The United States Court of Appeals for the First Circuit (in case citations, 1st Cir.) is a federal court with appellate jurisdiction over the district courts in the following districts:
MoreSELYA , Circuit Judge . Plaintiff-appellant Maryangela Tobin sued defendant-appellee Federal Express Corporation (FedEx) for invasion of privacy, infliction of emotional distress, and negligence. After some preliminary skirmishing, FedEx asked the district court to enter summary judgment in its favor on the principal ground that the plaintiff's claims are barred by the preemption provision of the Airline Deregulation Act (ADA), 49 U.S.C. 41713(b)(1). The court, ruling ora sponte, granted...
THOMPSON , Circuit Judge . We are, once again, called upon to interpret and apply the Massachusetts consumer protection statute, Mass. Gen. Laws ch. 93A ("Chapter 93A"). This case has humble origins: a seemingly-simple dispute over several $25 late fees the Pondview Condominium trustees charged to one of their residents, appellant William McDermott ("McDermott"), after he didn't pay his condominium fees on time. Unable to resolve the matter with McDermott, the trustees hired law firm...
LYNCH , Chief Judge . This case involves the guilty plea of a coconspirator, Jose Alibal Santiago, in a 2010 murder in Rhode Island. This court earlier issued an en banc decision about the state's obligation to honor a federal detainer in this same murder for his codefendant, Jason Pleau. See United States v. Pleau, 680 F.3d 1 (1st Cir.2012) (en banc). On September 5, 2013, Jose Alibal Santiago pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit robbery affecting commerce; robbery affecting...
BARRON , Circuit Judge . Gustavo Castro-Caicedo appeals his conviction and sentence for participating in a conspiracy that sought to send cocaine from Colombia to the United States. His primary objection is that federal agents used a highly suggestive means to prompt a member of the conspiracy to identify him as a confederate, and thus that the government's use of the identification at trial violated his constitutional right to due process. Castro-Caicedo also challenges the admission of...
LYNCH, Chief Judge. In 2007, Toray Plastics (America), Inc. ("Toray") of Rhode Island, a manufacturer of plastic film products, and T G Plastics Trading Co., Inc. ("National Plastics"), a Colorado-based broker of plastic film products, entered into a Settlement Agreement to resolve a pending lawsuit. As part of the Settlement Agreement, Toray agreed to sell certain materials exclusively through National Plastics and to pay National Plastics a twelve percent commission on all sales of the...
BARRON , Circuit Judge . On June 1, 2011, a devastating tornado struck the City of Springfield, Massachusetts. The twister ripped through the downtown area and caused a great deal of damage. Among the buildings affected were the South Commons Condominiums. This appeal concerns the lawsuit the owners of those buildings brought against the City, its officials, and one of its contractors. 1 The owners chose to name those defendants because the destruction of the buildings did not result — at...
KAYATTA , Circuit Judge . As someone with a metallic joint replacement, Mary Beth Ruskai cannot pass through some security checkpoints in U.S. airports under current Transportation Security Administration ("TSA") security protocols without submitting to a standard pat-down that includes security officials touching areas around her groin and breasts to look for concealed metallic and nonmetallic weapons. Having unsuccessfully petitioned TSA to change its protocols, she asks this court to...
LYNCH , Chief Judge . In 2007, Toray Plastics (America), Inc. ("Toray") of Rhode Island, a manufacturer of plastic film products, and T G Plastics Trading Co., Inc. ("National Plastics"), a Colorado-based broker of plastic film products, entered into a Settlement Agreement to resolve a pending lawsuit. As part of the Settlement Agreement, Toray agreed to sell certain materials exclusively through National Plastics and to pay National Plastics a twelve percent commission on all sales of the...
SELYA , Circuit Judge . This is a bruising commercial dispute between business rivals. When the eponymous plaintiff, Ira Green, Inc. (Green), repaired to the federal district court, it charged the defendant, Military Sales & Service Co. (MilSal), with tortious interference and defamation. After prodigious discovery and an acrimonious trial, the jury returned a take-nothing verdict. The district court denied Green's post-trial motions and, adding insult to injury, corrected a portion of the...
LIPEZ , Circuit Judge . Appellant Frank Ruksznis, former plumbing inspector for the Town of Sangerville ("the Town"), obtained a judgment against Lance Burgess, a Town Selectman, for slander. Ruksznis sought to collect the judgment through this reach and apply action against the Town's insurer, Argonaut Insurance Company ("Argonaut"). The district court granted summary judgment for Argonaut, finding that the exclusions in the insurance contract for "employment-related" practices barred...
KAYATTA , Circuit Judge . This appeal illustrates both the considerable responsibility granted to a jury, and the restricted scope of federal court review of state court convictions. A heinous crime most certainly occurred. Less certain is the perpetrator's identity. No confession, eye-witness testimony, DNA, or similar evidence pointed the finger confidently at any one person. Rather, the direct evidence simply narrowed the list of suspects. A properly instructed Massachusetts Superior...
Opinion En Banc TORRUELLA , Circuit Judge . This case involves important issues that arise under the Eighth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. We are asked to determine whether the district court erred in concluding that the Massachusetts Department of Correction ("DOC") has violated the Cruel and Unusual Punishment Clause of the Eighth Amendment by providing allegedly inadequate medical care to prisoner Michelle Kosilek ("Kosilek"). More precisely, we are faced with the question whether...
LYNCH , Chief Judge : There is a common understanding in this case, shared by both the Commonwealth of Massachusetts and the plaintiffs, that the Massachusetts Department of Children and Families' (DCF) administration of the foster care system has flaws and is in need of improvement. In some instances, these flaws have led to horrific and heartbreaking outcomes for children. Plaintiffs, admirably concerned about foster children, seek to have a federal court both order and oversee...
LYNCH , Chief Judge . This civil rights case arises out of the refusal of officers serving an arrest warrant to accede to the request of an arrestee, Brian Hunt, that he be handcuffed with his hands in front of him, and the ensuing events. Hunt and his wife brought this case, asserting violations of his federal constitutional rights under 42 U.S.C. 1983, as well as pendent state law claims. The district court denied the police officers' claim of qualified immunity on summary judgment...
SELYA , Circuit Judge . This is a single-issue sentencing appeal in which the defendant challenges only the district court's enhancement of her guideline sentencing range (GSR) through a two-level role-in-the-offense adjustment for leading, organizing, managing, or supervising a criminal activity. See USSG 3B1.1(c). Discerning no clear error in the district court's essentially factual determination, we summarily affirm the defendant's sentence. The silhouette of the case is easily...
BALDOCK , Circuit Judge . A federal grand jury indicted Defendant Cletus Davis on one count of being a felon in possession of two firearms in violation of 18 U.S.C. 922(g)(1). Prior to trial, Defendant filed a motion to suppress. He moved to suppress the firearms as products of an unlawful search of his residence. He also moved to suppress a statement he made while in transport to the county jail regarding the presence of the firearms in his residence. The district court in an oral ruling...
KAYATTA , Circuit Judge . Stephen Rossetti was convicted on federal criminal charges arising from a plot to rob an armored car depot in Eaton, Massachusetts. Having exhausted his direct appeals, Rossetti now seeks collateral review on a petition for a writ of habeas corpus, arguing that he was denied his Sixth Amendment right to counsel and that the district court wrongly refused to modify his sentence after a state court vacated a prior state conviction that had been relied upon to...
TORRUELLA , Circuit Judge . Defendants-Appellants Manuel Trinidad-Acosta ("Trinidad") and Ed Cogswell ("Cogswell") were convicted for their involvement in a conspiracy to distribute cocaine base (or "crack cocaine"). They appeal their convictions and sentences, citing a number of alleged trial and sentencing errors. We have reviewed their claims carefully and do not find merit in any of them. Accordingly, we affirm. I. Facts 1 Sometime around September 2010, two New York residents,...
SELYA , Circuit Judge . Defendant-appellant Edwin E. Narv ez-Soto challenges his upwardly variant sentence. After careful consideration, we affirm. Inasmuch as his appeal follows a guilty plea, we draw the facts from the change-of-plea colloquy, the uncontested portions of the presentence investigation report (PSI Report), and the transcript of the disposition hearing. See United States v. Cintr n-Echautegui, 604 F.3d 1 , 2 (1st Cir.2010); United States v. Santos, 357 F.3d 136 , 138 (...
LYNCH , Chief Judge . Lyman Morse Boatbuilding, Inc. (LMB) of Maine contracted to build a luxury yacht for Russ Irwin. Unhappy with the completed yacht, in 2011 Irwin brought an arbitration proceeding against LMB and Cabot Lyman, the controlling owner of LMB, alleging that the vessel had numerous defects. LMB and Cabot Lyman tendered defense of the arbitration complaint to their insurer, Northern Assurance Company of America, but Northern Assurance refused to defend the insureds. So the...
