collateral order exception

In January 2001, shortly after assuming office, President George W. Bush issued a memorandum establishing the National Energy Policy Development Group. The Group was directed to develop a national energy policy designed to help promote dependable, affordable, and environmentally sound production and distribution of energy. The President assigned agency heads and assistants, all federal employees, to serve as members of the committee. He authorized the Vice President, as chairman, to invite other officers of the Federal Government to participate as appropriate. Five months later the NEPDG issued a final report and, according to the Government, terminated all operations. Following publication of the report, Judicial Watch, Inc., and the Sierra Club filed separate actions in the United States District Court for the District of Columbia that were later consolidated. The plaintiffs alleged that the NEPDG had failed to comply with the procedural and disclosure requirements of the Federal Advisory Committee Act. Non-federal employees including private lobbyists regularly attended and fully participated in non-public meetings. Respondents contend that the regular participation of the non-Government individuals made them de facto members of the committee. The suits named Vice President Cheney, the NEPDG, government officials who served on the committee, and the alleged de facto members as defendants. The suit seeks declaratory relief and an injunction requiring them to produce all materials allegedly subject to FACA's requirements. The District Court granted the motion to dismiss in part and denied it in part. It dismissed respondents' claims against the non-Government defendants. Because the NEPDG had been dissolved, it could not be sued as a defendant, and the claims against it were dismissed as well. The District Court held that FACA's substantive requirements could be enforced against the Vice President and other Government participants on the NEPDG under the Mandamus Act and against the agency defendants under the Administrative Procedure Act. The court allowed respondents to conduct a tightly reined discovery to ascertain the NEPDG's structure and membership. The District Court denied in part the motion to dismiss and ordered respondents to submit a discovery plan. Petitioners including the Vice President sought a writ of mandamus in the Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit to vacate the discovery orders, direct the District Court to rule on the basis of the administrative record, and dismiss the Vice President from the suit. A divided panel of the Court of Appeals dismissed the petition for a writ of mandamus and the Vice President's attempted interlocutory appeal. The Supreme Court granted certiorari.

Charles Sell, a former licensed dentist, exhibited unusual behavior beginning in the late 1980s and was hospitalized multiple times for mental illness. In 1997 the Government charged him with submitting false Medicaid claims and making false statements to a law enforcement officer; a superseding indictment later added fifty-six counts of mail fraud, six counts of Medicaid fraud, and one count of money laundering. In early 1998 Sell's bail was revoked after a magistrate judge observed him screaming, shouting, and spitting in court, and a psychiatrist reported his condition had worsened. A new indictment in April 1998 charged Sell with attempting to murder an FBI agent and a potential witness. In May 1998 a magistrate judge found Sell incompetent to stand trial and ordered him hospitalized at the United States Medical Center for Federal Prisoners in Springfield, Missouri, for up to four months to determine whether he would attain capacity to proceed. While there, Sell refused staff recommendations to take antipsychotic medication. Medical Center authorities sought and obtained administrative approval to administer the drugs involuntarily after a hearing that considered Sell's history, current delusions, staff opinions, and an outside expert's view. Sell challenged the administrative decision in court. A magistrate judge held an evidentiary hearing that included testimony about a July 1999 incident in which Sell approached a nurse inappropriately and indicated the conduct would continue; the magistrate authorized involuntary medication, finding Sell dangerous to himself and others, that medication was the only way to render him less dangerous and competent, and that side effects could be ameliorated. The District Court reviewed the record, held the dangerousness finding clearly erroneous after Sell was returned to an open ward, but affirmed the medication order on the ground that drugs represented the only viable hope of restoring competence to allow adjudication of the charges. The Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit affirmed, agreeing that Sell was not dangerous at the Medical Center but concluding that the Government had an essential interest in bringing him to trial on the fraud charges, that medication was medically appropriate, and that the evidence showed a reasonable probability Sell could fairly participate in his defense. Sell petitioned for certiorari, which the Supreme Court granted.

In August 1998, respondents George Lane and Beverly Jones filed this action against the State of Tennessee and several Tennessee counties. They alleged past and ongoing violations of Title II of the Americans with Disabilities Act. Both respondents are paraplegics who use wheelchairs for mobility. They claimed that they were denied access to and the services of the state court system by reason of their disabilities. Lane alleged that he was compelled to appear to answer a set of criminal charges on the second floor of a county courthouse that had no elevator. At his first appearance, Lane crawled up two flights of stairs to get to the courtroom. When Lane returned to the courthouse for a hearing, he refused to crawl again or to be carried by officers to the courtroom. He consequently was arrested and jailed for failure to appear. Jones, a certified court reporter, alleged that she has not been able to gain access to several county courthouses. As a result, she has lost both work and an opportunity to participate in the judicial process. Respondents sought damages and equitable relief. The State moved to dismiss the suit on the ground that it was barred by the Eleventh Amendment. The District Court denied the motion without opinion, and the State appealed. The United States intervened to defend Title II's abrogation of the States' Eleventh Amendment immunity. On April 28, 2000, after the appeal had been briefed and argued, the Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit entered an order holding the case in abeyance pending the Supreme Court's decision in Board of Trustees of Univ. of Ala. v. Garrett. In Garrett, the Supreme Court concluded that the Eleventh Amendment bars private suits seeking money damages for state violations of Title I of the ADA. It left open the question whether the Eleventh Amendment permits suits for money damages under Title II. Following the Garrett decision, the Court of Appeals, sitting en banc, heard argument in a Title II suit brought by a hearing-impaired litigant. The litigant sought money damages for the State's failure to accommodate his disability in a child custody proceeding. A divided court permitted the suit to proceed despite the State's assertion of Eleventh Amendment immunity. Following the en banc decision in Popovich, a panel of the Court of Appeals entered an order affirming the District Court's denial of the State's motion to dismiss in this case. The order explained that respondents' claims were not barred because they were based on due process principles. In response to a petition for rehearing arguing that Popovich was not controlling because the complaint did not allege due process violations, the panel filed an amended opinion. It explained that the Due Process Clause protects the right of access to the courts. It also explained that the evidence before Congress when it enacted Title II established that physical barriers in government buildings, including courthouses and in the courtrooms themselves, have had the effect of denying disabled people the opportunity to access vital services and to exercise fundamental rights guaranteed by the Due Process Clause. The panel did not, however, categorically reject the State's submission. It instead noted that the case presented difficult questions that cannot be clarified absent a factual record, and remanded for further proceedings. The Supreme Court granted certiorari and now reviews the case.

On July 18, 2004, near midnight, Lieutenant Joseph Forthman of the West Memphis, Arkansas, Police Department pulled over a white Honda Accord driven by Donald Rickard because the car had only one operating headlight. Kelly Allen rode in the passenger seat. Forthman noticed an indentation roughly the size of a head or a basketball in the windshield, asked Rickard if he had been drinking, and received a negative response. Rickard failed to produce his driver's license upon request and appeared nervous, prompting Forthman to direct him to step out of the car. Rickard instead sped away. Forthman gave chase and was soon joined by five other police cruisers driven by Sergeant Vance Plumhoff and Officers Jimmy Evans, Lance Ellis, Troy Galtelli, and John Gardner. The pursuit proceeded east on Interstate 40 toward Memphis, Tennessee. The vehicles attained speeds over 100 miles per hour, passed more than two dozen other vehicles, and officers attempted without success to stop Rickard using a rolling roadblock. Rickard eventually exited the interstate in Memphis and made a quick right turn that caused contact between his car and Evans' cruiser. Rickard's car spun out into a parking lot and collided with Plumhoff's cruiser. Rickard put the car into reverse in an attempt to escape. Evans and Plumhoff exited their cruisers and approached, with Evans pounding on the passenger-side window while holding his gun. Rickard's car made contact with another cruiser, its tires began spinning, and the vehicle rocked back and forth with its bumper flush against a police cruiser. Plumhoff fired three shots into Rickard's car. Rickard then reversed in a 180-degree arc, maneuvered onto another street, and continued fleeing, forcing Ellis to step to his right to avoid the vehicle. As Rickard fled down that street, Gardner and Galtelli fired twelve additional shots. Rickard lost control of the car and crashed into a building. Rickard and Allen both died from some combination of gunshot wounds and injuries suffered in the crash. Rickard's minor daughter, through her mother as parent and next friend, filed a suit under 42 U.S.C. §1983 against the six officers, the mayor, and the chief of police of West Memphis, alleging that the officers used excessive force in violation of the Fourth and Fourteenth Amendments. The officers moved for summary judgment based on qualified immunity, which the District Court denied. The officers appealed. A Sixth Circuit motions panel initially dismissed the appeal for lack of jurisdiction but later granted rehearing and left the jurisdictional issue for the merits panel. The merits panel affirmed the District Court's order. The Supreme Court granted certiorari.