The Sixth Circuit has announced new standards for collective action lawsuits under the FSLA in Clark v. A&L Homecare and Training Center.  There are already many good summaries of this decision around the legal internet, so this recap will be short.  The question is how to determine whether other potential plaintiffs are “similarly situated” so that the district court should issue a formal notice to those potential plaintiffs about the claims.  Though this notice does not endorse the lawsuit, it has the inevitable effect of significantly bolstering both the number of plainti ..read more

About a decade ago, this blog found that Sixth Circuit judges cited the Second, Seventh, and Ninth Circuits more often than any other circuit.  When we controlled for the number of opinions, we found that opinions from the First, Seventh, Tenth and D.C. Circuits were three times more likely to be cited than opinions from other circuits.  After our recent post showing that some circuits issue a far higher percentage of published opinions than others, we decided to take another look at what circuits are the most influential in Sixth Circuit opinions over the last three years.  The ..read more

Last week the en banc court rejected a petition in United States ex rel. Martin v. Hathaway, 63 F.4th 1043, 1054 (6th Cir. 2023), a False Claims Act case in which an ophthalmologist and a hospital had an informal agreement to refer patients to each other.  Chief Judge Sutton’s opinion rejected the argument that the referral arrangement violated the False Claims Act, holding that the statute’s definition of “remuneration” requires “payments and other transfers of value” rather than just “any act that may be valuable to another.”  The opinion also rejected the claim on the basis that t ..read more

The latest statistics on unpublished opinions show an important trend between the circuits.  Across all circuits, 86% of written opinions are unpublished.  That means they are not precedential, so they do not create circuit law.  And most of those unpublished opinions, 69% of them in 2022, were also unsigned.  The Sixth Circuit mirrors the general trend.  In 2022, 89% of its opinions were unpublished, and 54% were both unsigned and unpublished.  But three circuits, the First, Seventh, and Eighth, buck this trend by publishing a far higher percentage of their opini ..read more

In Knight v. Metro. Gov’t of Nashville and Davidson County (No. 21-6179), the Sixth Circuit decided a longstanding question about the standard that applies to conditions imposed by a legislature on those applying for building permits.  The issue is common enough:  a city wants more sidewalks to improve safety, health, and traffic.  So the city requires landowners to add sidewalks to their properties as a condition of issuing building permits.  Nashville’s ordinance requires to grant an easement and build a sidewalk or to pay a fee to build sidewalks elsewhere in the city.&n ..read more

Nearly a decade ago, in an opinion by Judge Kethledge, the Sixth Circuit set forth “good reasons not to call an opponent’s argument ‘ridiculous.’” Bennett v. State Farm Mut. Auto. Ins. Co., 731 F.3d 584 (6th Cir. 2013). These included “civility; the near-certainty that overstatement will only push the reader away …; and that, even where the record supports an extreme modifier, ‘the better practice is usually to lay out the facts and let the court reach its own conclusion.’” Id. at 585. The advice merits repetition and elaboration. Too often appellate advocates succumb to the temptation (or jus ..read more

The Sixth Circuit has been slowly moving up the rankings for the time it takes to decide an appeal.  A decade ago, the Sixth and Ninth Circuits took the longest time to each a decision.  But while the Ninth Circuit remains slow (at 13.2 months), the latest statistics Sixth Circuit is now the third-fastest circuit, averaging 8.5 months between the notice of appeal and resolution.  The only faster circuits are the Fourth Circuit at 7.9 months, and the Eighth Circuit, which decides cases in just 4.6 months.  Note, though, that those numbers can be misleading.  They includ ..read more

In Fox v. Saginaw County (No. 22-1265/1272), the Sixth Circuit rejected a class action where multiple defendants have identical policies, but the named plaintiff was only injured by one defendant.  Until recently, Michigan law permitted counties to obtain complete ownership of a property during a tax foreclosure, even if the value of the property far exceeds the taxes owed.  So enterprising attorneys filed a class action against twenty-seven Michigan counties under the auspices of the “juridical link” doctrine, but only presented one named plaintiff—who had only been injured by one c ..read more

Our colleagues at the Global Investigations & Compliance Review Blog have written about an important decision the Sixth Circuit issued last week.  In its opinion, the Court limited the scope of Anti-Kickback claims under the False Claims Act.  You can read more about the decision here.  The post Sixth Circuit Limits Anti-Kickback Claims Brought Under False Claims Act appeared first on Sixth Circuit Appellate Blog ..read more

Co-authored by: Stephanie A. Darville & Shams H. Hirji About two weeks ago, the Sixth Circuit issued an important decision in United States v. White, No. 21-3209.  Judge White wrote the unanimous opinion for the Court, which was joined by Judge Moore and Judge Bush.  The Court held that an Ohio aggravated-robbery statute, R.C. § 2911.01(A)(1), does not qualify as a violent felony under the Armed Career Criminal Act (commonly referred to as “ACCA”).  The Sixth Circuit reversed the District Court’s contrary decision.  The case is notable for a few reasons.  The ..read more