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Environmental protection -- Tribe of Indians filed lawsuit for declaratory and injunctive relief alleging the manner in which the Army Corps of Engineers operated the Central and Southern Florida Project for Flood Control in the Everglades caused extreme flooding of tribal lands and would continue to do so in the future -- Claim that Florida Indian Land Claims Settlement Act obligates the Corps to protect and not interfere with rights granted to Tribe under Lease Agreement and Trustee Deed and that Corps has failed to protect and has interfered with Tribe's rights was properly dismissed for failure to state a claim for relief -- Complaint contains nothing, beyond a bald conclusion, to support allegation that Corps has an obligation to “protect” and “not interfere” with Tribe's rights -- FILCSA does not obligate the Corps to protect and not interfere with Tribe's rights, and nothing in language of Lease Agreement or the Trustee Deed creates such obligation -- Claim that Corps' water management activities deprive the Tribe of its rights to use and enjoy the Leased Land and the Reservation Land fails to state a claim for deprivation of property without due process of law where complaint contains no allegations of the process the Tribe claims was due or that any such process was inadequate -- Assessing the record in light of allegations as stated in complaint, claim that Corps, in discharging its obligations under C&SF Project, deprived Tribe and its members of equal protection of law through their disparate, unequal, and discriminatory water management fails to allege a case sufficient to withstand a motion to dismiss or, on summary judgment, to make a case for a jury
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Contracts -- Real property sales -- Buyer of condominium unit brought lawsuit against seller claiming violations under Interstate Land Sales Full Disclosure Act and Florida Deceptive and Unfair Trade Practices Act, and seeking rescission of contract, return of deposit, and attorney's fees based on attorney-fee provision in contract -- No error in granting seller's motion for summary judgment on ILSFDA claim on ground that buyer failed to show that development containing the condominium unit, which contained only fifteen units, was subject to ILSFDA -- Buyer failed to present any evidence from which a reasonable juror could conclude that subject development and another development owned by seller were marketed or advertised as a common unit or by a common name under a common promotional plan, such that number of units in these developments would be counted together for purposes of determining whether developments qualify for exemption from ILSFDA -- Seller was entitled to summary judgment on claim that seller violated FDUTPA by making a misleading statement of material fact in residence purchase contract regarding rate that seller's affiliated title company would charge for title insurance, because buyer made no allegation and presented no evidence that allegedly misleading statement caused buyer's damages -- Attorney's fees -- Prevailing party -- No error in awarding attorney's fees to seller pursuant to attorney-fee provision in contract where seller prevailed on all claims and is thus the prevailing party, and all claims in litigation are inextricably intertwined with contract and therefore arise out of contract
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Taxation -- Federal income taxes -- Deficiency -- Value of shares from exercise of option -- Consolidated appeals from decisions of Tax Court arising from deficiency notices issued to taxpayer, who failed to report his exercise of option to purchase shares in closely-held corporation as income on his federal income tax return, and shareholders of closely-held corporation, who claimed their pro rata shares of a deduction taken by corporation for the value of shares taxpayer received through option's exercise -- Tax court did not clearly err in determining that taxpayer was granted an option to purchase shares “in connection with the performance of services,” even though option passed through his former wife incident to their divorce, and so that exercise of the option generated ordinary income for taxpayer under 26 U.S.C. section 83(a) -- Language of Section 83, “in connection with the performance of services,” encompasses more transfers than just those made as compensation -- Taxpayer's exercise of option transferred to him by his former spouse incident to their divorce is not shielded by 26 U.S.C. section 1041, which provides that no gain or loss shall be recognized on transfers of property between spouses or former spouses incident to divorce -- Section 1041 does not apply to subsequent dispositions of that property by recipient spouse or former spouse -- Tax Court did not clearly err in determining fair market value of shares taxpayer received on exercise date by using cashless exercise provision contained in option agreement and thereby determining share price by reference to number of shares that parties deemed valued at sixteen million dollars when option was exercised -- It was reasonable to use parties' own valuation of shares on exercise date in assessing fair market value -- Because the closely-held corporation granted taxpayer the option in connection with performance of services such that he should have included the value of shares he received as ordinary income under Section 83(a), deductions of other shareholders were proper under Section 83(h), which provides that a person or entity that transfers property in connection with services performed is entitled to a deduction in amount equal to amount recipient is required to recognize
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Bankruptcy -- Discovery -- Litigation files -- Law firms that had represented wholly-owned subsidiary of Chapter 7 debtor, a defunct and administratively dissolved non-debtor entity, and subsidiary's former parent in a series of wrongful death cases objected to Chapter 7 trustee's Rule 2004 motions seeking the litigation files from subsidiary's former lawyers so trustee's new counsel could prepare its defense and investigate potential claims against former parent's receiver and against subsidiary's former counsel, citing former parent's attorney-client privilege, the common interest doctrine, and the work product doctrine -- Attorney-client privilege -- Under Florida law, debtor's wholly-owned subsidiary was a client of law firms retained by its former parent company and later former parent's state court-appointed receiver, even after subsidiary was sold to debtor and went out of business -- Whether former parent or its receiver technically retained the firms or paid their fees was not determinative -- Fact that law firms actually held themselves out as representing subsidiary, appeared in court on behalf of subsidiary, and rendered legal services to subsidiary is sufficient to establish attorney-client relationship -- Trustee, standing in shoes of subsidiary, was entitled to invoke the co-client exception to the attorney-client privilege to obtain communications between subsidiary's former parent company and law firms representing subsidiary and its former parent in defense of the wrongful death cases -- Although subsidiary was defunct and had no communication with any of the lawyers, factors relating to relationship between subsidiary and its former parent or the state court-appointed receiver weigh in favor of finding co-client exception does apply -- Former parent or its receiver owed subsidiary a fiduciary duty with respect to defending the wrongful death cases, parties contractually agreed to equal access to information, and the parties had identical interests in defending the wrongful death cases, such that it was not reasonable for receiver to claim he had a reasonable expectation of privacy sufficient to preclude application of the co-client exception -- Co-client exception only applied to communications about the defense of the wrongful death cases and did not apply regarding matters unrelated to those cases -- Subsidiary did not have any contractual right to access information related to those other matters, and subsidiary's former parent or its receiver did not owe subsidiary a fiduciary duty with respect to anything other than the defense of the wrongful death cases -- Communications between entity that provided “back office administrative services,” including in-house counsel services, to nursing facility operators nationwide, including subsidiary's former parent, and lawyers defending former parent and subsidiary, were available to subsidiary under the co-client exception, since entity was facilitating subsidiary's defense, as well as former parent's defense -- Communications strictly between former parent or its receiver and entity that provided “back office administrative services” were not subject to co-client exception where entity effectively served as former parent's in-house counsel -- Common interest doctrine -- Communications among parties to settlement agreement and their lawyers relating to the defense of wrongful death claims were not protected from disclosure to trustee, standing in shoes of subsidiary, by the common interest doctrine, though they were protected from disclosure to third parties, where the interests of all parties to the settlement agreement were identical with respect to defense of wrongful death cases -- Work product -- Under either federal or state law, subsidiary's former counsel could not use the work product doctrine to deny trustee access to the litigation files from wrongful death cases -- Trustee is prohibited from disclosing any information obtained under co-client exception with any third party that would destroy attorney-client and common interest privilege, common interest doctrine, and work product doctrine -- Waiver of privilege under those circumstances requires consent of all of the parties who share the privilege
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Civil rights -- Prisoners -- Religious discrimination -- State prisoner who is an Orthodox Jew filed pro se complaint pursuant to Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act alleging defendants violated his right to practice his religion by failing to give him a strictly kosher diet -- Jurisdiction -- Mootness -- Claims are not moot, even though Florida has a plan to provide kosher meals to qualified inmates, because Florida has not unambiguously terminated its policy which has deprived plaintiff of kosher meals, Florida's conduct makes it appear that change in policy was an attempt to manipulate jurisdiction where it implemented the plan to provide kosher meals only at prison where plaintiff is incarcerated and less than two weeks before oral argument was scheduled, and further, Florida continues to press in pending appeal that the voluntarily ceased conduct should be declared constitutional and has never promised not to resume the prior practice -- Summary judgment in favor of defendants on merits of RLUIPA claim was not appropriate where defendants failed to carry their burden to show that Florida's policy of not providing kosher meals to prison inmates in fact furthered two compelling governmental interests of safety and cost management, and failed to carry their burden of showing the Florida's policy is least restrictive means to further the cost and security interests they assert
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Civil rights -- Employment discrimination -- Colleges and universities -- Custodians employed at Florida community college filed complaint alleging discrimination and retaliation based on race in violation of Civil Rights Act and Florida Civil Rights Act and discrimination and retaliation violation of 42 U.S.C. section 1981 -- Eleventh Amendment immunity -- Defendant is entitled to summary judgment on Section 1981 discrimination and retaliation claims because, as an arm of state, defendant is protected from any suit under 42 U.S.C. section 1981 by Eleventh Amendment immunity -- Argument that defendant waived any immunity defense by failing to plead it as an affirmative defense in its answer is unavailing -- Punitive damages -- Defendant is entitled to summary judgment on claims for punitive damages because punitive damages against defendant as state governmental entity are completely barred under either Title VII or FCRA -- Section 1981a and FCRA present a complete bar to recovery of punitive damages and are not affirmative defenses that must be pled -- Exhaustion of administrative remedies -- Scope of EEOC charge -- Defendant is not entitled to summary judgment on FCRA retaliation claim based on conditions-precedent argument that EEOC charge raises an allegation of discriminatory discharge based on disability without contending that discharge was based on race or ethnicity or in retaliation for protected activity, where retaliation claim mentions only plaintiffs' opposition to “unlawful discriminatory employment practices” as basis for retaliation claim -- Failure to include retaliation in EEOC charge alleging disability discrimination does not preclude an FCRA claim alleging retaliation for activity “inextricably intertwined” with the disability-based EEOC charge -- Defendant is entitled to summary judgment on merits of FCRA retaliation claim, because there can be no causal link between filing of EEOC charge and plaintiff's termination where there is no record evidence that plaintiff engaged in any disability-related protected activity prior to his termination and EEOC charge was not filed until after plaintiff's discharge -- Defendant is entitled to summary judgment on Title VII and FCRA retaliation and discrimination claims based on race where, as matter of law, a reasonable investigation based on EEOC charge would not encompass race-based discrimination or retaliation claims, and defendant could not have waived the conditions precedent defense by not properly raising it with sufficient specificity in its answer, as defendant was permitted to raise its attack on whether plaintiff fulfilled conditions precedent in its summary judgment motion -- Defendant is entitled summary judgment on claims under Title VII and FCRA where plaintiff did not exhaust his administrative remedies by filing an EEOC charge within 300 days of last discriminatory act -- Equitable tolling of timing requirements is not appropriate when a person with reasonably prudent regard for his rights would have been aware of discriminatory treatment and could have filed a charge with EEOC within 300-day period -- Defendant is not entitled to summary judgment on claims of discrimination in termination where circumstantial evidence produced by plaintiff gives rise to triable issue concerning whether plaintiff's supervisor possessed a bias against plaintiff because of race and whether supervisor convinced the final decision maker to terminate plaintiff because of race -- Defendant is not entitled to summary judgment on retaliation claims where a reasonable factfinder could infer that reason given for plaintiff's probation was pretextual, and there are material questions of fact regarding who terminated, or recommended the termination of, plaintiff and what role, if any, bias played in the termination -- Defendant is entitled to summary judgment on discriminatory-discharge claim because plaintiff cannot establish prima facie case of discrimination in reduction-in-force decisions -- Defendant is entitled to summary judgment on retaliation claim under Title VII or FCRA where plaintiff's position was eliminated as part of reduction-in-force and plaintiff has not raised a material dispute over whether the reduction-in-force termination was pretext for retaliation -- Argument that summary judgment motion should be denied because defendant failed to comply with court's rules and orders is unavailing -- Neither Local Rules nor court's prior order compels defendant to file its summary judgment motion and statement of material facts as separate documents
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Patents -- Infringement -- Defenses -- Patent exhaustion, which confers on the purchaser of a patented article, or any subsequent owner, the right to use or resell that article, does not permit a farmer who buys patented seeds to reproduce those seeds through planting and harvesting without the patent holder's permission -- Patent exhaustion does not permit the purchaser to make new copies of the patented invention
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Bankruptcy -- Dischargeable debts -- Fraud or defalcation by fiduciary -- The term “defalcation” in the Bankruptcy Code includes a culpable state of mind requirement involving knowledge of, or gross recklessness in respect to, the improper nature of the fiduciary behavior
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Carriers -- Towing companies -- Disposal of abandoned vehicles -- Section 14501(c)(1) of Federal Aviation Administration Authorization Act, which preempts state laws “related to a price, route, or service of any motor carrier . . . with respect to the transportation of property,” does not preempt state-law claims for damages stemming from the storage and disposal of a towed vehicle -- Such claims escape preemption because they are “related to” neither the “transportation of property” nor the “service” a motor carrier renders to its customers
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