Bryan Lammon

@finaldecisions.org

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Lawyer & law professor focused on appellate jurisdiction. Founder of Final Decisions PLLC (finaldecisions.org).

Screenshot of a judicial opinion. The relevant text reads: We do not hold here that denials of anti-SLAPP motions to strike arising under any state's law are immediately appealable as a matter of right before this Court. Our holding today applies only, at this point, to California's anti-SLAPP statute. If we are presented with a case arising under another state's law, in determining whether we have appellate jurisdiction for a given case raising an issue regarding an anti-SLAPP motion to strike, we must evaluate the relevant state's anti-SLAPP statute at issue on appeal and evaluate how that tool has been exercised in practice to understand whether that given instance comports with the collateral-order exception to the final decision rule under Federal Circuit law.
Screenshot of the first page of the Supreme Court's opinion in Parrish v. United States.
Screenshot of a court opinion with the text: Since then, the case has been before numerous courts. In order to place the issues now before us in context, we need to go back to basics. We begin by recalling the distinction between a legal claim and a theory supporting relief (what the common law used to call a cause of action). A claim is the set of operative facts that produce an assertable right in court and create an entitlement to a remedy. A theory of relief is the vehicle for pursuing the claim; it may be based on any type of legal source, whether a constitution, statute, precedent, or administrative law. The specific theory dictates what the plaintiff needs to prove to prevail on a claim and what relief may be available. One lawsuit may raise multiple claims, and each claim may be supported by multiple theories.
Screenshot of a court opinion with highlighted text: That is because their warranty counts are an alternative theory of recovery to their fraud counts rather than separate “claims” for purposes of Rule 54(b). So the District Court’s Rule 54(b) judgment as to the fraud counts did not finally resolve a “claim.”
Screenshot of a court opinion with highlighted text: The DPS appealed, arguing that the district court should have granted summary judgment on Count 6 because of its sovereign immunity. See P.R. Aqueduct & Sewer Auth. v. Metcalf & Eddy, Inc., 506 U.S. 139, 141 (1993) (recognizing that an order denying sovereign immunity is an appealable collateral order).
Screenshot of a court opinion with highlighted text: [T]he interest is not just substantial but also time-bound.... Interlocutory appeals are not for issues that are merely important; they are for issues that are important, now.
Screen shot of a court opinion. The body of the opinion reads: Patience is a virtue. At least, that’s the message Title 28, United States Code, Section 1291, conveys. Section 1291 gives us jurisdiction over district courts’ “final decisions.” In contrast, we ordinarily lack jurisdiction over district courts’ decisions that don’t end the litigation—meaning litigants must wait for a final judgment before they can appeal. But a judge-made rule called the “collateral-order doctrine” offers a limited exception to this final-decision rule. The collateral-order doctrine extends § 1291’s jurisdictional grant to interlocutory appeals of “a small class of collateral rulings that, although they do not end the litigation, are appropriately deemed ‘final.’” Mohawk Indus., Inc. v. Carpenter, 558 U.S. 100, 106 (2009) (cleaned up). This case requires us to determine whether to expand the collateral-order doctrine to permit an im- mediate appeal when a district court recognizes a cause of action under Bivens v. Six Unknown Agents of the Federal Bureau of Narcotics, 403 U.S. 388 (1971), outside the context of addressing a qualified-immunity claim.
Screenshot of the linked court opinion with highlighted text: Prospective intervenors are subject to the same 60-day time limit as parties, even while their motions to intervene are pending. A motion to intervene alone is not construed as a motion to extend the deadline.
Screenshot of a court opinion with highlighted text: So a court cannot grant “meaningful review” to a qualified-immunity defense without delving into the merits.
Screenshot of a court opinion with highlighted text: We also have jurisdiction over the hospitals’ cross-appeal because our jurisdiction extends to the district court’s entire decision. We have held that if “both the plaintiff and the relevant agency” seek “review of the district court’s remand order,” the order is final for both parties’ appeals.
Screenshot of a court opinion with highlighted text: [S]he moved for reconsideration under Eastern District of Michigan Local Rule 7.1(h). That Local Rule, however, was amended two years prior to read “[p]arties seeking reconsideration of final orders or judgments must file a motion under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 59(e) or 60(b). The court will not grant reconsideration of such an order or judgment under this rule.” ... Miller never once mentioned Rules 59(e) or 60(b) in her motion for reconsideration. ... The Local Rule’s amended text now plainly forecloses any continued construal as a Rule 59(e) motion ....
Screenshot of a court opinion.
Screenshot of a judicial opinion with highlighted text: We conclude that we lack appellate jurisdiction over GEO’s interlocutory appeal of the district court’s order denying GEO’s claim of protection from suit under Yearsley because appellate review of an order denying such protection cannot be undertaken completely separate from the merits; consequently, an order denying Yearsley’s applicability does not satisfy the collateral order doctrine of Cohen.
Screenshot of a court opinion with highlighted text: The standard for granting a Rule 59(e) motion reflects a strong interest in finality at two levels: the district court’s final decision, which marks the beginning of appellate jurisdiction, and the entry of final judgment, which starts the countdown to the end of that jurisdiction.
Photo of a Shih Tzu puppy.
Screenshot of a court opinion.
Screenshot of a court opinion. Relevant text is: Our circuit has not yet applied these Watson-derived factors to address whether a healthcare provider acts at the direction of the National Coordinator when it creates an EHR website with an embedded tracking code. Thankfully, we are not staring at blank computer screens, learning how to program “Hello, World!”[footnote marker] [Footnote:] To ruin a joke with explanation: when students learn a new programming language, they often start by creating a computer program that displays the message “Hello, World!” See Brian W. Kernighan & Dennis Ritchie, The C Programming Language 9–10 (1st ed. 1978).
Screenshot of a court opinion with highlighted text: Lewis contends that “[d]isclosure orders adverse to the attorney-client privilege do not qualify for immediate appeal under the collateral order doctrine” based on the Court’s decision in Mohawk, 558 U.S. at 108–09. We disagree.
Screenshot of a court opinion with highlighted text: Finally, Defendants argue that because courts have jurisdiction to determine their own jurisdiction, we always have appellate jurisdiction—no matter the order appealed from—to correct a district court’s erroneous exercise of subject-matter jurisdiction. Grey Br. at 2–6 (citing, among others, Solomon v. St. Joseph Hosp., 62 F.4th 54 (2d Cir. 2023)). This argument is simply wrong. The Defendants’ reliance on Solomon is misplaced.
Screenshot of a court opinion.
Screenshot of a court opinion with highlighted text: "Contriving finality, however, doesn’t always preclude our review."
Screenshot of the linked court opinion.
Screenshot of a court opinion with highlighted text: We thus reiterate that permission to appeal should be granted where the certification decision itself under Rule 23(a) and (b) turns on a novel or unsettled question of law, not simply where the merits of a particular case may turn on such a question.
Screenshot of a court opinion with highlighted text: "the BOP defendants did not make a qualified immunity argument in their opening brief"
Screenshot of an opinion, with highlighted text: Did the district court in this case resolve questions “separate from the merits”? Far from being “collateral” to the merits, a decision about who receives how much of the proceeds from a sale is the merits.
Screenshot of a court opinion, with highlighted text: The district court effectively resolved the Plaintiffs’ preemption claim as a matter of law, by rejecting the legal basis of New York’s preemption defenses; all claims have been disposed of with finality and with prejudice; the parties stipulated to judgment solely to obtain immediate appellate review, without circumventing any restrictions on our appellate jurisdiction; and New York expressly preserved its right to appeal from the stipulated judgment. The parties have not circumvented the final judgment rule but have merely accelerated the process of obtaining the final judgment that became inevitable once the district court reached its legal conclusion.
Screen shot of a court opinion in which the court used ten initialisms in a single paragraph. Also, a footnote informs the reader that "a glossary of acronyms is attached in an Appendix to this opinion."
Screenshot of a court opinion. Highlighted text reads: But as the Supreme Court has made clear, "if what is at issue . . . is nothing more than whether the evidence could support a finding that particular conduct occurred, the question decided is not truly ‘separable’ from the plaintiff’s claim." Given the fact-dependent nature of the anti SLAPP analysis, and relying on Johnson, we conclude that we lack appellate jurisdiction to review the district court’s order. Moreover, appellate review here would infringe on a principal purpose of the separability requirement: preventing piecemeal appellate review. . . . For these reasons, the collateral-order doctrine does not allow appeals from orders denying special motions to dismiss under Colorado’s anti-SLAPP statute.
we now hold that we lack pendent appellate jurisdiction over Heck claims in qualified-immunity appeals
Screenshot of a court opinion discussing "super snap removal."
Screenshot of a case excerpt describing the grounds for removal.
In the first appeal, we reversed the district court’s grant of summary judgment to Defendants on Plaintiffs’ copyright-infringement claim related to the software code and remanded the case to the district court “for the taking of additional evidence.” We dismissed the second appeal for lack of appellate jurisdiction.
To the extent that the County argues we lack jurisdiction to review the summary judgment order because the notice of appeal referenced only the order resolving the Rule 60(b) motion, we disagree. Fed. R. App. P. 3 specifies that a notice of appeal must “designate the judgment—or the appealable order—from which the appeal is taken.” Fed. R. App. P. 3(c)(1)(B). We have instructed that “a mistake in designating the judgment appealed from should not bar appeal as long as the intent to appeal a specific judgment can be fairly inferred and the appellee is not prejudiced or misled by the mistake.” ... Here, where the district court's denial of T.A.'s Rule 60(b) motion denied reconsideration of its summary judgment order, T.A.'s intent to appeal both the Rule 60(b) ruling and the underlying summary judgment ruling is “fairly inferred.” Id. And we conclude that there is no prejudice to the County that warrants limiting the notice of appeal to only the Rule 60(b) ruling.
"the presiding magistrate judge recommended dismissing the case as a sanction under Federal Rules of Civil Procedure 16(f), 37(b), and 41(b) because Marquez had purportedly failed to comply with discovery obligations and related orders."
A threshold issue we must first address is our authority to consider the jurisdictional issue. Our case law reflects a period during which a hearing panel’s authority to review an administrative panel’s denial of a motion to dismiss for lack of jurisdiction was in flux
The 30-day deadline is “‘mandatory and jurisdictional’ and is ‘not subject to equitable tolling.’” ... We subsequently concluded that “the holding in Santos-Zacaria is limited to § 1252(d)(1) and the Supreme Court has not overruled Stone,” therefore “we are bound to apply Stone unless and until the Supreme Court provides to the contrary.” ... In a Notice of Supplemental Authority, the Government renounced its prior position on jurisdiction and adopted the opposite argument, asserting that we do have jurisdiction over this petition
And here, the Government objects—but only partially. Following the same dividing line as the appellate waiver in the plea agreement, the Government objects to Crump’s challenges to the four-point enhancements under § 2K2.1(b)(4)(B) for the obliteration of a serial number and § 2K2.1(b)(6)(B) for felony reckless endangerment of another person. But the Government does not object to the timeliness of Crump’s appeal of his two crime-of-violence challenges. Accordingly, Crump’s challenges to the four-point enhancements imposed under § 2K2.1(b)(4)(B) and § 2K2.1(b)(6)(B) will be dismissed, but his two crime-of-violence arguments, which, if both successful, would yield a Guidelines range of 37 to 46 months, remain for consideration on appeal.
[Describing the three-part test for effective injunctions.]
The first is whether the district court picked and applied the right summary-judgment standard. The second is whether unverified factual allegations can substitute for actual evidence in determining whether a genuine issue of material fact exists. In our view, both raise pure “legal issues” that fall within our jurisdiction, as limited as it may be.
Petition cover and question presented in Boresky v. Graber, No. 23-384: "Whether a district court decision fashioning a new implied cause of action under Bivens is immediately appealable."
To appeal the order denying his Rule 60(b) motion, Garnett had to file a new notice of appeal or an amended notice of appeal within 30 days of the denial of the order. See Fed. R. App. P. 4(a)(4)(B)(ii) . . . . Garnett didn’t file a new or amended notice of appeal challenging the order dismissing his Rule 60(b) motion within 30 days. . . . Because Garnett failed to timely file a new notice of appeal or an amended notice of appeal from the order denying his Rule 60(b) motion, we lack jurisdiction to consider the order on appeal.
My second thought concerns the exception for all claims against a single defendant. As the Eleventh Circuit acknowledged in Esteva, courts have recognized an exception to the “actions only” rule in multi-defendant suits: We have recognized an exception to this rule, allowing plaintiffs to voluntarily dismiss less than the entire action so long as they dismiss a defendant in its entirety (i.e., they dismiss all of the claims brought against that defendant). But what is the basis for this exception? The text still says “action.” And a multi-defendant action is still a single action. That’s why the resolution of all claims against one defendant is not appealable when claims against other defendants remain pending. Perhaps this is all an argument to do away with the multi-defendant exception. (That was one of the dissent’s arguments in Williams v. Taylor Seidenbach Co.). But it at least shows some inconsistency in courts’ treatment of Rule 41.
Manufactured Finality title page and abstract
the Lowerys filed a "notice of intent to abandon" the bad-faith claim alleged in count three. The notice stated that the Lowerys had "elect[ed] to forego" the penalties and fees they were seeking in count three and were "abandon[ing]" that count.
For the reasons explained below, we hold that §1252(d)(1) is not jurisdictional.
A denial of PREP Act immunity also satisfies the collateral order doctrine’s requirements.