Petitions to Watch | Conference of 11.6.09

This edition of “Petitions to Watch” features cases up for consideration at the Justices’ private conference tomorrow, November 6.  As always, it lists the petitions on the Court’s paid docket that Tom has deemed to have a reasonable chance of being granted.  Links to all previous editions are available in our SCOTUSwiki archive.

Docket: 08-1500

Title: Federal Express Corp. v. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission

Issue: If Title VII precludes the EEOC from bringing a direct action against an employer once the employee elects to request the right-to-sue notice and files suit on the claims alleged in his charge, would it be inconsistent with Title VII to allow the EEOC to maintain perpetual jurisdiction to investigate the charge?

• Opinion below (9th Circuit)
• Petition for certiorari
• Brief in opposition
• Petitioner’s reply

Docket: 08-1566

Title: Brittany McComb v. Gretchan Crehan

Issues: Does the First Amendment prohibit public high school officials from censoring student-initiated, student-composed religious speech at a high school graduation ceremony?; can an interlocutory appellant unilaterally restart the 30-day clock for filing an interlocutory appeal by re-filing the same motion previously denied by the lower court?

• Opinion below (9th Circuit)
• Petition for certiorari
• Brief in opposition
• Petitioner’s reply

Docket: 09-152

Title: Russell Bruesewitz v. Wyeth, Inc.

Issue: Does Section 22(b)(1) preempt all vaccine design defect claims, whether the vaccine’s side effects were unavoidable or not?

• Opinion below (3d Circuit)
• Petition for certiorari
• Brief in opposition
• Amicus brief of the National Vaccine Information Center et al.

Docket: 09-311

Title: HCA Health Services, Inc. v. Shinn

Issue: Whether the Due Process Clause requires recusal of a judge in a case in which the chair of her ongoing reelection campaign is lead counsel for one of the parties; whether the same clause requires courts to provide parties with particularized notice and an opportunity to present evidence and submit a written response before imposing a severe sanction such as dismissal or direction of a judgment on liability.

• Opinion below (Oklahoma Court of Civil Appeals)
• Petition for certiorari
• Brief in opposition
• Petitioner’s reply

Docket: 09-400

Title: Staub v. Proctor Hospital

Issue: In what circumstances may an employer be held liable based on the unlawful intent of officials who caused or influenced but did not make the ultimate employment decision?

• Opinion below (7th Circuit)
• Petition for certiorari
• Brief in opposition
  

Cases involving lawyers from Akin Gump or Howe & Russell (listed without regard to likelihood of being granted):

Docket: 09-158

Title: Magwood v. Culliver

Issues: When a person is resentenced after having obtained federal habeas relief from an earlier sentence, is a claim in a federal habeas petition challenging that new sentencing judgment a “second or successive” claim under 28 U.S.C. § 2244(b) if the petitioner could have challenged his previous sentence on the same constitutional grounds?; did petitioner’s attorney provide ineffective assistance of counsel by failing to raise an argument at resentencing proceedings that would have made the petitioner constitutionally ineligible for the death penalty?

• Opinion below (11th Circuit)
• Petition for certiorari
• Brief in opposition
• Petitioner’s reply

Other petitions from earlier editions of Petitions to Watch were re-listed for the November 6 conference:

• Wong v. Belmontes (08-1263) – originally Conference 9.29
• Christian Legal Society v. Martinez (08-1371) – originally Conference 10.19
• Manning v. United States (08-1595) – originally Conference 10.30
• Noriega v. Pastrana (09-35) – originally Conference 10.9
• Bobby v. Van Hook (09-144) – originally Conference 9.29
• United States Defense Department v. American Civil Liberties Union (09-160) – originally Conference 10.9