US v. Baroni — criminal — partial reversal — Scirica

The introduction admirably summarizes things:

Defendants William E. Baroni, Jr. and Bridget Anne Kelly engaged in a scheme to impose crippling gridlock on the Borough of Fort Lee, New Jersey, after Fort Lee’s mayor refused to endorse the 2013 reelection bid of then-Governor Chris Christie. To this end, under the guise of conducting a “traffic study,” Baroni and Kelly, among others, conspired to limit Fort Lee motorists’ access to the George Washington Bridge—the world’s busiest bridge—over four days in early September 2013: the first week of Fort Lee’s school year. This scheme caused vehicles to back up into the Borough, creating intense traffic jams. Extensive media coverage ensued, and the scandal became known as “Bridgegate.”

In 2015, a grand jury indicted Baroni and Kelly for their role in the scheme. Each Defendant was charged with seven counts: conspiracy to obtain by fraud, knowingly convert, or intentionally misapply property of an organization receiving federal benefits, 18 U.S.C. § 371, and the substantive offense, id. § 666(a)(1)(A); conspiracy to commit wire fraud, id. § 1349, and two counts of the substantive offense, id. § 1343; and conspiracy against civil rights, id. § 241, and the substantive offense, id. § 242. A jury convicted Defendants on all counts. They appeal only their judgments of conviction.

For reasons that follow, we will affirm Defendants’ judgments of convictions on the wire fraud and Section 666 counts but will reverse and vacate their civil rights convictions.

Criminal liability on the civil rights convictions turned on whether their actions were subject to qualified immunity. The court today held that they were protected by qualified immunity, even though their actions had been clearly illegal in the Third Circuit for almost three decades, because there was not a robust consensus on the point among the rest of the circuits. It wrote, “The Supreme Court has suggested that a single binding case from the defendant’s jurisdiction is insufficient to give notice that certain conduct could lead to criminal punishment. See Carroll
v. Carman, 135 S. Ct. 348, 350 (2014).” But Carroll assumed for the sake of argument that a single prior decision could constitute clearly established law, and instead held that the case relied on there did not answer the question. So today’s holding appears, at least at first blush, to expand significantly the scope of qualified immunity.

Joining Scirica were Ambro and Siler CA6 by designation. Arguing counsel were Michael Levy of Sidley Austin for one defendant, Jacob Roth of Jones Day for the other, and Bruce Keller for the government.

Weitzner v. Sanofi Pasteur — civil — affirmance — Smith

The Third Circuit upheld a grant of summary judgment in favor the defense in a suit under the Telephone Consumer Protection Act, holding that the plaintiffs’ untimely claims were not subject to class-action tolling under American Pipe.

Joining Smith were McKee and Restrepo. Arguing counsel were Todd Bank of NY for the appellants and Carl Greco of Scranton for the appellees.