Friday round-up
on Apr 20, 2012 at 10:22 am
Briefly:
- For this blog, Bradley Joondeph analyzes the Court’s recent opinion in Filarsky v. Delia, in which it held that a private individual temporarily retained by the government to carry out its work is entitled to seek qualified immunity from suit under 42 U.S.C. § 1983.
- At the Constitutional Law Prof Blog, Steven D. Schwinn summarizes Wednesday’s opinion in Mohamad v. Palestinian Authority, in which the Court unanimously affirmed the D.C. Circuit’s holding that, as used in the Torture Victim Protection Act, the word “individual” encompasses only natural persons and therefore does not impose liability on organizations. Reuters (via the Jerusalem Post) and UPI also provide coverage. (Disclosure: Goldstein & Russell, P.C., whose attorneys contribute to this blog in various capacities, serves as counsel to the petitioners in this case.)
- In the New York Times Opinionator Blog, Linda Greenhouse discusses a “gender gap” on the Court.
- At the Sentencing Law and Policy Blog, Doug Berman weighs in on Tuesday’s oral arguments in Dorsey v. United States and Hill v. United States, the Fair Sentencing Act of 2010 cases; Berman argues that “as a matter of both doctrine and policy, FSA defendants ought to win the fight in this particular setting where all the FSA does is lower the trigger quantities of crack for applicable mandatory minimum prison terms.”
- RegBlog discusses the Court’s opinion in Mayo Collaborative Services v. Prometheus Laboratories and the Patent and Trademark Office’s reaction to the opinion.
- At PrawfsBlawg, Jack Chin discusses an amicus brief in Arizona v. United States (the challenge to Arizona’s S.B.1070 immigration law) filed by the Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights.
- The Baltimore Sun reports that the Court’s opinion in Florence v. Board of Freeholders “could derail the civil claims of thousands of detainees who say they were illegally examined by Baltimore law enforcement officials, including a nurse who was arrested at gunpoint for alleged traffic violations.”
- MSNBC, Entertainment Weekly, and BET all report on the government’s cert. petition in the infamous Janet Jackson “wardrobe malfunction” case.
