsequently, Hallock brought this suit for the same damage against the
customs employees instead of the United States. In district court, the
defendants moved to dismiss the suit because the FTCA bars suits when
judgment has been previously entered for a claim. The district court ruled in
favor of Hallock and Second Circuit Court of Appeals affirmed, declaring that
it had jurisdiction to hear the matter as an interlocutory appeal. The Second
Circuit ruled that Hallock had not properly presented a claim in the first suit
because sovereign immunity had not been waived. Therefore, the second suit
was not barred by the first suit’s dismissal because no final judgment had
been entered in the first suit.
What the Court said
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In a warranted search of Susan and Richard Hallocks’ residence,
Customs Service agents seized computer equipment, software, and
disk drives. No criminal charges were ever brought, but the equipment
was returned damaged, with all of the stored data lost, forcing Susan
to close her computer software business. She sued the United States
under the Federal Tort Claims Act, invoking the waiver of sovereign
immunity, and alleging negligence by the customs agents in executing
the search. While that suit was pending, Susan also filed this action
against the individual agents under Bivens v. Six Unknown Fed.
Narcotics Agents,, alleging that the damage they caused to her
computers deprived her of property in violation of the Fifth
Amendment’s Due Process Clause After the District Court dismissed
the first suit on the ground that the agents’ activities fell within an
exception to the Tort Claims Act’s waiver of sovereign immunity, the
agents moved for judgment in the Bivens action. They relied on the
Tort Claims Act’s judgment bar,, which provides that “the judgment in
an action under … constitutes] a complete bar to any action … against
the employee of the government whose act or omission gave rise to
the claim.” The District Court denied the motion, holding that dismissal
of the Tort Claims Act suit against the Government failed to raise the
Act’s judgment bar. The Second Circuit affirmed, after first ruling in
favor of jurisdiction under the collateral order doctrine. Under this
doctrine, appellate authority to review “all final decisions of the district
courts," includes jurisdiction over “a narrow class of decisions that do
not terminate the litigation,” but are sufficiently important and
collateral to the merits that they should “nonetheless be treated as
‘final,’ ” Digital Equipment Corp. v. Desktop Direct,
Lethal Injection Cruel
WASHINGTON - Florida death row inmate Clarence Hill won a last-minute
Supreme Court stay Tuesday night about an hour after It was not clear
if the court's intervention would only briefly delay Hill's execution,
which had been scheduled for 6 p.m. EST, to give justices additional
time to review three separate stay requests.
Witnesses had gathered at the Florida State Prison for the execution, which
was put off for more than an hour before word came from the court.
The witnesses were sent home after Justice Anthony M. Kennedy filed
paperwork that said Hill's death sentence would "be stayed pending
further order" of the justices.
"The court will not rule until tomorrow," said Robby Cunningham,
spokesman for the Florida Department of Corrections.
Earlier, Hill had lost appeals at the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in
Atlanta. He was scheduled to die for the Oct. 19, 1982, slaying of a
Pensacola police officer and the wounding of his partner.
Hill was to be the 61st inmate executed in Florida since 1976, when
executions resumed after a 12-year moratorium, and the 257th since
1924, when the state took that duty from individual counties.
Hill first asked the court for a stay last week. In one of his appeals, Hill
asked for a delay to give him time to contest the chemicals that will be
used. Kennedy cited that case in granting the stay.
Hill's lawyers argue that the three chemicals used in Florida's lethal injection
method of execution cause pain, making his execution cruel and
unusual punishment. (Amendment eight) He also contends that he is
mentally retarded.
Continued
Lethal injections are used in most states that have capital punishment, and there's
been a growing dispute over the way they are carried out.
The Supreme Court has never found a specific form of execution to be cruel and
unusual punishment, and the latest case from Florida does not give court
members that opportunity. The justices will, however, spell out what options are
available to inmates with last-minute challenges to the way they will be put to
death.
Hill argues that the doses of three chemicals used in Florida executions — sodium
pentothal, pancuronium bromide and potassium chloride — can cause pain. The
first drug is a pain killer. The second one paralyzes the inmate and the third
causes a fatal heart attack.
The final drug, potassium chloride, "burns intensely as it courses through the veins
toward the heart," Doss wrote in the appeal. He said there is "a foreseeable risk
of the gratuitous and unnecessary infliction of pain." Hill argues that the doses of
three chemicals used in Florida executions — sodium pentothal, pancuronium
bromide and potassium chloride — can cause pain. The first drug is a pain killer.
The second one paralyzes the inmate and the third causes a fatal heart attack.
The final drug, potassium chloride, "burns intensely as it courses through the veins
toward the heart," Doss wrote in the appeal. He said there is "a foreseeable risk
of the gratuitous and unnecessary infliction of pain."
Hill argues that the doses of three chemicals used in Florida executions — sodium
pentothal, pancuronium bromide and potassium chloride — can cause pain. The
first drug is a pain killer. The second one paralyzes the inmate and the third
causes a fatal heart attack.
The final drug, potassium chloride, "burns intensely as it courses through the veins
toward the heart," Doss wrote in the appeal. He said there is "a foreseeable risk
of the gratuitous and unnecessary infliction of pain."
This case was brought for Amendment 8
Assisted suicide in Oregan
The Supreme Court on Tuesday let stand Oregon's physician-assisted suicide law,
opening the door to many more such laws across the nation for ending the lives
of the terminally ill. In a 6-3 vote, justices ruled that a federal drug law could not
be used to prosecute Oregon doctors who prescribed overdoses intended to
facilitate the deaths of terminally ill patients. The Bush administration in 2001
sought to go after Oregon doctors who invoked the law, saying that induced
suicide was not a "legitimate medical purpose."
But during oral arguments last November, several justices seemed skeptical of the
government's position. Justice Sandra Day O'Connor pointed out that doctors
participate in the administration of lethal injections to death row inmates.
Writing for the majority, Justice Anthony Kennedy chided former Attorney General
John Ashcroft, who tried to lock horns with Oregon over the law. Kennedy wrote
that the "authority claimed by the attorney general is both beyond his expertise
and incongruous with the statutory purposes and design."
Kennedy said that both Ashcroft and the current attorney general, Alberto Gonzales,
were overstepping their bounds in trying to impede Oregon's legislature and the
U.S. Congress. The attorneys general had argued that the federal Controlled
Substances Act (CSA) gave them the power to override the Oregon assisted
suicide law.
"The CSA explicitly contemplates a role for the states in regulating controlled
substances," Kennedy noted. Moreover, when Ashcroft said that assisted suicide
was not a "legitimate medical purpose," he was seeking to define that term,
which was not spelled out in the CSA. If anyone is going to define what a
legitimate medical purpose is, Kennedy wrote, it should not be the attorney
general, whose job description does not include making health and medical
policy. "He is not authorized to make a rule declaring illegitimate a medical
standard for care and treatment of patients that is specifically authorized under
state law," Kennedy wrote. He was joined in the majority opinion by Justices
O'Connor, John Paul Stevens, David Souter, Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Stephen
Breyer
continued
Peg Sandeen, executive director of the Death With Dignity National Center, said she
was pleased but hardly surprised by Tuesday's outcome.
"We're pretty convinced states are going to go forward with similar legislation,"
Sandeen told FOXNews.com, citing pending legislation in Vermont and California.
"We really believe the American people want this."
The court did not make a bold statement about the right to die, however. It merely
said that the attorney general could not use the CSA to prosecute physicians who
prescribe deadly doses to terminally ill patients — meaning, Congress could
explicitly grant or deprive the attorney general of that power in new legislation.
"It's a rebuke to the Bush administration, but it's not any great victory for one side or
the other," said Neil Siegel, a constitutional law professor at Duke Law School.
"The decision did not [address] the merits of assisted suicide," said Bradford Short,
staff attorney for the Culture of Life Foundation. "At the most what it said is that
the Controlled Substances
This decision was based on states rights
Can States be sued?
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - States can be sued in certain bankruptcy proceedings, a
divided U.S. Supreme Court ruled on Monday in a case that pitted state powers
against those of the federal government.
By a 5-4 vote, the high court rejected arguments that states could not be sued
because of state sovereign immunity. The court said Congress, in adopting the
bankruptcy law, has the power to treat states the same way as other creditors.
The decision departed from the series of rulings in recent years by the court's
conservative majority that generally have expanded the immunity of states from
lawsuits while cutting back on the power of Congress.
The case involved four state-run colleges in Virginia -- Central Virginia Community
College, Virginia Military Institute, New River Community College and Blue Ridge
Community College.
Wallace Bookstores, which operated a chain of college bookstores, filed for
bankruptcy in 2001. The liquidating supervisor of the bankruptcy estate sued the
four colleges in an attempt to recover money owed to Wallace.
The colleges moved to dismiss on the grounds that state sovereign immunity barred
the lawsuit. But a federal bankruptcy court, a federal judge and a U.S. appeals
court all rejected the request and said Congress acted within its power in
revoking state immunity in bankruptcy proceedings.
The high court, in an opinion written by Justice
John Paul Stevens, agreed. He was joined by Justices Sandra Day O'Connor, David
Souter, Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Stephen Breyer.
Stevens said the ruling involved proceedings initiated by a bankruptcy trustee to set
aside preferential transfers by the debtor to state agencies.
Chief Justice John Roberts and Justices Clarence Thomas, Antonin Scalia and Anthony
Kennedy dissented. Thomas wrote that the majority opinion cannot be justified
by the U.S. Constitution and that it conflicted with the court's precedents on state
sovereign immunity.
This decision was based on powers of government