Chesapeake Appalachia v. Scout Petroleum — arbitration — affirmance– Cowen

Last year in Opalinski the Third Circuit held that the availability of class arbitration is an issue for courts to decide unless the parties’ arbitration agreement provides otherwise “clearly and unmistakeably.” Today, the court held that the parties’ arbitration agreement here, which incorporated rules promulgated by the American Arbitration Assoc., did not delegate the class arbitrability decision to the arbitrators with the requisite clarity, and therefore it affirmed the district court’s order vacating the arbitrator’s decision.

Joining Cowen were Shwartz and Krause. Arguing counsel were Robert Pratter of Cohen Placitella for the appellants and Daniel Donovan of Kirkland & Ellis for the appellee.

US v. Moreno — criminal sentencing — reversal in part — Fisher

Applying plain-error review, the Third Circuit today vacated a criminal defendant’s sentence because the defendant’s right of allocution was violated when the court permitted the prosecutor to vigorously cross-examine the defendant during his allocution. The court held that the error was plain even though “no previous cases have explicitly proscribed cross-examination during allocution,” because cross-examination was clearly contrary to the purpose of allocution. Interestingly, the opinion went on to say that, even if the error here were not plain, the court would still exercise its supervisory power to hold that defendants may not be cross-examined during allocution. The court also affirmed the defendant’s conviction (concluding it was clear a Confrontation Clause violated occurred when a witness read into the record law enforcement reports, but that the error was harmless) and rejected a challenge to imposition of a sentencing enhancement.

Joining Fisher were Chagares and Jordan. Arguing counsel were Brett Sweitzer of the federal defender for Moreno and Jane Datillo for the government.