Free US Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit case summaries from Justia.
If you are unable to see this message, click here to view it in a web browser. | | US Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit July 3, 2020 |
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Click here to remove Verdict from subsequent Justia newsletter(s). | New on Verdict Legal Analysis and Commentary | Reflections on the Movement in California to Repeal the State’s Ban on Affirmative Action | VIKRAM DAVID AMAR | | Illinois law dean and professor Vikram David Amar offers three observations on a measure recently approved by the California legislature that would, if approved by the voters, repeal Proposition 209, the voter initiative that has prohibited affirmative action by the state and its subdivisions since its passage in 1996. Amar praises the California legislature for seeking to repeal Prop 209 and for seeking to do so using the proper procedures, and he suggests that if Prop 209 is repealed, legal rationales for the use of race should be based not only on the value of diversity (as they have been for some time now), but also on the need to remedy past wrongs against Black Americans. | Read More |
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US Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit Opinions | Digital Drilling Data Systems, LLC v. Petrolink Services, Inc. | Docket: 19-20116 Opinion Date: July 2, 2020 Judge: Stuart Kyle Duncan Areas of Law: Copyright, Energy, Oil & Gas Law, Intellectual Property | Digidrill filed suit against its competitor, Petrolink, alleging that Petrolink hacked into its software at various oil drilling sites in order to "scrape" valuable drilling data in real time. The district court granted Petrolink's motion for summary judgment on Digidrill's copyright claims. Digidrill's unjust enrichment claim proceeded to trial, where a jury returned a verdict in Digidrill's favor. In regard to the copyright infringement claim, the Fifth Circuit affirmed the district court's judgment and held that Digidrill likely waived its "qualitative importance" argument but, even if not, the argument fails on the merits because no reasonable jury could find substantial similarity based on the qualitative importance of the copied schema to DataLogger as a whole. The court also affirmed the district court's judgment as to the Digital Millennium Copyright Act claims, holding that the USB dongle and Interface Process did not effectively control access to the protected database schema. The court also held that Digidrill's unjust enrichment claim is not preempted by the Copyright Act because the claim incorporates an element beyond mere unauthorized copying. The court held that the available Texas authorities do not foreclose the possibility that a litigant may show the taking of an undue advantage without showing the violation of a law or legal duty. Therefore, the court affirmed the district court's denial of Petrolink's judgment as a matter of law on the issue of whether Digidrill adduced sufficient evidence of the benefit Petrolink obtained from Digidrill. Finally, the court held that the district court failed to treat Petrolink as the prevailing party under the relevant statutes and failed to apply the correct legal standard. Accordingly, the court vacated the district court's denial of Petrolink's motion for fees and remanded. | | United States v. Burden | Docket: 19-30394 Opinion Date: July 2, 2020 Judge: Jerry E. Smith Areas of Law: Criminal Law | The Fifth Circuit affirmed Defendants Burden and Scott's convictions and sentences for unlawfully possessing firearms as felons. The court held that the district court did not abuse its discretion in denying Scott's motion for severance where Scott failed to overcome the presumption that the jury would follow the district court's limiting instruction; defendants cannot meet their burden to show that Rehaif error affected their substantial rights; regardless of the standard of review, the evidence was sufficient to support the conviction; the district court did not err, much less plainly so, in ordering the attorneys to seek approval before mentioning or eliciting testimony concerning defendants' statements that they had just been robbed of their clothing; and the district court did not abuse its discretion in applying a cross-reference to attempted first degree murder at sentencing. | |
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