2015 Seventh Circuit US Court of Appeals Case Law
Opinions 1 - 500 of 1065
Date: December 31, 2015
Docket Number: 13-2800
Justia Opinion Summary: Brown began working as a United flight attendant in 1991. He suffered from depression and bipolar disorder and was disciplined for absenteeism and unprofessionalism. In 2000, he required psychiatric hospitalization. The…
Date: December 31, 2015
Docket Number: 14-2554
Justia Opinion Summary: FirstMerit Bank sued CFE Group in federal court to enforce a promissory note and guaranties. The district court dismissed without prejudice, with leave to amend. Rather than amend, FirstMerit filed a notice of voluntary…
Date: December 31, 2015
Docket Number: 14-3088
Justia Opinion Summary: Jean-Paul was convicted of state drug crimes and sentenced to 13 years’ confinement. His appointed appellate counsel, Donnelly, told Jean-Paul that he intended to file a “no-merit report,” unless Jean-Paul wanted to…
Date: December 31, 2015
Docket Number: 15-1139
Justia Opinion Summary: Estrada fled Honduras in 1994 after police there detained and tortured him. An immigration judge granted Estrada relief from removal, finding that he will more likely than not face torture if he is removed to Honduras.…
Date: December 30, 2015
Docket Number: 14-2514
Justia Opinion Summary: During a consensual search for a stolen television, an old gun that had belonged to West's father was found in the attic. No fingerprints were recovered from the gun and there was conflicting evidence concerning whether…
Date: December 29, 2015
Docket Number: 15-8025
Justia Opinion Summary: Inmates, acting pro se, alleged violations of the Eighth Amendment by overcrowding and provision of inadequate mental-health services. The district court denied their “Motion for Class Certification and Appointment of…
Date: December 28, 2015
Docket Number: 15-1447
Justia Opinion Summary: Tate filed suit pro se, claiming that his former employer, which provides non‐emergency medical transportation, discriminated against him and then having retaliated against him for complaining about the discrimination,…
Date: December 23, 2015
Docket Number: 14-2912
Date: December 23, 2015
Docket Number: 14-3071
Date: December 23, 2015
Docket Number: 14-3292
Justia Opinion Summary: In 2006, 12 U.S. Marshals waited in Khan’s apartment, then arrested her at gunpoint for making false statements to HUD. When she asked to use the bathroom, a marshal patted her down and watched her pull down her…
Date: December 23, 2015
Docket Number: 15-1495
Justia Opinion Summary: Defendant was found guilty of multiple counts of health care fraud, 18 U.S.C. 1347, and sentenced to 70 months in prison. The Seventh Circuit affirmed, rejecting defendant’s argument that the judge did not address one of…
Date: December 23, 2015
Docket Number: 15-1881
Justia Opinion Summary: Mitchell, physically a man, psychologically a woman, sought to compel her probation officers to alter conditions of her probation, by allowing her to reside with her family rather than in the men’s homeless shelter,…
Date: December 23, 2015
Docket Number: 15-2011
Justia Opinion Summary: Lawyer Spicer represented plaintiff Egan in a case that alleged sex discrimination and the creation of a hostile work environment. The complaint included allegations that Egan, at her deposition, emphatically denied.…
Date: December 23, 2015
Docket Number: 15-2551
Justia Opinion Summary: Mendoza-Sanchez entered the U.S. at age 18, in 1983, and became a lawful permanent resident. He sold cocaine obtained from members of the violent La Linea cartel, known to work with corrupt Mexican police officers. In…
Date: December 23, 2015
Docket Number: 15-3259
Justia Opinion Summary: CEOC, the Chapter 11 debtor, owns and operates casinos. Caesars (CEC) is CEOC's principal owner. CEOC borrowed billions of dollars, issuing notes guaranteed by CEC. As CEOC’s financial position worsened, CEC tried to…
Date: December 22, 2015
Docket Number: 15-1206
Justia Opinion Summary: Alliance for Water Efficiency engaged Fryer to analyze how water agencies’ programs affect elasticity of water demand during droughts. Fryer prepared a draft report. Alliance was dissatisfied, and sued to prevent Fryer…
Date: December 22, 2015
Docket Number: 15-1535
Date: December 22, 2015
Docket Number: 15-1770
Justia Opinion Summary: Vivas-Ceja, a citizen of Mexico, was removed from the U.S. on three occasions. In 2013, he was arrested at an airport in Madison, Wisconsin, for illegally reentering the country. He pleaded guilty to illegal reentry…
Date: December 22, 2015
Docket Number: 15-2983
Justia Opinion Summary: Mother and father, Mexican citizens, dated in 2001-2002. In 2002, mother gave birth to a child, D.S., in Mexico. Although mother has had physical custody of D.S., father played an active part in the child’s life. In…
Date: December 21, 2015
Docket Numbers: 13-3506, 15-3661
Justia Opinion Summary: In 2007 Garner was convicted of federal gun and drug crimes and sentenced to 322 months’ imprisonment. Garner appealed, but counsel filed a no-merit “Anders” brief; the Seventh Circuit dismissed. A year later, Garner…
Date: December 21, 2015
Docket Number: 15-1915
Justia Opinion Summary: Carothers, an African-American woman, was hired by Cook County Juvenile Detention Center (JDC) in 2005 as an Administrative Assistant-Hearing Officer, inputting data and creating reports, and serving as a hearing officer…
Date: December 18, 2015
Docket Numbers: 15-1103, 15-1046
Justia Opinion Summary: In 2012, the National Labor Relations Board found that Big Ridge violated the National Labor Relations Act, 29 U.S.C. 158, by threatening employees with mine closure and job loss based on their support of the union and…
Date: December 18, 2015
Docket Numbers: 15-1839, 14-3308
Justia Opinion Summary: In 1956, Ephrem, a Catholic nun, experienced apparitions of the Virgin Mary. Devotions to Our Lady of America was launched. Ephrem joined a cloistered house, approved by the Pope. Fuller entered the cloister in 1965. In…
Date: December 17, 2015
Docket Number: 14-3653
Justia Opinion Summary: The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) brought an enforcement action under Section 707(a) of Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, 42 U.S.C. 2000e‐6, claiming that CVS Pharmacy violates Title VII by…
Date: December 17, 2015
Docket Number: 15-1860
Justia Opinion Summary: Rodriguez-Molinero, a Mexican citizen, has lived in the U.S. for many years as a lawful permanent resident. His involvement in the methamphetamine trade led to his conviction of federal drug crimes and a prison sentence…
Date: December 16, 2015
Docket Number: 15-1405
Justia Opinion Summary: Cincinnati Insurance issued a liability policy to Painters, which allowed the insured to add an “additional insured” by oral agreement, if that agreement preceded the occurrence and “a certificate of insurance ... has…
Date: December 14, 2015
Docket Number: 14-2150
Date: December 14, 2015
Docket Number: 14-2559
Justia Opinion Summary: An association of Indiana convenience stores filed suit seeking to invalidate a state law that restricts the sale of cold packaged beer. The suit claims the law violates the Equal Protection Clause because some kinds of…
Date: December 14, 2015
Docket Number: 14-2846
Justia Opinion Summary: A few months after Horsley turned 18, she mailed in an application for an Illinois Firearm Owner’s Identification Card (FOID) card along with the requisite check for $10. Horsley’s application was returned to her with a…
Date: December 11, 2015
Docket Number: 14-2183
Justia Opinion Summary: Ajayi, an electrical engineer, wanted to start a business selling MRI products in Africa. He incorporated GRI in Illinois and another company in Africa and sought investors. While traveling, he solicited a $45,000…
Date: December 11, 2015
Docket Number: 14-2912
Date: December 11, 2015
Docket Number: 14-3071
Justia Opinion Summary: Defendants are national securities exchanges registered with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) and operate as self‐regulatory organizations that regulate markets in conformance with securities laws under…
Date: December 11, 2015
Docket Number: 15-1866
Justia Opinion Summary: Plaintiffs, Woodward employees, filed a qui tam action under the False Claims Act, alleging that Woodward falsely certified helicopter engine parts that it sold to the government. Plaintiffs had complained that the…
Date: December 8, 2015
Docket Number: 15-8018
Justia Opinion Summary: Plaintiff brought this putative class action under the Fair Debt Collection Practices Act (FDCPA), claiming that LVNV Funding, Inc. violated the FDCPA when it sought to collect or settle debts that are not legally…
Date: December 7, 2015
Docket Number: 14-1199
Justia Opinion Summary: Plaintiffs purchased a restaurant in the City of Angola, Indiana and planned to convert it to an adult-entertainment venue featuring dancers wearing only “pasties and a g-string.” Angola reacted to the proposed…
Date: December 7, 2015
Docket Number: 15-1801
Justia Opinion Summary: Plaintiff is confined at a treatment and detention facility in Illinois as a result of his designation as a sexually violent person for purposes of Illinois’s Sexually Violent Persons Commitment Act. Plaintiff filed this…
Date: December 3, 2015
Docket Number: 14-2911
Justia Opinion Summary: Plaintiff worked for United Airlines as a ramp serviceman at O’Hare International Airport. Plaintiff twice injured his back at work. When he returned for the second time, he had several permanent work restrictions.…
Date: December 3, 2015
Docket Number: 15-1230
Justia Opinion Summary: Plaintiff applied for disability benefits, listing eight impairments. The Social Security Administration denied Plaintiff’s application and did so again on reconsideration. The next year, Plaintiff testified before an…
Date: December 2, 2015
Docket Number: 14-1538
Justia Opinion Summary: Defendant was indicted for possession with intent to distribute 500 grams or more of cocaine. Defendant was released on a $200,000 bond secured by real property owned by his parents. When Defendant violated a condition…
Date: December 1, 2015
Docket Number: 14-1694
Justia Opinion Summary: Plaintiff, an inmate at the Illinois Stateville Prison, filed a complaint against members of the prison staff, claiming that a prison prohibition against inmates receiving any magazine that “includes sexually explicit…
Date: November 30, 2015
Docket Number: 15-1896
Justia Opinion Summary: Plaintiff was arrested for an alleged sexual assault, which allegation turned out to be false. Plaintiff brought this lawsuit against Defendants, Polk County and a Polk County investigator, advancing claims under 42…
Date: November 30, 2015
Docket Number: 15-3047
Justia Opinion Summary: Backpage.com provides an online forum for classified ads and includes an “adult section.” The Sheriff of Cook County initiated a campaign to extinguish Backpage’s adult section - and, by extension, all of Backpage - by…
Date: November 25, 2015
Docket Number: 14-1780
Justia Opinion Summary: Plaintiff was fired from her employment with the Fox Valley Workforce Development Board, Inc., a state job-training agency serving central Wisconsin with funding from the federal government. Approximately two years…
Date: November 25, 2015
Docket Number: 14-1836
Justia Opinion Summary: After a jury trial in an Illinois state court, Appellant was found guilty of murdering his girlfriend’s one-year-old daughter. After exhausting his state appeals, Appellant filed a federal habeas petition, claiming,…
Date: November 25, 2015
Docket Number: 14-2860
Justia Opinion Summary: An Illinois state trooper stopped a car that had been speeding. The subsequent search of the car revealed 1.5 kilograms of cocaine, which the police seized. Defendant, who was one of two passengers in the car, was…
Date: November 25, 2015
Docket Number: 14-3203
Justia Opinion Summary: Francis Foster filed suit against Principal Life Insurance Company, alleging, inter alia, tortious interference with prospective economic advantage. Principal filed a motion to dismiss the complaint on the grounds that…
Date: November 25, 2015
Docket Number: 15-1208
Justia Opinion Summary: Appellant was convicted of failing to register as a sex offender. A federal district court sentenced Appellant to thirty months in prison, five years of supervised release, a special assessment, and a fine. As part of…
Date: November 25, 2015
Docket Number: 15-1291
Justia Opinion Summary: Plaintiff, an occasional employee of the Federal Emergency Management Agency, which is part of the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), filed an administrative claim of discrimination on the basis of her race, age, and…
Date: November 25, 2015
Docket Number: 15-1804
Justia Opinion Summary: Mathew Neisler worked as a stockman in food service during his incarceration at the Waupun Correctional Institution. Three months after Neisler suffered work-related injury, he was fired for “medical” reasons. Neisler…
Date: November 24, 2015
Docket Numbers: 14-2150, 14-2287
Justia Opinion Summary: This appeal was the most recent appeal in a series of lawsuits that have arisen over the sale of bonds by a corporation wholly owned by the Lac du Flambeau Band of Lake Superior Chippewa Indians (collectively, “the…
Date: November 24, 2015
Docket Number: 14-2246
Justia Opinion Summary: Pursuant to a plea agreement, Defendant entered a plea of guilty to a drug conspiracy charge. The plea agreement contained a waiver of Defendant’s right to collaterally attack his conviction or sentence. The district…
Date: November 24, 2015
Docket Number: 14-2772
Justia Opinion Summary: Sixteen days after Defendant, a dentist, learned Plaintiff, an inmate of Illinois’s Stateville prison, was complaining of a tooth abscess, Defendant diagnosed an abscessed molar, prescribed penicillin to bring the…
Date: November 24, 2015
Docket Number: 14-3354
Justia Opinion Summary: Plaintiff, an employee of Costco Wholesale Corporation, made two requests for a medical leave under the FMLA. Costco granted both requests. During that time, Plaintiff was demoted from optical manager to cashier.…
Date: November 24, 2015
Docket Number: 15-1242
Justia Opinion Summary: Anthony Zimmerman, the president and owner of Premier Forest Products Products, Inc. (together, Plaintiffs), was hired to harvest trees on certain property. When the landowner discovered that Zimmerman had been…
Date: November 24, 2015
Docket Number: 15-1269
Justia Opinion Summary: Several multi-employer health and welfare funds filed this suit under the Employee Retirement Income Security Act seeking approximately $70,000 in alleged delinquent contributions. The assertedly delinquent employer,…
Date: November 23, 2015
Docket Number: 14-2622
Justia Opinion Summary: Plaintiff, who is black, filed a complaint against the Chicago Transit Authority (CTA) in federal court, alleging that the CTA fired him because of his race in violation of Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and…
Date: November 23, 2015
Docket Number: 15-1312
Justia Opinion Summary: Appellant, an alien, has been frequently removed from the United States in light of his criminal record. Appellant has been convicted three times of illegal reentry in violation of 8 U.S.C. 1326(a). In this, Appellant's…
Date: November 23, 2015
Docket Number: 15-1736
Justia Opinion Summary: On July 5, 2013, the Governor of Wisconsin signed into a law a statute that the Wisconsin legislature had passed one month earlier prohibiting a doctor from performing an abortion unless he or she has admitting…
Date: November 20, 2015
Docket Number: 14-1329
Justia Opinion Summary: In 2011, Nationwide Credit Corporation, a debt-collection agency - telephoned Gregory Leeb about an unpaid medical bill. Leeb mailed and faxed a letter to Nationwide disputing the debt. A few days later, Nationwide sent…
Date: November 20, 2015
Docket Number: 14-3135
Justia Opinion Summary: In 2008, defendant Jason Austin was the leader of a street-level, retail drug-trafficking operation. Austin received drugs from suppliers and sold the drugs to users, with the help of many others. Money was passed up a…
Date: November 18, 2015
Docket Number: 15-1083
Justia Opinion Summary: ACT, Inc. and The College Board (collectively, Defendants) are national testing agencies that administer the ACT and SAT college entrance exams. When a student applies to take a test, Defendants obtain some of the…
Date: November 17, 2015
Docket Number: 14-2320
Justia Opinion Summary: After a jury trial, Petitioner was convicted of first-degree murder and attempted armed robbery. The Illinois Appellate Court reversed Petitioner’s attempted armed robbery conviction and ordered resentencing on the…
Date: November 10, 2015
Docket Number: 14-3187
Justia Opinion Summary: On four occasions, Normal, Illinois, police attached battery‐powered, global‐positioning‐ system devices (GPS) to the Lincoln sedan belonging to Martin, a suspected drug trafficker, in an effort to monitor his movements.…
Date: November 9, 2015
Docket Number: 13-1586
Justia Opinion Summary: A building that housed the Café, other restaurants, and 10 apartments burned to the ground. The Cafe’s owner, Rahman, signed a consent form that allowed investigators to look for the “origin and cause” of the fire.…
Date: November 9, 2015
Docket Number: 14-2519
Justia Opinion Summary: Chatman was charged with six counts of distributing heroin, 21 U.S.C. 841(a)(1), based on separate transactions between Chatman and an undercover agent. He pled guilty to one count, his sixteenth criminal conviction…
Date: November 6, 2015
Docket Number: 14-2701
Justia Opinion Summary: Defendant pleaded guilty to fraud consisting of having abused her position as a Chicago public-school board member by accepting kickbacks of more than $500,000 from bus companies to which she steered transportation…
Date: November 5, 2015
Docket Number: 13-2434
Justia Opinion Summary: The law firm represented Goesel, a minor, and his parents in a personal-injury suit that settled before trial. The law firm needed judicial approval to finalize the settlement. The contingent-fee agreement entitled the…
Date: November 5, 2015
Docket Number: 14-1416
Date: November 5, 2015
Docket Number: 14-1553
Justia Opinion Summary: Rogers has a long criminal record that includes West Virginia convictions for sexually abusing his daughter and stepdaughter. He is required by the Sex Offender Registration and Notification Act to register in each state…
Date: November 5, 2015
Docket Numbers: 14-1555, 14-1416
Justia Opinion Summary: Continental sells carbon black, a material used in rubber products. BRC makes rubber products for the automotive industry. The companies entered into a contract that stated: It is the intent of this agreement that…
Date: November 4, 2015
Docket Number: 14-1134
Justia Opinion Summary: Vinyard pled guilty to conspiracy to manufacture, distribute, and possess methamphetamine with intent to distribute. At sentencing, he started to backtrack on whether he was admitting some of the relevant conduct. After…
Date: November 4, 2015
Docket Number: 14-2915
Justia Opinion Summary: A jury found Ferrell, a licensed psychologist, and Bryce, Ferrell’s employee, guilty of six counts of healthcare fraud, 18 U.S.C. 1347. Ferrell was sentenced to 88 months of imprisonment. The Seventh Circuit affirmed,…
Date: November 4, 2015
Docket Number: 14-3409
Justia Opinion Summary: Chicago Officer Williams received information from a registered informant that an individual whom the informant personally knew was selling narcotics from a gold Toyota Camry with tinted windows near 71st and Paxton. The…
Date: November 3, 2015
Docket Numbers: 14-2297, 13-3008, 13-2929
Justia Opinion Summary: Cruse, McClain, Henderson, and eight others were indicted for involvement in a long-running conspiracy to distribute controlled substances in Milwaukee. The indictment centered on two street gangs that controlled the…
Date: October 30, 2015
Docket Number: 14-1745
Justia Opinion Summary: Plaintiff has a neurological disorder, tardive dyskinesia. Plaintiff’s involuntary movements include tongue thrusting, pursing of the lips, choking, and side-to-side chewing of the jaw. She becomes mute, screams or makes…
Date: October 29, 2015
Docket Number: 14-2368
Justia Opinion Summary: Garcia pled guilty to two counts of distribution of heroin, 21 U.S.C. 841(a)(1) and (b)(1)(C). The court found that Garcia had a Criminal History Category of V and a total offense level of 19, which led to a guideline…
Date: October 28, 2015
Docket Numbers: 14-1342, 14-1283, 14-1267
Justia Opinion Summary: In 2005 the Army Corps of Engineers invited bids on a federal reservoir project in Illinois. One of the successful bidders was Slurry, which leased from Pileco a trench cutter made by Bauer. Slurry was a prime contractor…
Date: October 28, 2015
Docket Numbers: 14-3363, 14-3311
Justia Opinion Summary: Chapman’s sales of heroin and cocaine were recorded by an undercover informant wearing a Hawk recording device, which captured audio-video recordings of each transaction. The recordings were introduced at trial.…
Date: October 27, 2015
Docket Number: 12-2606
Justia Opinion Summary: Navarro pleaded guilty to conspiracy to possess with intent to distribute more than five kilograms of cocaine. In the plea agreement, the government and Navarro both agreed to refrain from seeking a departure from the…
Date: October 27, 2015
Docket Number: 13-3327
Justia Opinion Summary: In 2001, Sherman was shot and died from multiple gunshot wounds. When an officer arrived, Sherman lay on the ground with 50-60 people gathered around. Long was tried for first degree murder. No physical evidence tied…
Date: October 27, 2015
Docket Numbers: 15-1090, 14-2211
Justia Opinion Summary: Bour and Natisha met on seven or eight occasions for Bour to molest Natisha’s younger daughter, “Jane,” then four to 18 months old. Bour sexually touched Jane, penetrated her mouth and genitals, and filmed at least two…
Date: October 26, 2015
Docket Number: 14-2344
Justia Opinion Summary: Hooper, a family practice physician, was diagnosed with bipolar disorder in 2000. He must regularly see a psychologist to maintain his Illinois medical license. In 2009, Proctor hired Hooper to work in its Peoria…
Date: October 26, 2015
Docket Number: 15-1261
Justia Opinion Summary: Chinese farmworker Wang married in 1988. His wife gave birth to a daughter. Government officials required his wife to have an intrauterine device implanted. Five years later the IUD “fell off,” and she got pregnant.…
Date: October 26, 2015
Docket Number: 15-1604
Justia Opinion Summary: In 2008, Armour was sentenced to 51 months in prison and three years of supervised release after he pled guilty to possession of a firearm by a felon. After he was released from prison in 2012, Armour violated the…
Date: October 23, 2015
Docket Number: 15-1241
Justia Opinion Summary: Plaintiffs, a putative class of electrical workers, claimed that their respective employers, in collusion with Metropolitan Pier and Exposition Authority (MPEA, which used electricians supplied by the employers)…
Date: October 21, 2015
Docket Number: 12-2217
Justia Opinion Summary: In 2000, Huri began working at the Circuit Court of Cook County. Her manner of dress marked her as a follower of Islam. Huri is from Saudi Arabia. From 2002-2010, she worked as a child care attendant—the only one who was…
Date: October 21, 2015
Docket Number: 14-2515
Justia Opinion Summary: In 2012 Illinois State Police witnessed and videotaped Addison participating in crack cocaine sales at a drug house in East St. Louis. A jury later found him guilty of possession and distribution of cocaine base. The…
Date: October 20, 2015
Docket Number: 13-2833
Justia Opinion Summary: In 1995 Barrett began work at the Illinois Department of Corrections (IDOC) as an account technician. IDOC employees can be fired if they accumulate 12 unauthorized absences from work; unauthorized absences accrue on an…
Date: October 20, 2015
Docket Number: 14-2210
Justia Opinion Summary: Two men robbed a Chicago bank. When Warfield was arrested on the day of the robbery, he told the FBI that he had robbed the bank with Hawkins. Hawkins and Warfield were indicted. During Warfield’s proffer session with…
Date: October 20, 2015
Docket Numbers: 14-3725, 1-3664
Justia Opinion Summary: Morady sold life insurance policies. Davis, a former lawyer, approached elderly African-Americans and paid them small amounts to become the nominal applicant-buyers of the policies, with Morady as the insurance agent,…
Date: October 20, 2015
Docket Number: 15-1006
Justia Opinion Summary: Plaintiff, a stockholder in DeVry, which operates for-profit colleges and universities, filed a shareholders’ derivative suit against DeVry’s board of directors. A 2005 incentive plan authorized awards of stock options…
Date: October 16, 2015
Docket Numbers: 14-2818, 14-2737
Justia Opinion Summary: In 2005, Martinez, Vallejo, and 47 others were indicted for crimes committed while they were members of the Milwaukee chapter of the Latin Kings gang organization. Martinez and Vallejo pled guilty to a RICO offense, 18…
Date: October 16, 2015
Docket Number: 15-1055
Justia Opinion Summary: In 2007, Adkins, a detective at a Chicago Veterans Affairs (VA) Medical Center, installed a hidden surveillance camera in the ceiling of an office used by female officers as a changing area. The camera captured images of…
Date: October 15, 2015
Docket Number: 13-3766
Justia Opinion Summary: Woods told a coworker at the Berwyn Fire Department that “he wanted to kill somebody, all of them” and that his children were going to “go over there” and “tune them up,” referring to his coworkers and superiors. Chief…
Date: October 15, 2015
Docket Number: 14-2850
Justia Opinion Summary: The Centralia state-operated developmental center, one of seven Illinois SODCs, houses approximately 200 severely disabled individuals, some having the mentality of an infant or toddler. Many also have serious…
Date: October 14, 2015
Docket Number: 14-3626
Justia Opinion Summary: Mullins lived in apartment 2 in the complex behind the BigFoot Lounge in Rockford, Illinois. Mullins and Washington (called “T”) used Mullins’s apartment as a stash house for their cocaine and marijuana distribution…
Date: October 13, 2015
Docket Numbers: 13-2882, 13-2974
Justia Opinion Summary: A vehicle search turned up 11.4 grams of heroin that Fields had obtained from Burnett. Fields called Burnett and said the heroin had been seized and asked Burnett to leave guns in a certain trash can in exchange for…
Date: October 13, 2015
Docket Number: 14-2174
Justia Opinion Summary: In 1997, Player and his wife established EAR, purportedly to refurbish high-tech machinery . In 2005-2009, EAR defrauded creditors and the couple obtained $17 million in fraudulent transfers from EAR. Before the fraud…
Date: October 13, 2015
Docket Number: 14-2914
Justia Opinion Summary: Faruki, a computer technology consultant, met Tishfield in 2006 while Tishfield was working as a portfolio manager at SAC Capital, a Connecticut-based hedge fund. In 2010, Faruki informed Tishfield that he had launched…
Date: October 13, 2015
Docket Number: 15-3028
Justia Opinion Summary: In 2014, two people were killed when a Seattle news helicopter crashed. The National Transportation Safety Board investigated, pursuant to 49 U.S.C. 1131(a)(1), “to ascertain measures that would best tend to prevent…
Date: October 8, 2015
Docket Number: 14-2212
Justia Opinion Summary: Darinchuluun, a citizen of Mongolia, has a wife and son in Mongolia. He worked for a railroad that was a joint venture between Russia and Mongolia. In 2004 Darinchuluun discovered guns and ammunition in a box that was…
Date: October 8, 2015
Docket Number: 14-3591
Justia Opinion Summary: Burton had been treated for back pain, anxiety, acid reflux, herpes simplex, hyperlipidemia, and depression. In addition to other medications, he was intermittently prescribed an opioid pain medication similar to…
Date: October 7, 2015
Docket Number: 15-1392
Justia Opinion Summary: In 2010 Manuel was sentenced to two concurrent terms of 51 months in federal prison, with “credit for not less than all the time he has spent in federal custody” since May 24, 2010. That was the date on which, having…
Date: October 7, 2015
Docket Number: 15-1517
Justia Opinion Summary: Officer Stirmell followed a speeding pickup truck and activated his sirens. The driver, Greg, ignored the sirens and continued driving. Stirmell radioed for assistance. Greg drove to his father’s house, ran from his…
Date: October 6, 2015
Docket Number: 14-3618
Justia Opinion Summary: Arroyo worked as a Volvo material handler, 2005-2011. Arroyo was a member of the U.S. Army Reserve. She deployed twice to Iraq and Kuwait: 2006-2007 and 2009-2010 and took leave for training and other military…
Date: October 5, 2015
Docket Number: 15-2029
Justia Opinion Summary: After serving a term in an Illinois state prison for a sex crime, the plaintiff was committed to a Treatment and Detention Facility, pursuant to the civil Sexually Violent Persons Commitment Act. He had a job in the…
Date: October 2, 2015
Docket Number: 14-2489
Justia Opinion Summary: An inmate of a Wisconsin state prison filed suit under 42 U.S.C. 1983, alleging that Schneider, a guard, had inflicted cruel and unusual punishment on him. The district court dismissed the complaint at “screening,” 28…
Date: October 2, 2015
Docket Numbers: 14-3729, 14-3528
Justia Opinion Summary: Caterpillar bought a South Milwaukee factory that manufactures strip-mining equipment and became the employer party to a collective-bargaining agreement with a United Steelworkers local union. Two months later, a crane…
Date: October 1, 2015
Docket Numbers: 15-1274, 14-2322, 14-3174
Justia Opinion Summary: The insurer operates a preferred-provider system that offers patients better benefits, or lower co-payments, for patronizing medical providers who have agreed with the insurer to accept lower reimbursements (per…
Date: September 30, 2015
Docket Numbers: 13-2982, 13-2078
Justia Opinion Summary: Daniels, Dean, and Jones were indicted for several 2005 armed bank robberies in the Chicago area. Dean moved to sever the cases. The prosecution argued that joinder was appropriate because the defendants participated in…
Date: September 29, 2015
Docket Number: 14-1805
Justia Opinion Summary: Brown filed a class action complaint, alleging that she contacted Defender by telephone in response to its advertisement for a home security system; that, during several calls, she provided Defender with personal…
Date: September 28, 2015
Docket Number: 14-3678
Justia Opinion Summary: Chicago’s Department of Administrative Hearings determined that Discount Inn had violated city ordinances, providing that “any person who owns or controls property within the city must cut or otherwise control all weeds…
Date: September 25, 2015
Docket Number: 14-1169
Justia Opinion Summary: Smith filed a pro se complaint under 42 U.S.C. 1983, alleging that Smith, as a pretrial detainee and Army veteran, was enrolled in a special program for veterans. Under that program, Smith worked in the jail laundry and…
Date: September 23, 2015
Docket Number: 14-1511
Justia Opinion Summary: Boutros worked for Avis Rent A Car as a courtesy bus driver at O’Hare Airport. He had worked for Avis before a short stint in the military. After he was honorably discharged for unsatisfactory performance, Avis did not…
Date: September 23, 2015
Docket Number: 14-1641
Justia Opinion Summary: Cook committed a home robbery in 2005 and was arrested nine days later in the apartment of a girlfriend, later his fiancée, Thede. Convicted in a Wisconsin state court of armed robbery, armed burglary, battery, theft of…
Date: September 23, 2015
Docket Number: 14-2402
Justia Opinion Summary: Rahn, a white male who earned a PhD in Industrial Engineering from the University of Illinois, was hired as a visiting professor at NIU. His wife, Regina, was hired as a tenure-track assistant professor in the Department…
Date: September 22, 2015
Docket Number: 13-3454
Justia Opinion Summary: In 1995, Evans, then nine months pregnant, was fatally shot and stabbed in her Addison, Illinois apartment. The assailants cut open her womb and removed the unborn baby, Elijah. Debra had three older children— Samantha…
Date: September 22, 2015
Docket Numbers: 14-3153, 14-2007, 12-3446
Justia Opinion Summary: Philos Tech, an Illinois company, sent equipment to Korea for delivery to P&D in connection with an alleged joint venture between the companies. The nature and origins of the joint venture are disputed. Defendant…
Date: September 21, 2015
Docket Number: 14-3634
Justia Opinion Summary: In 1920 Peoples Gas and Beazer’s predecessor entered into a contract, Beazer agreed to to operate a plant for coke by-products and carbureted water gas (Chicago Coke), at Crawford Station, Chicago, using its patented…
Date: September 16, 2015
Docket Number: 14-2205
Justia Opinion Summary: In 1985 Edwards was convicted of cocaine distribution and sentenced to imprisonment, followed by 10 years of “special parole,” an additional penalty for drug offenses. If an individual was reimprisoned for violating…
Date: September 16, 2015
Docket Number: 14-3441
Justia Opinion Summary: A Cook County Jail pretrial detainee was attacked and stabbed. He cried out for help but was ignored by an unidentified guard standing 10-15 feet from him. The plaintiff regained consciousness three days later in a…
Date: September 15, 2015
Docket Number: 13-3723
Justia Opinion Summary: Dansberry shot and killed 18-year-old Bass during a 1997 attempted armed robbery. An eyewitness saw the crime and Dansberry admitted his culpability. Dansberry entered a “blind” plea of guilty. The court advised…
Date: September 14, 2015
Docket Number: 14-1530
Justia Opinion Summary: A frightened woman called 911, stating that she was in her car in a narrow alley when another driver blocked her exit, got out of his car, was approaching in a menacing manner, screaming obscenities, and had displayed a…
Date: September 14, 2015
Docket Number: 14-3325
Justia Opinion Summary: Brown, convicted of raping adult women and diagnosed with paraphilia (specifically, sexual attraction to non-consenting women) and personality disorder with antisocial and narcissistic traits, was civilly committed to…
Date: September 11, 2015
Docket Number: 14-3262
Justia Opinion Summary: A judge issued a warrant to search Thompson's house, based exclusively on the affidavit of officer Lane stating that an informant had told him that “a black male” named Sidney “routinely sells cocaine” from his Peoria…
Date: September 10, 2015
Docket Number: 13-3837
Justia Opinion Summary: Investors in Central Sleep filed suit against the company, Dachman, its promoter, and others, claiming fraud, RICO violations, conversion, fraudulent conveyance, civil conspiracy, and securities fraud. Dachman was also…
Date: September 9, 2015
Docket Number: 14-3300
Justia Opinion Summary: Common Cause is a national organization that advocates for elimination of barriers to voting. ICommon Cause Indiana challenged the constitutionality of Indiana Code 33-33-49-13, which establishes the process for electing…
Date: September 9, 2015
Docket Number: 14-3365
Justia Opinion Summary: Bisluk, a conservative who votes Republican, was a special agent working in Chicago for the Illinois Department of Revenue’s Liquor Control Commission under former Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich’s Democratic…
Date: September 8, 2015
Docket Number: 12-3639
Justia Opinion Summary: A deputy noticed paper covering the light above the bed of pretrial detainee Kingsley and ordered him to remove it. Kingsley refused and ignored several subsequent requests. The administrator decided that jail staff…
Date: September 8, 2015
Docket Number: 14-1380
Justia Opinion Summary: Two weeks before her death, Julie Jensen gave a sealed envelope to her neighbors, stating that if anything happened to her, they should give the envelope to the police. It contained a handwritten letter, stating that…
Date: September 8, 2015
Docket Number: 14-3515
Justia Opinion Summary: In 2009, Clarke submitted 2006-2008 tax returns for a trust, each claiming $900,000 in income and $900,000 in fiduciary fees; they did not identify the income’s source. Each reported $300,000 of tax paid to the IRS and…
Date: September 4, 2015
Docket Numbers: 13-3844, 13-1206
Justia Opinion Summary: Anzaldi, DeSalvo, and Latin concocted an $8 million fraudulent tax scheme based on a sovereign citizen-type theory that the U.S. government holds hidden bank accounts for its citizens that can be accessed through various…
Date: September 4, 2015
Docket Numbers: 14-1430, 14-1431
Justia Opinion Summary: Religious, not-for-profit organizations challenged the “contraceptive mandate” of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act of 2010 (ACA), 42 U.S.C. 300gg-13(a)(4), arguing that the ACA’s accommodations for…
Date: September 4, 2015
Docket Number: 14-1431
Date: September 4, 2015
Docket Number: 14-1949
Justia Opinion Summary: Avila bought his Chicago home with a $100,500 CitiMortgage loan. Five years later, a fire made the house uninhabitable. Avila’s insurance carrier paid out $150,000. CitiMortgage took control of the proceeds and paid…
Date: September 4, 2015
Docket Number: 14-1984
Justia Opinion Summary: In 1989, the Supreme Court held that courts should apply de novo review in suits challenging denials of employee benefits governed by the Employee Retirement Income Security Act (ERISA), 29 U.S.C. 1132(a)(1), but if the…
Date: September 4, 2015
Docket Numbers: 14-2991, 14-3361
Justia Opinion Summary: Libertyville Toyota is a 140-employee car dealership with an 80-person service department. In 2011 Libertyville’s owner, AutoNation, became aware of interest in unionization and held meetings with the affected staff, the…
Date: September 3, 2015
Docket Number: 14-1701
Justia Opinion Summary: Beginning in 2008 Mullins served as Cook County’s Director of Public Affairs and Communications. At that time, contracts requiring the county to spend $25,000 or more had to be approved by its Board of Commissioners.…
Date: September 2, 2015
Docket Numbers: 14-3726, 14-3737
Justia Opinion Summary: Michels is a member of the Pipe Line Contractors Association (PLCA), a trade association that negotiates collective bargaining agreements (CBAs) on behalf of its employer members with unions. In 2006, the PLCA and the…
Date: September 1, 2015
Docket Number: 13-1731
Justia Opinion Summary: Rollins pleaded guilty to selling crack cocaine and was sentenced to 84 months in prison and four years of supervised release. The Seventh Circuit vacated the sentence on limited grounds, noting that the government…
Date: September 1, 2015
Docket Numbers: 14-1603, 14-1369
Justia Opinion Summary: Falor was convicted of two counts of tax evasion, 26 U.S.C. 7201, and sentenced to 74 months’ imprisonment and three years of supervised release. In an unrelated case, Jines was convicted of conspiracy to manufacture…
Date: September 1, 2015
Docket Number: 14-3185
Justia Opinion Summary: When she arrived at the Kankakee jail on suspicion of conspiring to commit bank fraud, plaintiff was almost eight months pregnant. She experienced pains 11 days later and was taken to a hospital, where she gave birth.…
Date: September 1, 2015
Docket Number: 14-3239
Justia Opinion Summary: A class action filed against Dairy Farmers of America (DFA), a dairy marketing cooperative, Keller’s Creamery, a butter manufacturer, two DFA officers, and two Keller’s officers, alleged a conspiracy to purchase cheese…
Date: September 1, 2015
Docket Number: 14-3460
Justia Opinion Summary: Grzegorczyk met with undercover officers posing as gun suppliers and stated that he wanted to have individuals killed because he held them responsible for his divorce and loss of child custody. The agents agreed to kill…
Date: September 1, 2015
Docket Number: 14-3668
Justia Opinion Summary: Dr. Meinders sued United Healthcare in Illinois state court, alleging that in 2013, United sent him and a number of similarly-situated persons an unsolicited “junk fax” advertising United’s services, which violated the…
Date: September 1, 2015
Docket Number: 15-1328
Justia Opinion Summary: Secrease sued his former employer and some of its supervisors, alleging unlawful discrimination and retaliation, 42 U.S.C. §§ 2000e–2 and 2000e–3(a). The employer moved to dismiss the suit as untimely, arguing that…
Date: August 31, 2015
Docket Number: 14-1437
Justia Opinion Summary: In 2011, the two companies signed an agreement under which Life Plans would broker and Security Life would insure life insurance policies financed through arbitrage. Four months later, Security Life terminated the…
Date: August 31, 2015
Docket Number: 14-3018
Justia Opinion Summary: Bell alleged that her former employer, PNC Bank, failed to pay her overtime wages in violation of the Fair Labor Standards Act, 29 U.S.C. 201, and the Illinois Minimum Wage and Wage Payment and Collection Acts, and that…
Date: August 31, 2015
Docket Numbers: 14-3344, 14-3327
Justia Opinion Summary: The Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act (FSIA) removes sovereign immunity in actions involving personal injury or death resulting from an act of state-sponsored terrorism, 28 U.S.C. 1605A. Subsection 1610(g) allows…
Date: August 31, 2015
Docket Number: 14-3733
Justia Opinion Summary: H-1B visas allow U.S. companies to hire noncitizen workers with specialized skills. The United States Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS), an agency within the Department of Homeland Security, is responsible for…
Date: August 28, 2015
Docket Number: 14-1491
Justia Opinion Summary: In 2005, Mutual Bank of Harvey, Illinois, made loans to the defendants, evidenced by promissory notes. As security the defendants executed mortgages. Mortgage I applies to four properties in Appleton, Menasha, and…
Date: August 28, 2015
Docket Number: 14-2420
Date: August 28, 2015
Docket Numbers: 14-2546, 14-2420
Justia Opinion Summary: The Hospital had to pay a Hospital Assessment Fee (HAF) as part of an Indiana program designed to increase Medicaid reimbursements to eligible hospitals. After it failed to pay its HAF, the Indiana Family and Social…
Date: August 28, 2015
Docket Number: 14-2961
Justia Opinion Summary: In 1974, Kelley robbed a sandwich shop of $28, using a gun. He was also charged with conspiracy to deliver a controlled substance. Kelley claims to have struck a deal: he would plead guilty and upon successful completion…
Date: August 28, 2015
Docket Number: 14-3097
Justia Opinion Summary: Seifer was convicted of four counts of mail fraud, 18 U.S.C. 1341, and one count of theft of government property, 18 U.S.C. 641. At Seifer’s trial the district court empaneled 13 jurors without designating the alternate,…
Date: August 28, 2015
Docket Number: 15-1095
Justia Opinion Summary: In 1986, Packer, a Ph.D. in physiology, began work as a post-doctoral fellow at Indiana University’s School of Medicine. She was appointed to the tenure-track position of assistant professor in 1994. Packer’s 1999…
Date: August 26, 2015
Docket Number: 13-3141
Justia Opinion Summary: In 1996 Gladney was convicted in Wisconsin of murdering Wilson. Wilson died of gunshot wounds, following a struggle for a gun during an argument about money. At trial, Gladney did not dispute that he intentionally killed…
Date: August 26, 2015
Docket Number: 13-3727
Justia Opinion Summary: More than 10 years ago, federal authorities investigated a drug conspiracy headed by Freeman at the Cabrini-Green housing projects. Ultimately, 15 persons were charged, 10 pleaded guilty, and five went to trial,…
Date: August 26, 2015
Docket Number: 14-2158
Justia Opinion Summary: Pendell claimed that a city inspector illegally entered her yard, used information from that unauthorized inspection to swear out an affidavit, and obtained an administrative search warrant. City employees then removed…
Date: August 26, 2015
Docket Number: 14-2190
Justia Opinion Summary: Patrick discovered a Medicaid fraud scheme in which the government paid more than $75 million in phony billings. Patrick and an associate filed a qui tam suit under the False Claims Act against Kyphon, alleging that the…
Date: August 26, 2015
Docket Number: 14-3448
Justia Opinion Summary: Textron began operations at its fastener manufacturing plant in Rochester, Indiana, in 1954; it remained in operation through 2006. The plant released vinyl chloride, a toxic gas, which eventually seeped into the…
Date: August 25, 2015
Docket Numbers: 13-3343, 13-3346, 13-3347
Justia Opinion Summary: Stinson spent 23 years in prison for a murder he did not commit. He was exonerated by DNA evidence and sued the lead detective and two forensic odontologists who investigated the murder and testified at trial. The…
Date: August 25, 2015
Docket Number: 13-3889
Justia Opinion Summary: In 2008 Ramirez pleaded guilty to possessing marijuana with intent to distribute. His presentence investigation report classified him as a career offender based on two convictions for assault. Despite the fact that his…
Date: August 25, 2015
Docket Number: 14-1713
Justia Opinion Summary: In 2012, Harden, a Caucasian, sued the Marion County Sheriff’s Department for retaliation under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, 42 U.S.C. 2000. He alleged that the Sheriff’s Department terminated him in…
Date: August 25, 2015
Docket Number: 14-2799
Justia Opinion Summary: Meyer, the manager of a company that acquired distressed loans guaranteed by Dvorkin, filed suit in Illinois to recover on the debt. The state court entered judgment for $8.2 million. The parties were unable to negotiate…
Date: August 25, 2015
Docket Number: 14-3563
Justia Opinion Summary: Olson worked for Bemis at its Neenah, Wisconsin factory, and was a member of the Union. He was injured on the job and later fired. The Union filed a grievance on Olson’s behalf as permitted under its collective…
Date: August 25, 2015
Docket Number: 15-1195
Justia Opinion Summary: Plaintiff produced the motion picture The Merry Gentleman, which was released in 2009. Despite some critical acclaim, the film was a commercial flop, for which the plaintiff blames Michael Keaton, the film’s lead actor…
Date: August 25, 2015
Docket Number: 15-1425
Justia Opinion Summary: Dill was placed on supervised release after serving 10 years in federal prison for bank robbery. He was twice returned to prison for multiple violations of conditions of release relating to drug testing and use and…
Date: August 24, 2015
Docket Number: 13-3549
Justia Opinion Summary: D. Stahl claimed she was the victim of vicious, physical bullying by fellow East Porter students. D. complained to school officials. Apart from witnessing the counselor talk to one alleged bully and seeing the principal…
Date: August 24, 2015
Docket Number: 14-1994
Justia Opinion Summary: Zuniga entered the U.S. unlawfully from Mexico in 1989. In 1991, he was convicted of aggravated criminal sexual abuse. Zuniga, 30 years old, was in a consensual relationship with a 15-year-old girl. Illinois law…
Date: August 24, 2015
Docket Numbers: 14-2154, 13-3711
Justia Opinion Summary: Before Judge Gettleman. Maday pleaded guilty to three 2008 bank robberies. Before sentencing he escaped while being transported to face sentencing for state crimes. He then committed bank robbery, escape from federal…
Date: August 24, 2015
Docket Number: 14-3125
Justia Opinion Summary: Preddie worked as a fifth-grade teacher in the Bartholomew Consolidated School Corporation during the 2010–2011 school year. After Preddie was absent 23 times, the BCSC did not renew his contract. Preddie, an…
Date: August 24, 2015
Docket Numbers: 14-3315, 14-3306
Justia Opinion Summary: Child Craft manufactured furniture. Bienias owns Summit. The parties had a long-standing business relationship. Child Craft contracted with Summit to supply raw wood for a planned line of high-end baby furniture, the…
Date: August 24, 2015
Docket Number: 14-3426
Justia Opinion Summary: Plaintiff, an inmate at Stateville prison in Illinois, filed suit under 42 U.S.C. 1983, claiming that the prison’s medical staff was deliberately indifferent to the results of 11 blood tests, administered over a period…
Date: August 24, 2015
Docket Number: 15-1416
Justia Opinion Summary: Schwartz was hired as an executive of Barclays, which lent him $400,000 and promised to forgive the loan in equal installments on the first through seventh anniversaries of his start date. Before the second anniversary,…
Date: August 24, 2015
Docket Number: 15-1511
Justia Opinion Summary: Bebo is the respondent in an administrative enforcement proceeding before the Securities and Exchange Commission, alleging that she violated federal law by manipulating internal books and records, making false…
Date: August 21, 2015
Docket Number: 14-2904
Justia Opinion Summary: From 2004-2007, CUNA purchased residential mortgage-backed securities from RBS. The housing market crashed and the securities declined in value. CUNA commissioned a forensic study of the loan pools underlying the…
Date: August 21, 2015
Docket Number: 14-3688
Justia Opinion Summary: Yang pled guilty to being a felon in possession of a firearm, 18 U.S.C. 922(g)(1). The district court found that Yang had three felony convictions that could be classified as violent under the Armed Career Criminal Act…
Date: August 20, 2015
Docket Number: 13-1057
Justia Opinion Summary: While Gevas was serving a life sentence in Galesburg, Illinois, his cellmate stabbed him in the neck with a pen. Gevas filed a complaint against three prison officials, alleging that they failed to protect him from the…
Date: August 20, 2015
Docket Numbers: 13-3264, 13-3462, 14-2591, 14-2495, 14-2602
Justia Opinion Summary: In 2010, Southwest Airlines stopped honoring certain in-flight drink vouchers issued to customers who had bought “Business Select” fares. Customers filed suit, seeking to represent a class of similarly situated…
Date: August 20, 2015
Docket Number: 14-1952
Justia Opinion Summary: While he was an inmate, the Pontiac Illinois prison refused to equip Plaintiff with gloves and a hat when he exercised in the prison yard in cold winter weather. His indoor cell was too small for the exercise he needed…
Date: August 20, 2015
Docket Number: 14-2937
Justia Opinion Summary: Tawuo was born in Cameroon in 1986. He entered the U.S. in 2009 with a nonimmigrant student visa to attend school in New York. He registered, but did not attend for long. Tawuo moved to Illinois, and in 2010 applied for…
Date: August 20, 2015
Docket Number: 14-2944
Justia Opinion Summary: Watts brought a federal civil rights suit against a police officer whom Watts accused of having broken his arm while arresting him. When the judge announced the verdict, in favor of the officer, Watts stood up, picked up…
Date: August 20, 2015
Docket Number: 14-3084
Justia Opinion Summary: Castro-Cortes was working for Astro, a subcontractor of JRJ, when he fell through a hole on the jRJ property. He sued JRJ for personal injury in Illinois state court. After being served in that suit, JRJ’s two members,…
Date: August 20, 2015
Docket Number: 14-3271
Justia Opinion Summary: When Meza-Rodriguez, a citizen of Mexico, was arrested in August 2013, he was carrying a .22 caliber cartridge and did not have documentation showing that he is lawfully in the United States, which made his possession of…
Date: August 20, 2015
Docket Number: 14-3452
Justia Opinion Summary: After pleading guilty to a drug offense in 2001, Ford was sentenced to a term of imprisonment followed by supervised release. While on supervised release, he committed an act of prostitution and other violations of the…
Date: August 19, 2015
Docket Numbers: 13-2326, 13-3023
Justia Opinion Summary: MISO, an organization of independent transmission-owning utilities, has linked the transmission lines of its members into a single interconnected grid across 11 states. The Generators, which operate 150-megawatt…
Date: August 19, 2015
Docket Number: 14-1493
Justia Opinion Summary: Dunnet, a highway construction company, is prequalified to bid and work on Illinois Department of Transportation (IDOT) projects and competes for federally assisted highway construction contracts. Dunnet is owned and…
Date: August 19, 2015
Docket Number: 14-2787
Justia Opinion Summary: In 1988 Jones pled guilty to three counts of attempted sexual battery (the victim was a child) and was sentenced to 12 years in prison plus 10 years of probation. Jones was released from prison in 1994, with a lifelong…
Date: August 19, 2015
Docket Number: 14-3316
Justia Opinion Summary: Indiana inmate Rowe was diagnosed with reflux esophagitis, (GERD), which may cause esophageal bleeding and can increase the risk of esophageal cancer. The prison physician told him to take Zantac pills. Rowe was…
Date: August 19, 2015
Docket Number: 15-1515
Justia Opinion Summary: Flores was pulled over on an Illinois highway for driving with an obstructed license plate—his rear plate was affixed to his car by a standard frame that covered the plate’s periphery. After Flores consented to a search…
Date: August 18, 2015
Docket Number: 13-3747
Justia Opinion Summary: Pust and Anderson ran a $10 million Ponzi scheme for over two years getting clients to invest in a phony low-income housing investment program in the Chicago area. Anderson pled guilty, but Pust proceeded to trial. He…
Date: August 18, 2015
Docket Number: 14-1806
Justia Opinion Summary: Bible defaulted on a loan under the Federal Family Education Loan Program, but entered into a rehabilitation agreement. She remains current on her reduced payments, but a guaranty agency assessed $4,500 in collection…
Date: August 18, 2015
Docket Number: 15-1727
Justia Opinion Summary: Alaura, age 22, was struck in the back of his head by an assailant wielding a bar stool. The blow shattered his skull, necessitating emergency surgery to remove part of his brain and place a metal plate in his skull.…
Date: August 17, 2015
Docket Number: 10-2746
Justia Opinion Summary: In 1999, detainees at the Cook County Juvenile Temporary Detention Center claimed that Center personnel abused detainees. Eight years into the certified class action, the court appointed a “Transitional Administrator” to…
Date: August 17, 2015
Docket Number: 13-3908
Justia Opinion Summary: Black repeatedly tried to pay off a more than $5 million tax debt with checks drawn on checking accounts that he knew were closed to prevent the IRS from collecting taxes from him. A jury convicted Black of one count of…
Date: August 17, 2015
Docket Number: 14-1347
Justia Opinion Summary: The Indianapolis Metropolitan Police Department participated in a reality television program, The Shift. The film crew followed homicide detectives investigating a deadly 2008 home invasion. Police eventually arrested…
Date: August 17, 2015
Docket Number: 14-3049
Justia Opinion Summary: In 1988, Kramer was convicted of conspiring to distribute marijuana, 21 U.S.C. 846, and engaging in a Continuing Criminal Enterprise (CCE), 21 U.S.C. 848(b). Based on a motion filed under 28 U.S.C. 2255, Kramer’s section…
Date: August 14, 2015
Docket Numbers: 13-1553, 13-1552
Justia Opinion Summary: Wright retired after working 1982-2007 as a caseworker at the Peoria Field Office of the Illinois Department of Children and Family Services after the Department ordered her to undergo a fitness-for-duty evaluation. The…
Date: August 14, 2015
Docket Number: 14-2809
Justia Opinion Summary: Boyd was arrested and released from jail pursuant to a bond agreement, subject to bond conditions, including that he not engage in any criminal activity. While on release, Boyd was arrested and charged in Wisconsin state…
Date: August 14, 2015
Docket Number: 14-2862
Justia Opinion Summary: In 2004, Seneca and Tari Adams endured vicious beatings by Chicago police officers and prolonged detentions. Along with their sister, Sicara, they sued the city and the officers. The city admitted its liability to all…
Date: August 14, 2015
Docket Number: 14-2876
Justia Opinion Summary: Based on his forcible rape of a 15-year-old, Rengifo was convicted of three counts of first-degree child sexual abuse while armed and one count of second-degree child sexual abuse while armed. After exhausting state…
Date: August 14, 2015
Docket Number: 14-2910
Justia Opinion Summary: While working as an employee of a contractor at the Wabash Valley Correctional Facility, Rebecca Riker engaged in a romantic relationship with inmate Vest. When the relationship became known, her employment ended. She…
Date: August 14, 2015
Docket Number: 14-3171
Justia Opinion Summary: After a night of heavy drinking, Lauren Spierer, a 20-year-old Indiana University student, left the apartment of a classmate and disappeared. Four years later, she remains missing. Lauren’s parents sued three students…
Date: August 13, 2015
Docket Number: 14-2621
Justia Opinion Summary: Miller began work as a technician at Polaris Laboratories in Indianapolis in 2009. About eight months later, Miller was fired for repeated failures to meet an average daily quota of 260 samples processed per day.…
Date: August 13, 2015
Docket Numbers: 14-2808, 14-2523
Justia Opinion Summary: In both cases, consolidated on appeal, family members called police officers to their home because a family member had locked himself in a room of his home and was threatening suicide. The officers responded to the…
Date: August 12, 2015
Docket Number: 13-2063
Justia Opinion Summary: Barr was a tenure-track journalism professor at Western Illinois University from the fall of 2007 through the spring semester 2010, when the University declined to retain her for the next academic year. Barr contends…
Date: August 12, 2015
Docket Number: 14-1898
Justia Opinion Summary: Kubsch was twice convicted of the 1998 murders of his wife, her son, and her ex-husband and was sentenced to death. After exhausting state remedies, he filed an unsuccessful petition for federal habeas relief. The…
Date: August 12, 2015
Docket Number: 14-3265
Justia Opinion Summary: Raney was convicted of interstate travel with intent to engage in a sexual act with a minor, 18 U.S.C. 2423(b), and attempt to manufacture child pornography, 18 U.S.C. 2251(a). He was sentenced to 145 months’…
Date: August 12, 2015
Docket Number: 15-1145
Justia Opinion Summary: Jackson was serving an 18-month sentence in Illinois when he was extradited to Wisconsin to face charges of identity theft. In Wisconsin, Jackson sought habeas corpus under 28 U.S.C. 2241 challenging the extradition.…
Date: August 11, 2015
Docket Number: 14-2618
Justia Opinion Summary: The Richers filed for bankruptcy. Morehead, who had invested in commercial real estate owned by a trust controlled by Richer, filed an unsecured claim for $945,000 in the proceeding. The Richers filed an adversary action…
Date: August 11, 2015
Docket Number: 14-3427
Justia Opinion Summary: Collins was on supervised release when he attempted to buy cocaine and marijuana from an undercover officer. Collins gave a statement about his “wholesale” Illinois drug purchases and “retail” Wisconsin distribution.…
Date: August 10, 2015
Docket Number: 13-2359
Justia Opinion Summary: The IRS assessed deficiencies against Williams in connection with his income tax for 1996-2005, totaling, with interest and penalties, about $1.3 million. He did not pay. The IRS filed tax liens in Clark County, Indiana,…
Date: August 10, 2015
Docket Number: 14-3075
Justia Opinion Summary: JHM rents commercial laundry machines to Chicago-area apartment buildings. Firestone made four loans to JHM, totaling $254,114.99. JHM defaulted on each. Firestone sued. JHM filed an answer, asserting a counterclaim…
Date: August 10, 2015
Docket Number: 14-3168
Justia Opinion Summary: Burglars stole four desktop computers from Advocate Health and Hospitals Corporation’s Illinois administrative offices. The computers contained unencrypted private data relating to approximately four million Advocate…
Date: August 10, 2015
Docket Number: 15-1150
Justia Opinion Summary: The bankruptcy court awarded a fee of $28,030.33 to the bankruptcy trustee, Lanser, in a Chapter 7 bankruptcy. The district court affirmed, over a challenge by the debtors’ principal unsecured creditor, Mohns, which had…
Date: August 7, 2015
Docket Number: 13-3581
Justia Opinion Summary: Springfield has an ordinance that prohibits panhandling in its “downtown historic district”—less than 2% of the city’s area, containing its principal shopping, entertainment, and governmental areas. The ordinance defines…
Date: August 7, 2015
Docket Number: 14-2843
Justia Opinion Summary: When the Chicago Board of Education deems a school to be deficient, it implements a reconstitution, replacing all administrators, faculty, and staff. A school may be subject to turnaround if it has been on probation for…
Date: August 7, 2015
Docket Number: 14-3214
Justia Opinion Summary: Under the Clean Air Act (CAA), 42 U.S.C. 7401, the EPA sets the maximum permissible atmospheric concentrations for harmful air pollutants, including ozone and classifies geographic areas as “attainment” or…
Date: August 7, 2015
Docket Number: 15-1115
Justia Opinion Summary: His aunt and uncle reported to police that Witzlib was making M-80s in the basement of his grandmother’s house, where he and his grandmother lived. A federal license is required for manufacture of the highly explosive…
Date: August 6, 2015
Docket Number: 13-3312
Justia Opinion Summary: At Carter’s trial, for possessing between five and 15 grams of cocaine with intent to deliver, an officer testified about his work with an informant who had said Carter was involved in distributing drugs and that he…
Date: August 6, 2015
Docket Number: 14-1490
Justia Opinion Summary: D.Z., a minor, filed suit under 42 U.S.C. 1983, claiming that, Evanston Police Officer Buell, violated his rights under the Fourth Amendment when he detained D.Z. in connection with a reported burglary. The district…
Date: August 6, 2015
Docket Numbers: 14-1707, 14-2481
Justia Opinion Summary: On May 7, 2005, a commuter aircraft, operated by Transair, crashed into terrain on its way to the Lockhart River airfield in Queensland, Australia. All 15 people on board died. The estates sued several companies and one…
Date: August 6, 2015
Docket Number: 14-2009
Justia Opinion Summary: Vandenberg, attending a cruise on a chartered yacht, was injured when he fell from the upper deck because the bench on which he was sitting tipped over, while the boat was anchored in Lake Michigan. The bench was not…
Date: August 6, 2015
Docket Number: 14-2451
Justia Opinion Summary: Sweatt , an African-American male, worked for Union Pacific, performing manual labor jobs. After a few years, Sweatt experience pain in his shoulder and hands. It progressed to the point that Sweatt could no longer do…
Date: August 6, 2015
Docket Number: 14-2694
Justia Opinion Summary: Viktor Barengolts was driving a tractor-trailer on Route 30 in Wheatland Township, Illinois when he rear-ended the Bernals in their pickup truck, causing serious injuries and property damage. The Bernals sued Unlimited…
Date: August 6, 2015
Docket Numbers: 14-2773, 14-2775
Justia Opinion Summary: Chapman, proposed to represent a class, under 47 U.S.C. 227, the Telephone Consumer Protection Act, who received faxes from First Index despite not having given consent. First Index responded that it always had consent,…
Date: August 6, 2015
Docket Number: 14-3173
Justia Opinion Summary: On December 24, 2009, inmate Conley’s hand was examined by a prison nurse, who described Conley’s symptoms to Dr. Birch over the phone; throbbing pain, severe swelling, discoloration, and loss of function throughout the…
Date: August 6, 2015
Docket Number: 14-3545
Justia Opinion Summary: In 2009, McGuire was charged her with concealing and laundering drug proceeds (about $141,000), 18 U.S.C. 1956, based on her receipt of proceeds of marijuana and cocaine sales from her nephew that she deposited into her…
Date: August 6, 2015
Docket Number: 14-3554
Justia Opinion Summary: Reaves was suspected of dealing heroin. From an informant, Peoria police learned that Reaves drove to Detroit in a white Chrysler Pacifica to get his heroin supply. Police confirmed that Reaves owned a white Chrysler…
Date: August 6, 2015
Docket Number: 14-3790
Justia Opinion Summary: Taylor entered an online chat room and connected with “elliegirl1234,” identified as a 13–year–old girl. Taylor responded that he was 37, and asked whether Ellie had engaged in sexual acts with her boyfriend. Taylor…
Date: August 5, 2015
Docket Numbers: 14-1420, 14-1243
Justia Opinion Summary: When sentenced in 2009 for unlawful reentry by an alien, 8 U.S.C. 1326, Medina-Mora was serving undischarged terms in an Illinois state prison on a drug charge and a weapons charge. In open court, the judge said that…
Date: August 5, 2015
Docket Number: 14-3424
Justia Opinion Summary: Purham pled guilty to conspiracy to distribute 280 grams or more of crack cocaine, 21 U.S.C. 841, 846. Purham agreed to the quantity and acknowledged the 20-year mandatory minimum sentence. The court denied Purham’s…
Date: August 5, 2015
Docket Number: 14-3746
Justia Opinion Summary: FRCP 4(c)(3) requires a court to order that service be made by a U.S. marshal or deputy marshal or by a person specially appointed if the plaintiff is authorized to proceed in forma pauperis under 28 U.S.C. 1915.…
Date: August 4, 2015
Docket Number: 14-1940
Justia Opinion Summary: Timmermann’s sued its former employee, Pace, for conversion, breach of fiduciary duty, fraud, and unjust enrichment, claiming that Pace had stolen merchandise and money from the company. Pace filed her answer and a…
Date: August 4, 2015
Docket Numbers: 14-2747, 14-2759, 14-2792
Justia Opinion Summary: Cipra, Gregory, and Konrady ran a cannabis grow operation at in Lee County, Illinois for two years. Shannon Gregory’s brother, Scott, contacted the DEA and provided detailed information about the operation. DEA Agent…
Date: August 4, 2015
Docket Number: 15-1059
Justia Opinion Summary: Two men committed four armed robberies of Peoria, Illinois businesses. They left a plastic bag at the scene of the final robbery. Officers sent it to the State Bureau of Forensic Science. A latent fingerprint impression…
Date: August 4, 2015
Docket Number: 15-1193
Justia Opinion Summary: Pons was charged with wire fraud, 18 U.S.C. 1343, and equity skimming, 12 U.S.C. 1715z-19, and was released from custody pending trial. Two months before trial was to begin, he fled the country. He eventually turned…
Date: August 4, 2015
Docket Number: 15-2427
Justia Opinion Summary: Price, a convicted felon, was convicted of possessing a gun, 18 U.S.C. 922(g)(1). Applying the Armed Career Criminal Act (ACCA), 18 U.S.C. 924(e), the court concluded that Price had three qualifying convictions and…
Date: July 31, 2015
Docket Number: 13-1870
Justia Opinion Summary: Bulk, a gasoline distributor with gas stations in Kentucky, Indiana, and Tennessee, leases stations and equipment to tenant-operators. Bulk receives monthly rent plus payment for gasoline. The Kentucky Department of…
Date: July 31, 2015
Docket Number: 14-1640
Justia Opinion Summary: The Cocrofts acquired a home in Country Club Hills, Illinois. In 2007, they refinanced their mortgage. As part of the transaction, the Cocrofts’ mortgage and loan were pooled into a mortgage loan trust. A year later, the…
Date: July 31, 2015
Docket Number: 14-3163
Justia Opinion Summary: Stepp, a former correctional officer, training secretary and coordinator, and parole probation officer, applied for a period of disability and disability insurance benefits under the Social Security Act, 42 U.S.C. 401.…
Date: July 31, 2015
Docket Number: 15-1207
Justia Opinion Summary: Evansville police became aware of Internet threats against police, coming from an IP address at the home of 68-year-old Louise Milan and her 18-year-old daughter. They had an unsecured wifi network. Before they searched,…
Date: July 30, 2015
Docket Number: 14-2405
Justia Opinion Summary: Silk began working in 1986 at Moraine Valley Community College as a part-time, non-tenure track, adjunct professor. Silk’s typical teaching load included four courses during fall and spring semesters and two or three…
Date: July 30, 2015
Docket Number: 14-2674
Justia Opinion Summary: Illinois prisoner Petties was climbing stairs when he felt a “pop” and extreme pain in his left ankle. At the prison infirmary, the examining physician prescribed Vicodin and crutches and a week of “meals lay-in.” The…
Date: July 29, 2015
Docket Number: 14-2010
Justia Opinion Summary: While Lee was on supervised release, his probation officer learned that he had assaulted his girlfriend, Pulliam, with a small souvenir baseball bat. The court issued a warrant for Lee’s arrest and initiated proceedings…
Date: July 29, 2015
Docket Number: 14-2758
Justia Opinion Summary: CentiMark, a commercial roofer, hired Turnell as a laborer in 1978. In 1988 CentiMark promoted him to Chicago District Operations Manager. In his employment agreement, Turnell agreed to a non-disclosure provision and to…
Date: July 29, 2015
Docket Number: 14-3699
Date: July 28, 2015
Docket Number: 13-2995
Justia Opinion Summary: A police officer followed a vehicle after discovering that its owner’s driver’s license had expired 18 years earlier. He initiated a traffic stop after observing the vehicle cross into another lane on an Illinois highway…
Date: July 28, 2015
Docket Number: 14-1651
Justia Opinion Summary: Northbound generates and sells life insurance leads, using the brand name “Leadbot,” but ran out of cash with a frozen line of credit and revenue that did not support its overhead. Norvax generates and sells health…
Date: July 28, 2015
Docket Number: 14-2636
Justia Opinion Summary: Just before investing in Zhongpin on behalf of Prestige, Yang, a Chinese citizen employed at a U.S. investment firm, purchased Zhongpin shares and option contracts for himself. Yang was Prestige’s only officer and…
Date: July 28, 2015
Docket Number: 14-3451
Justia Opinion Summary: Valdes was traveling by train. During a layover, DEA agents approached Valdes because he fit their profile of a drug courier, searched Valdes’s luggage, and found bundles of cash totaling $239,400. Each bundle was…
Date: July 28, 2015
Docket Number: 15-1442
Justia Opinion Summary: In 2003, the SEC filed a civil suit against Custable, charging fraud involving “penny stocks” that yielded him at least $4 million. Criminal proceedings resulted in a long prison sentence for Custable. In 2010 he…
Date: July 28, 2015
Docket Number: 15-1776
Justia Opinion Summary: The plaintiff alleged consumer fraud by the seller of a dietary supplement, and the district court certified a plaintiff class of individuals “who purchased Instaflex within the applicable statute of limitations of the…
Date: July 27, 2015
Docket Numbers: 13-3052, 12-3624
Justia Opinion Summary: Monsanto operated chemical plants and disposed of waste, including PCBs, at sites within Sauget Area 1. In 1999, the government filed suit under the Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation and Liability Act…
Date: July 27, 2015
Docket Number: 14-1618
Justia Opinion Summary: ManWeb, an Indianapolis engineering and installation company, entered into an asset purchase agreement with Tiernan, another Indianapolis electrical contractor. Unlike ManWeb, Tiernan was party to a collective bargaining…
Date: July 27, 2015
Docket Number: 14-1990
Justia Opinion Summary: Illinois inmate Miller sued under 42 U.S.C. 1983, claiming deliberate indifference to his gastroesophageal reflux disease (GERD), which can cause severe heartburn. When Miller arrived at the prison he was taking Zantac…
Date: July 27, 2015
Docket Number: 14-2384
Justia Opinion Summary: Bowman law firm filed suit in Hendricks County Indiana, to recover Bentrud’s credit card debt owed to Capital One. Months later, Bowman moved for summary judgment. Bentrud responded by invoking the arbitration provision…
Date: July 27, 2015
Docket Number: 14-2419
Justia Opinion Summary: In 2006, DuPriest pled guilty to “Use of a Telephone to Facilitate a Drug Trafficking Crime.” Judge Stadtmueller sentenced DuPriest to a 48-month term of imprisonment and a 12-month term of supervised release, to run…
Date: July 27, 2015
Docket Number: 14-2473
Justia Opinion Summary: Stars is a nude dancing establishment in Neenah, Wisconsin. When Stars opened in 2006, the County had a zoning ordinance governing Adult Entertainment Overlay Districts. Stars’s application was stalled because, all…
Date: July 27, 2015
Docket Numbers: 14-2653, 14-2652, 14-2650
Justia Opinion Summary: Kieffer robbed the Bank of O’Fallon and led police officers on a high-speed chase. Kieffer confessed; police retrieved the $3,330 he had stolen. Kieffer confessed that he had robbed six other banks (five outside…
Date: July 24, 2015
Docket Numbers: 13-1353, 13-1441
Justia Opinion Summary: Sergeant Laha stopped Ruiz after a license-plate check revealed that his driver’s license was suspended. The stop was captured by Laha’s dash-mounted video camera and lapel microphone. Laha explained the ticket and asked…
Date: July 24, 2015
Docket Number: 14-2122
Justia Opinion Summary: Varga, now 42, had a 1994 medical discharge from the military because of severe endometriosis (a condition which causes pelvic pain). She then worked as a correctional officer, and later an office worker, at the Federal…
Date: July 24, 2015
Docket Number: 14-2959
Justia Opinion Summary: McCormick bought a single-premium variable life-insurance policy that permits borrowing against its cash value. Loans are secured by moving an equivalent amount from sub-accounts that the policyholder can invest to a…
Date: July 24, 2015
Docket Number: 14-3309
Justia Opinion Summary: Swanson resigned from the Village of Flossmoor’s police department after suffering two strokes in 2009, six weeks apart, the second of which left him unable to perform as a detective. Swanson claimed that the Village…
Date: July 24, 2015
Docket Number: 15-1313
Justia Opinion Summary: In 2013 the Seventh Circuit held unconstitutional a provision of the Indiana Unclaimed Property Act, Ind. Code 32-34-1-1 that stated that “property” is “presumed abandoned if the owner or apparent owner has not…
Date: July 24, 2015
Docket Number: 15-1444
Justia Opinion Summary: Price, an almost illiterate, mentally retarded 44-year-old who also suffers from psychiatric ailments, intermittently received Supplemental Security Income (SSI) benefits, having been adjudged disabled in 1988, 1991, and…
Date: July 23, 2015
Docket Number: 13-2005
Justia Opinion Summary: Trovare sought to purchase an affiliated group of family-owned companies. The parties executed a Letter of Intent that included a provision requiring the companies, if they terminated negotiations in writing before a…
Date: July 23, 2015
Docket Number: 14-1216
Justia Opinion Summary: Billhartz left more than $20 million to his four children when he died. His estate tax return claimed a deduction for more than $14 million because the amounts paid to the children through a trust were paid pursuant to…
Date: July 23, 2015
Docket Number: 14-1936
Justia Opinion Summary: Attacked by a fellow prisoner while being transported from a court hearing to an Illinois jail, Robinson, pro se, filed suit under 42 U.S.C. 1983, claiming that guards were deliberately indifferent to his safety in…
Date: July 23, 2015
Docket Numbers: 14-3105, 14-3013
Justia Opinion Summary: The United States delivered a criminal summons to the office of Sinovel Wind (USA) in Texas in order to serve process on Sinovel Wind Group, a Chinese corporation and the owner of 100% of the shares of Sinovel (USA),…
Date: July 23, 2015
Docket Number: 14-3730
Justia Opinion Summary: Pickering was mailed a summons for federal jury duty, and later was sent a reminder. When she neither responded nor appeared, the judge asked the Justice Department to institute criminal contempt proceedings. The…
Date: July 23, 2015
Docket Number: 15-1156
Justia Opinion Summary: Carter lost his home in Crete, Illinois, after its mortgage foreclosed. He sued the financial institutions involved in making, servicing, or foreclosing his mortgage, alleging constitutional claims based on the fact that…
Date: July 23, 2015
Docket Numbers: 15-1474, 15-1326
Justia Opinion Summary: More than 20 years ago, Newman was sentenced to 540 months’ imprisonment for drug offenses, including distributing 40-50 kilograms of cocaine. Congress and the Sentencing Commission have several times reduced permissible…
Date: July 22, 2015
Docket Number: 14-1763
Justia Opinion Summary: Based on 2004 Milwaukee muggings, McGhee was charged with armed robbery, theft of movable property from a person, and operating a vehicle without the owner’s consent. Public defender Thomey was appointed. On the first…
Date: July 22, 2015
Docket Number: 14-2779
Justia Opinion Summary: A man robbed Standard Bank in Hammond, wearing thigh-length leather coat, sneakers with red stitching, and a green Chicago Bulls baseball cap. He approached employees with a note demanding money. They turned over $5,000.…
Date: July 22, 2015
Docket Number: 14-3702
Justia Opinion Summary: Tetzlaff, age 56, lives with his mother, is unemployed, and owes approximately $260,000 in student loan debt, which is guaranteed by Educational Credit Management Corporation. When Tetzlaff filed for Chapter 7 bankruptcy…
Date: July 21, 2015
Docket Number: 11-3853
Justia Opinion Summary: Before the 2008 presidential election, federal agents were investigating then-Governor Blagojevich and obtained warrants authorizing the interception of his phone calls. When Barack Obama, then a Senator from Illinois,…
Date: July 21, 2015
Docket Numbers: 13-2266, 13-2264
Justia Opinion Summary: From 2006-2011, NCO purchased consumers’ defaulted debt and referred collections to its sister corporation Financial, an Illinois-licensed debt collector, and to outside attorneys, who are exempt from the Illinois…
Date: July 21, 2015
Docket Number: 14-1351
Justia Opinion Summary: Officer Beasley was dispatched and spoke to Hack, who stated that he had been asleep when his neighbor, Howlett, grabbed and threatened him, and thrust a hand down the front of Hack’s pants. Hack guessed that Howlett had…
Date: July 21, 2015
Docket Number: 14-1913
Justia Opinion Summary: Dugan was involved in an automobile accident with a vehicle owned by Rainey and claimed more than $200,000 in damages. Rainey’s insurer, American Family, offered $100,000 (the limit under Rainey’s policy). The Dugans…
Date: July 21, 2015
Docket Number: 14-2449
Justia Opinion Summary: McClellan operated T&M Daycare. Nearly all of its clients participated in an Illinois program that reimbursed daycare centers. To qualify, a parent or guardian had to reside in Illinois, be employed or attend school, and…
Date: July 20, 2015
Docket Numbers: 13-3469, 13-2814
Justia Opinion Summary: In 2000 an almost totally deaf 73‐ year‐old, the federally licensed owner of a gun store in Hammond, Indiana, was shot to death and the store robbed of many of its guns. Taylor and Thomas, drug dealers, were indicted for…
Date: July 20, 2015
Docket Number: 14-2207
Justia Opinion Summary: The Higginses visited an Indiana amusement park. The filter pump connected to the park’s lazy river malfunctioned. As staff worked to fix the problem, pool chemicals—bleach and hydrochloric acid—accumulated in the pump.…
Date: July 20, 2015
Docket Numbers: 14-2328, 14-2746
Justia Opinion Summary: Dibble and Akemann were arbitrators for the Illinois Workers’ Compensation Commission. At the time of their appointments, the Workers’ Compensation Act, 820 ILCS 305/14, provided that each arbitrator would be appointed…
Date: July 20, 2015
Docket Number: 14-2982
Justia Opinion Summary: Two Milwaukee police officers on bicycle patrol were investigating gunshots around 16th and Center Street. They saw Smith crossing 16th Street as he prepared to enter an alley. The officers rode ahead of Smith into the…
Date: July 20, 2015
Docket Number: 14-3017
Justia Opinion Summary: Taylor’s brother died in an accident. Caiarelli, the decedent’s ex-spouse and guardian of their minor child, obtained a state court declaration that the child was entitled to assets distributed to Taylor ($1.4 million).…
Date: July 20, 2015
Docket Number: 14-3122
Justia Opinion Summary: In 2013, hackers attacked Neiman Marcus and stole the credit card numbers of its customers. In December 2013, the company learned that some of its customers had found fraudulent charges on their cards. On January 10,…
Date: July 20, 2015
Docket Number: 14-3388
Justia Opinion Summary: Apollo owned Franklin, Wisconsin property, which it rented to DKCLM, for the sale and servicing of boats. DKCLM subleased part of the property to Kreil, an officer of DKCLM, who lived in a house on his leased part of the…
Date: July 17, 2015
Docket Number: 13-3767
Justia Opinion Summary: Giri, a citizen of Nepal, was living in the U.S. as a conditional permanent resident based on his marriage to a U.S. citizen, Tammy, until USCIS terminated his conditional resident status after finding that his marriage…
Date: July 16, 2015
Docket Number: 13-1017
Justia Opinion Summary: Townsend signed a note and a mortgage to purchase a condominium. After Townsend defaulted, HSBC sought foreclosure under Illinois law. Representing himself, Townsend answered the complaint. HSBC moved for summary…
Date: July 16, 2015
Docket Number: 14-2254
Justia Opinion Summary: In 2010, while Hinkle was finishing his elected term as Sheriff of Wayne County, his 14-year-old step-daughter accused him of sexually abusing her while helping her apply chigger medicine. A Charleston police officer…
Date: July 16, 2015
Docket Number: 14-2557
Justia Opinion Summary: The defendant claims that he does not molest girls, but solicits, obtains, views, and distributes videos and images of very young girls in lewd poses. He pleaded guilty to two counts of transportation of child…
Date: July 15, 2015
Docket Number: 14-2331
Justia Opinion Summary: Defendant, age 35, was sentenced to 420 months in prison for possessing 1.2 grams of crack cocaine with intent to sell; possessing a gun as a felon; and using the gun in furtherance of a drug-trafficking offense, 21…
Date: July 15, 2015
Docket Number: 14-3332
Justia Opinion Summary: In 2011 Faulkner pleaded guilty to two counts of the use of a communication facility in facilitation of a drug-related felony; he was sentenced to a 91-month term of imprisonment. Two years later, he and other members of…
Date: July 14, 2015
Docket Number: 14-1164
Justia Opinion Summary: Armed men were robbing Milwaukee businesses, wearing dark sweatshirts and ski masks. Officers saw three men approach a store in dark clothing, with hoods pulled over their faces. One attempted to enter, while the others…
Date: July 14, 2015
Docket Number: 14-1269
Justia Opinion Summary: Quadri bought an apartment in Chicago at a foreclosure sale. Later, she learned that the police had investigated a disturbance there, and visited the apartment with her real estate agent and a locksmith. Quadri’s agent…
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