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Abouammo v. United States

Supreme Court of the United States

Decided Jun 11, 2026

Published

Advisory citizen opinion on this ruling, never a legal appeal or challenge. It does not form a citizen mandate. Public record, no accusation of wrongdoing.

Abouammo v. United States Revisions: 6/16/26

Supreme Court of the United States

Decided Jun 11, 2026

Published

Advisory citizen opinion on this ruling, never a legal appeal or challenge. It does not form a citizen mandate. Public record, no accusation of wrongdoing.

Keathley v. Buddy Ayers Construction, Inc.

Supreme Court of the United States

Decided Jun 11, 2026

Published

Advisory citizen opinion on this ruling, never a legal appeal or challenge. It does not form a citizen mandate. Public record, no accusation of wrongdoing.

FS Credit Opportunities Corp. v. Saba Capital Master Fund, Ltd.

Supreme Court of the United States

Decided Jun 11, 2026

Published

Advisory citizen opinion on this ruling, never a legal appeal or challenge. It does not form a citizen mandate. Public record, no accusation of wrongdoing.

Sripetch v. SEC

Supreme Court of the United States

Decided Jun 4, 2026

Published

Advisory citizen opinion on this ruling, never a legal appeal or challenge. It does not form a citizen mandate. Public record, no accusation of wrongdoing.

FCC v. AT&T

Supreme Court of the United States

Decided Jun 4, 2026

Published

Advisory citizen opinion on this ruling, never a legal appeal or challenge. It does not form a citizen mandate. Public record, no accusation of wrongdoing.

Hikma Pharmaceuticals USA Inc. v. Amarin Pharma, Inc.

Supreme Court of the United States

Decided Jun 4, 2026

Published

Advisory citizen opinion on this ruling, never a legal appeal or challenge. It does not form a citizen mandate. Public record, no accusation of wrongdoing.

Allen v. Milligan

Supreme Court of the United States

Decided Jun 2, 2026

Published

Advisory citizen opinion on this ruling, never a legal appeal or challenge. It does not form a citizen mandate. Public record, no accusation of wrongdoing.

Whitton v. Dixon

Supreme Court of the United States

Decided Jun 1, 2026

Published

Advisory citizen opinion on this ruling, never a legal appeal or challenge. It does not form a citizen mandate. Public record, no accusation of wrongdoing.

Rutherford v. United States

Supreme Court of the United States

Decided May 28, 2026

Published

Advisory citizen opinion on this ruling, never a legal appeal or challenge. It does not form a citizen mandate. Public record, no accusation of wrongdoing.

Pitchford v. Cain

Supreme Court of the United States

Decided May 28, 2026

Published

Advisory citizen opinion on this ruling, never a legal appeal or challenge. It does not form a citizen mandate. Public record, no accusation of wrongdoing.

Flowers Foods, Inc. v. Brock

Supreme Court of the United States

Decided May 28, 2026

Published

Advisory citizen opinion on this ruling, never a legal appeal or challenge. It does not form a citizen mandate. Public record, no accusation of wrongdoing.

Becky Joseph v. Thomas-Grace Const. Inc.

U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit

Decided Jul 24, 2026

Published

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit affirmed the district court's grant of summary judgment in favor of Thomas-Grace Construction Inc. Becky Joseph, a former Lead Installer, had sued her employer alleging sex discrimination and retaliation under federal and Michigan civil rights law. The appellate court agreed with the lower court that TGC was entitled to judgment as a matter of law.

Becky Joseph was hired by Thomas-Grace Construction Inc. as a Lead Installer in November 2022 and was assigned to a project in Las Vegas beginning in January 2023. From early in her employment, Joseph had repeated conflicts with her supervisors, including Gary Raney and later Joe Cikotte. She complained that supervisors were condescending and dismissive, and she sent several emails and texts to TGC management expressing frustration, at times in confrontational language. She…

Advisory citizen opinion on this ruling, never a legal appeal or challenge. It does not form a citizen mandate. Public record, no accusation of wrongdoing.

Jennifer Audette v. Lake of the Woods County

U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit

Decided Jul 24, 2026

Published

The Eighth Circuit affirmed the district court's ruling against Robert and Jennifer Audette, who sued Lake of the Woods County under the Americans with Disabilities Act after the county denied their after-the-fact permit for a large concrete ramp they built without prior approval. The court found that the Audettes had missed their opportunity to properly request a disability accommodation by violating the county's instructions and proceeding with construction without going…

Robert and Jennifer Audette own a lakefront home in Minnesota. In 2020, Robert met with county land and water planning officials who told him he could pour limited concrete on the property without a permit, as long as it stayed on existing fill and remained under 400 square feet. Without obtaining county approval, the Audettes built a 12-foot-wide concrete ramp from their property down to the lake's ordinary high-water mark. A subsequent inspection found approximately 2,122…

Advisory citizen opinion on this ruling, never a legal appeal or challenge. It does not form a citizen mandate. Public record, no accusation of wrongdoing.

United States v. Gregory Berry

U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit

Decided Jul 23, 2026

Published

The Eighth Circuit affirmed Gregory Berry's 48-month prison sentence after he pleaded guilty to making a false statement when buying a firearm, specifically lying about being a marijuana user. Berry argued the district court made factual errors by treating him as an unlicensed firearms dealer and imposed an unreasonable sentence, but the appeals court found neither claim persuasive. The court ruled the district court reasonably concluded Berry operated a commercial firearms…

Gregory Berry was convicted of making a false statement when acquiring a firearm, specifically denying he was a marijuana user on federal paperwork. Between 2018 and 2024, he had purchased more than 180 firearms from licensed dealers in Arkansas. Over 100 guns were found at his home and in his vehicle, many with price tags attached. Evidence on his phone showed he had sold firearms at auction, receiving a check for nearly $54,000 labeled 'Gun Auction.' Thirteen of the guns…

Advisory citizen opinion on this ruling, never a legal appeal or challenge. It does not form a citizen mandate. Public record, no accusation of wrongdoing.

La Belle Dairy, LLC v. Sharpe Holdings, Inc.

U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit

Decided Jul 23, 2026

Published

The Eighth Circuit affirmed a district court order preventing Sharpe Holdings from evicting La Belle Dairy from thousands of acres of leased farmland in Northeast Missouri. The court first determined it had jurisdiction, finding that the order labeled a 'temporary restraining order' actually functioned as a preliminary injunction because it had no expiration date and lasted more than 28 days. The court then rejected Sharpe's argument that it was denied due process, finding…

La Belle Dairy leases thousands of acres of forage land in Northeast Missouri from Sharpe Holdings to grow feed for its cattle and manage waste under a government-mandated nutrient management plan. After La Belle Dairy sued Sharpe for breach of their lease, Sharpe threatened to evict the dairy. La Belle Dairy asked the district court for emergency relief, and the court issued an order, labeled a 'temporary restraining order,' blocking Sharpe from evicting or interfering with…

Advisory citizen opinion on this ruling, never a legal appeal or challenge. It does not form a citizen mandate. Public record, no accusation of wrongdoing.

RMS v. Commerce Bank

U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit

Decided Jul 23, 2026

Published

The Eighth Circuit affirmed the district court's decision denying Revenue Management Solutions a preliminary injunction against Commerce Bank. RMS had accused Commerce of breaching their software licensing contract and misappropriating trade secrets by developing a competing product called RemitConnect 2.0. The appeals court agreed with the lower court that RMS did not demonstrate it was likely to suffer irreparable harm, which is a required element for obtaining this type…

The central question in this case was whether Revenue Management Solutions (RMS) was entitled to a preliminary injunction, an emergency court order, to stop Commerce Bank from using software called RemitConnect 2.0 while the underlying lawsuit was pending. RMS claimed Commerce violated their 2014 licensing agreement by reverse engineering and copying RMS's healthcare revenue management software platform to build its own competing product, and also misappropriated RMS's trade…

Advisory citizen opinion on this ruling, never a legal appeal or challenge. It does not form a citizen mandate. Public record, no accusation of wrongdoing.

BSI Group LLC v. Solid Financial Technologies

U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit

Decided Jul 22, 2026

Published

The Eighth Circuit reversed a district court order that allowed merits discovery and trial preparation to proceed at the same time as a jury trial on whether the parties had agreed to arbitrate their dispute. The court held that the Federal Arbitration Act requires the arbitrability question to be resolved quickly and without delay, before merits proceedings move forward. Allowing parallel merits activity defeats the core purpose of arbitration, which is to resolve disputes…

This case arose after the Eighth Circuit had previously sent the case back to a district court in Arkansas for a narrow jury trial on one question: whether the plaintiffs had agreed to be bound by an arbitration clause through a website pop-up. On remand, the district court issued a scheduling order that required merits discovery and arbitrability discovery to happen at the same time, and it also set a merits trial to begin immediately after the jury decided the…

Advisory citizen opinion on this ruling, never a legal appeal or challenge. It does not form a citizen mandate. Public record, no accusation of wrongdoing.

United States v. Colar

U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit

Decided Jul 21, 2026

Published

The Ninth Circuit vacated Attila Colar's conviction on 44 federal counts related to alleged Paycheck Protection Program fraud and obstruction, and ordered a new trial. The court found that an alternate juror had expressed actual bias against Colar's defense, which centered on claims of racial and religious targeting by law enforcement. The district court abused its discretion by failing to investigate that bias promptly, conducting only a belated and inadequate inquiry, and…

Attila Colar, a Black Muslim man, was convicted by a jury on 44 federal counts including bank fraud, wire fraud, aggravated identity theft, obstruction, and witness tampering. His defense throughout trial was that law enforcement had targeted him because of his race and religion. Shortly after the jury was sworn in, an alternate juror told the court that he had a strong negative reaction to that defense theory and had already concluded it lacked substance and…

Advisory citizen opinion on this ruling, never a legal appeal or challenge. It does not form a citizen mandate. Public record, no accusation of wrongdoing.

Faith Elsharkawy v. Chisago Lakes Board of Education

U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit

Decided Jul 21, 2026

Published

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit affirmed the lower court's grant of summary judgment in favor of the Chisago Lakes School District and several school officials. Faith Elsharkawy had sued the district after her son J.L.E., a high school freshman with disabilities, died by suicide, alleging violations of the Rehabilitation Act, the ADA, and Minnesota's wrongful death statute. The appeals court agreed with the district court that the evidence did not support…

This case arose after J.L.E., a student with multiple health and learning disabilities in the Chisago Lakes School District in Minnesota, died by suicide. His mother, Faith Elsharkawy, sued the school district and several school employees, claiming they violated the Rehabilitation Act of 1973, the Americans with Disabilities Act, and Minnesota's wrongful death law. She argued the district failed to properly serve her son and that those failures contributed to his death. The…

Advisory citizen opinion on this ruling, never a legal appeal or challenge. It does not form a citizen mandate. Public record, no accusation of wrongdoing.

Cecil E Fox v. Lexington County Detention Center Lexington County

U.S. District Court, D. South Carolina

Decided Aug 28, 2026

In Fox v. Lexington County Detention Center, the U.S. District Court for the District of South Carolina dismissed the pro se civil rights lawsuit brought by Cecil E. Fox against the Lexington County Detention Center and the Lexington County Sheriff's Department. The court adopted a Magistrate Judge's recommendation and dismissed the case without prejudice because Fox failed to update the court with a current address and failed to respond to a court order identifying problems…

Cecil E. Fox, representing himself, filed a civil rights lawsuit under 42 U.S.C. Section 1983 against the Lexington County Detention Center and the Lexington County Sheriff's Department. A Magistrate Judge reviewed the case as part of standard preliminary procedures and identified deficiencies in Fox's amended complaint, ordering him to file a corrected version. The Magistrate Judge's order notifying Fox of these problems was returned to the court as undeliverable because…

Advisory citizen opinion on this ruling, never a legal appeal or challenge. It does not form a citizen mandate. Public record, no accusation of wrongdoing.

Angel Gabriel Jiminez Jiminez v. Latonya T Simmons

U.S. District Court, D. South Carolina

Decided Aug 28, 2026

In Jiminez-Jiminez v. Simmons, a federal district court in South Carolina dismissed a pro se civil rights lawsuit brought under 42 U.S.C. Section 1983. The plaintiff sued a defendant for signing arrest warrants, but the court found the defendant was acting in a judicial capacity and therefore entitled to judicial immunity. The court adopted the Magistrate Judge's recommendation and dismissed the case without prejudice.

The plaintiff, Angel Gabriel Jiminez-Jiminez, filed a lawsuit without an attorney under 42 U.S.C. Section 1983, a federal law that allows people to sue government officials for violating their constitutional rights. The sole defendant, Latonya T. Simmons, was sued specifically for signing arrest warrants, which is an action taken in a judicial capacity. A Magistrate Judge reviewed the case and issued a report recommending dismissal before the case even got started…

Advisory citizen opinion on this ruling, never a legal appeal or challenge. It does not form a citizen mandate. Public record, no accusation of wrongdoing.

Thelathia K v. Commissioner of Social Security

U.S. District Court, D. South Carolina

Decided Aug 28, 2026

In Thelathia K. v. Commissioner of Social Security, the U.S. District Court for the District of South Carolina affirmed the Social Security Administration's decision to deny the plaintiff's claim for Disability Insurance Benefits. A Magistrate Judge had reviewed the case and recommended affirming the Commissioner's decision. Because neither party filed objections to that recommendation, the district court reviewed only for clear error, found none, and adopted the…

The central question was whether the Social Security Administration's denial of Disability Insurance Benefits to the plaintiff was legally sound. The plaintiff brought this case under 42 U.S.C. Section 405(g), which allows individuals to ask a federal court to review a final decision by the Social Security Commissioner. The case was referred to a Magistrate Judge, William S. Brown, who issued a Report and Recommendation on August 13, 2026, concluding that the Commissioner's…

Advisory citizen opinion on this ruling, never a legal appeal or challenge. It does not form a citizen mandate. Public record, no accusation of wrongdoing.

Jacqueline Elizabeth Ard Terry Frank Nicola v. The Spa On Port Royal Sound

U.S. District Court, D. South Carolina

Decided Aug 28, 2026

In Jacqueline Elizabeth Ard and Terry Frank Nicola v. The Spa on Port Royal Sound et al., the U.S. District Court for the District of South Carolina denied the plaintiffs' motion to withdraw reference, meaning the adversary proceeding will remain before the Bankruptcy Court rather than being transferred to the district court. The court adopted the Magistrate Judge's Report and Recommendation, which found the motion was moot, that mandatory withdrawal was not established, and…

The central question in this case was whether an adversary proceeding pending in the U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the District of South Carolina should be transferred, or 'withdrawn,' to the federal district court. The two plaintiffs, representing themselves without an attorney, filed the motion seeking that transfer. The district court denied the motion, agreeing fully with the Magistrate Judge's prior analysis. The Magistrate Judge had identified three separate reasons to…

Advisory citizen opinion on this ruling, never a legal appeal or challenge. It does not form a citizen mandate. Public record, no accusation of wrongdoing.

Larry A. White v. Curtis Earley, Warden of Perry Correctional Institution

U.S. District Court, D. South Carolina

Decided Aug 28, 2026

In White v. Earley, the U.S. District Court for the District of South Carolina dismissed Larry A. White's petition for federal habeas corpus relief, granting the warden's motion for summary judgment. The court found that White did not file his petition within the time allowed by federal law and did not demonstrate a sufficient basis for equitable tolling, meaning the deadline could not be extended on his behalf. The court also denied White's motions for discovery and for…

Larry White, a South Carolina state prisoner, pleaded guilty in 2018 to attempted murder and first-degree burglary and received a 15-year sentence. After pursuing post-conviction relief in state court, including a belated direct appeal that was affirmed, White filed a federal habeas corpus petition in July 2025 under 28 U.S.C. Section 2254, raising claims of ineffective assistance of counsel, involuntary plea, tainted indictment, prosecutorial misconduct, newly discovered…

Advisory citizen opinion on this ruling, never a legal appeal or challenge. It does not form a citizen mandate. Public record, no accusation of wrongdoing.

In re Jacqueline Elizabeth Ard and Terry Frank Nicola v. John B Kelchner

U.S. District Court, D. South Carolina

Decided Aug 28, 2026

In In re Jacqueline Elizabeth Ard and Terry Frank Nicola v. John B. Kelchner, the U.S. District Court for the District of South Carolina dismissed the appellants' appeal from a Bankruptcy Court ruling and denied all of their pending motions. The Bankruptcy Court had previously denied the appellants' motion to impose an automatic stay, finding that because they had two prior bankruptcy cases dismissed within the twelve months before their April 2025 filing, they did not…

Jacqueline Ard and Terry Nicola filed a Chapter 13 voluntary bankruptcy petition in April 2025. Shortly after filing, they asked the Bankruptcy Court to impose an automatic stay, which is a legal protection that generally halts creditors from taking action against a debtor's property while a bankruptcy case is pending. The Bankruptcy Court denied that request, pointing to federal bankruptcy statutes, specifically 11 U.S.C. sections 362(c)(4)(A)(i) and 362(c)(4)(D)(i)(I)…

Advisory citizen opinion on this ruling, never a legal appeal or challenge. It does not form a citizen mandate. Public record, no accusation of wrongdoing.