The United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit, in Communications Network Int’l, Ltd. v. MCI WorldCom Communications, Inc., a 2-1 decision issued on January 24, dismissed an appeal as untimely because the putative appellant’s lawyer failed to update his email address in the district court’s ECF system when he changed firms. There’s an important lesson about diligence for all lawyers in this.
Tag Archives: Appellate Practice
Del Marcelle: The Standard for Assessing Class-of-One Equal-Protection Claims Remains Unresolved in the Seventh Circuit
Posted in Federal Decisions; Seventh Circuit; Supreme CourtWith the Supreme Court’s denial of certiorari on November 26, 2012, in Del Marcelle v. Brown County Corp., No. 12-367, the Seventh Circuit’s inability to resolve the standard by which class-of-one equal-protection claims should be assessed will likely persist for some time. The Seventh Circuit had heard the case en banc to resolve the conflicted case law, hoping to determine whether a class-of-one claim requires pleading malicious or wrongful motivation and to agree on an improved standard, but the en banc court failed in its quest, affirming by an evenly divided court. 680 F.3d 887 (7th Cir. 2012).
Don’t Ignore Bad Precedent — Not Only Will You Lose Your Appeal, But the Seventh Circuit Might Mock You by Name
Posted in Federal Decisions; Seventh CircuitIt will be impossible ever to think of Gonzalez-Servin v. Ford Motor Co., No. 11-1665 (7th Cir., Nov. 23, 2011), as anything but “the ostrich case,” chiefly because the court includes in its opinion full color pictures of an ostrich with its head in the sand and a lawyer imitating the bird.