The Tenth Circuit on Monday issued four published opinions and six unpublished opinions.

Published

In Chizzali v. Gindi, the Court affirmed in part and reversed in part the district court’s decision. Respondent “filed a voluntary petition for relief under Chapter 11 of the Bankruptcy Code while the Colorado Court of Appeals was considering two appeals arising out of a lawsuit brought against him by [Petitioner], his former partner in two companies. The bankruptcy court refused to lift the automatic stay to permit further proceedings regarding the two issues raised by [Petitioner] in his appeal,” and the Court affirmed, except finding that Petitioner was entitled to relief from the stay on one of the issues before the Colorado appellate court.

In United States v. McBride, the Court affirmed the district court’s decision. Petitioner admitted violating the terms of his supervised release and was sentenced to twelve months imprisonment. Petitioner claims that the sentence is substantively and procedurally unreasonable. The Court, however, found that Petitioner did not overcome “the presumption that his sentence, which was within the range suggested by the United States Sentencing Commission’s policy statements, was reasonable in length.”

In Knox v. Bland, the Court affirmed the district court’s decision. Petitioner, an inmate, attempted unsuccessfully in state court “to have his name changed for religious reasons to Ali Ishmael Mandingo Warrior Chief.” After the denial of his request, he brought a pro se civil rights action against eight Oklahoma state judges, claiming they violated his “Fourteenth Amendment rights to equal protection and due process, his First Amendment rights to freedom of religion and to petition the government for redress of injustice, the Seventh Amendment, the Ninth Amendment, the Thirteenth Amendment, and the Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act.” The Court found that his claims were rightly dismissed as frivolous and malicious, and that his claims in federal court are barred under the Rooker/Feldman abstention doctrine, under which “a party losing in state court is barred from seeking what in substance would be appellate review of the state judgment in a United States district court, based on the losing party’s claim that the state judgment itself violates the loser’s federal rights.”

In C.W. Mining Co. v. Aquila, Inc., the Court reversed and remanded the Bankruptcy Appellate Panel’s decision. Petitioner is the debtor in an involuntary Chapter 7 bankruptcy proceeding; the bankruptcy court determined that the creditors who filed the involuntary petition were “qualifying creditors” as required to trigger involuntary bankruptcy, and the former managers of Petitioner appealed that determination to the Bankruptcy Appellate Panel. The Court, however, found that while Petitioner had standing to appeal, the managers did not. The Chapter 7 trustee was the only person authorized to bring the appeal as the managers were divested of their authority to appeal by the appointment of the trustee, which they did not challenge.

Unpublished

Sperry v. Werholtz

United States v. Lasley

Jackson v. Enforcer of Constitutional Policy

United States v. Beltran-Aguilar

Knox v. Aldridge

United States v. Vasquez