Aerospace & Defense Case Summaries
[06/23] Rectrix Aerodrome Ctrs., Inc. v. Barnstable Mun. Airport Comm'n
In plaintiff's suit against an airport commission and individual defendants, claiming that it was prevented from competing with defendant in the sale of jet fuel, district court's grant of summary judgment in favor of the defendants is affirmed where: 1) plaintiff's fraud claim fails as plaintiff was a commercial tenant of the airport and, given the self-service standards and lease terms, had no right and no reasonable expectation of being able to sell jet fuel at the airport; 2) the antitrust claim is barred by the state action doctrine given the Massachusetts statute; and 3) plaintiff's equal protection claim under section 1983 fails as no private entity at the airport has the privilege sought by plaintiff.
[06/23] Air Line Pilots Ass'n v. US Airways Group
In an airline pilots union's suit to establish and arbitrate before a multi-employer, multi-union board of adjustment, district court's dismissal of the complaint is affirmed as plaintiff's claim is foreclosed by the plain language of section 204 of the Railway Labor Act, which permits but does not require such a board adjustment, and plaintiff's alternative state law claim is meritless.
[06/08] Turner v. NTSB
In pilots' petition for review of the National Transportation Safety Board's order reversing an attorney's fee award to petitioners against the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) in a pilot's license revocation proceeding, the petition is denied where: 1) because the Administrative Law Judge dismissed the cases without prejudice, there was nothing in this case analogous to judicial relief; 2) the pilots are not prevailing parties for purposes of 5 U.S.C. section 504(a)(1), and thus, they are not entitled to recover their attorneys fees and expenses under that section; and 3) petitioners could not recover under section 504(a)(4) because the FAA did not prevail.
[06/04] Rogers v. Bell Helicopter Textron, Inc.
In plaintiff's suit against a manufacturer of the helicopter she was piloting at the time of her crash, a grant of defendant's motion in limine to exclude evidence that the maintenance manual was defective and caused the accident, and its subsequent grant of defendant's motion for a nonsuit are reversed as the maintenance manual here was not a part of the helicopter for purposes of the General Aviation Revitalization Act of 1994.
[06/01] National Air Traffic Controllers Assn. v. Fed'l Serv. Impasses Panel
In an action by an air traffic controllers' union against the Federal Service Impasses Panel (FSIP), the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), and the Federal Labor Relations Authority, seeking both a declaratory judgment that the FSIP had jurisdiction over an impasse involving the FAA and an injunction requiring the FSIP to assert jurisdiction over all such pending and future impasses, dismissal of the action for lack of subject matter jurisdiction is affirmed in part where none of the relief sought by the union could be obtained from the FAA. However, the dismissal is reversed in part where, because the union did not seek review of a decision of either the FSIP or the General Counsel, the district court erred in dismissing the case for lack of jurisdiction.
[05/25] Friedman & Friedman, Ltd. v. Tim McCandless, Inc.
In an action against a seller of an airplane that allegedly failed to comport with the contract and with the representations by the seller, judgment for plaintiff is reversed where the district court abused its discretion in refusing to instruct the jury on plaintiff's duty to provide timely notice of the plane's alleged nonconformity with the contract.
[05/17] Pettitt v. Boeing Co.
In plaintiffs' wrongful death suit arising out of an accident when a Boeing 737 aircraft crashed shortly after take-off in Cameroon, killing all 114 people on board, judgment of the district court sua sponte remanding the case on the ground that removal had been defective is vacated as the district court lacked statutory power to enter a remand order, and even if the district court were correct that a defect in removal had occurred, this is merely a procedural defect which was waived.
[05/14] Vaughn v. Airline Pilots Assoc. Int'l.
In an action against an airline pilot's union for breach of the duty of fair representation, the dismissal of the complaint is affirmed where: 1) defendants' failure to conduct the audit at issue was not so far outside a wide range of reasonableness as to be irrational; 2) the mere collection of management fees in exchange for services legally rendered did not, without more, evidence an improper motive; and 3) plaintiffs failed to allege a causal connection between defendant's failure to conduct the audit and the termination of plaintiffs' benefit plan.
[05/12] Elassaad v. Independence Air, Inc.
In plaintiff's lawsuit against an airline company for injuries he sustained when he fell while disembarking from an airplane, district court's grant of summary judgment in favor of the defendant on the ground of preemption is reversed as the standard of care in plaintiff's negligence claim is not preempted by federal law where: 1) although Abdullah v. American Airlines, Inc. 181 F.3d 363 (3d Cir. 1999) stated that the Aviation Act preempts "the entire field of aviation safety" from state regulation, the "field of aviation safety" does not include a flight crew's oversight of the disembarkation of passengers once a plane has come to a complete stop at its destination; 2) the Aviation Act and the regulations promulgated thereunder to not preempt state tort law with respect to such negligence claims; and 3) the federally enacted Air Carrier Access Act and its implementing regulations do not control the standard of care from the standpoint of airline safety.
[05/05] Rolls-Royce, PLC v. United Tech., Corp.
In a patent interference proceeding, relating to swept fan blades used on turbofan jet engines, district court's reversal of the Board's judgment against Rolls-Royce is affirmed as the claims of Rolls-Royce's '077 patent are patentable over defendant's '931 application because the '931 application does not render the '077 patent obvious.
[04/30] Ventress v. Japan Airlines
In plaintiff-flight engineer's action under various whistleblower protection laws against an airline, judgment on the pleadings for one defendant and the confirmation of an arbitral award in favor of another is affirmed in part where: 1) the filing and denial of a motion to disqualify an arbitrator in one arbitration did not establish bias in a subsequent arbitration, and the arbitrator's supposed affiliations, and plaintiff's unsupported assertions about their ideologies, did not establish bias; 2) plaintiff chose to bring only California state-law claims, argued strenuously that California's interests were paramount, waited nearly a year -- until a substantive motion was pending against their complaint -- before attempting to amend it, and did not show that Hawaii law was different on the merits. However, the judgment is reversed in part where plaintiff's state-law claim was not "related to" a "service" for purposes of Federal Airline Deregulation Act preemption.
[04/12] Watsonville Pilots Ass'n v. City of Watsonville
In plaintiffs' mandamus petition challenging the city's certification of a final environmental impact report (FEIR) and the approval of the 2030 General Plan (Plan) on the grounds that the Plan violated the State Aeronautics Act (SAA) and the city's certification of the FEIR violated the CEQA because the FEIR failed to adequately analyze the impact of the Plan on aviation, traffic, and the water supply, and failed to consider a reasonable range of alternatives, the judgment of the trial court is affirmed as the trial court correctly concluded: 1) that the Plan violates the SAA; 2) that the city's certification of the FEIR violated the CEQA; and 3) the trial court did not err in failing to find that the FEIR inadequately analyzed the impact of the Plan on the water supply.
[03/25] Int'l Soc'y for Krishna Consciousness of California, Inc. v. City of Los Angeles
In an action brought by the International Society for Krishna Consciousness of California and others challenging an ordinance which prohibits soliciting funds at LAX, the California Supreme Court responds to the request from the Ninth Circuit by finding that, whether or not Los Angeles International Airport is a public forum for free exercise under the California Constitution, the ordinance is valid as a reasonable time, place, and manner restriction of expressive rights to the extent that it prohibits soliciting the immediate receipt of funds.
[03/24] Martin v. Halliburton
In an action against affiliated governmental contractors providing logistical support to the United States Army in Iraq based on the death of a US citizen working for the contractors, defendants' appeal from the denial of their motion to dismiss for lack of subject matter jurisdiction is dismissed where: 1) defendants failed to make a substantial showing that their allegedly tortious conduct was within the scope of their official duties and was discretionary in the sense that it involved governmental policy-making activities; 2) the court lacked jurisdiction to review the district court's denial of defendants' claim of derivative sovereign immunity; and 3) the combatant activities exception was not subject to a sui generis exemption from the ordinary jurisdictional requirements for denials of preemption claims.
[03/24] Roberts v. Delta Air Lines, Inc.
In a flight attendant's suit against Delta Airlines for injuries she suffered while working on a flight for a company which was owned and operated by Delta Air Lines, despite receiving lump sum workers' compensation payment from the company and Delta's insurer, district court's entry of summary judgment in favor of the defendant is affirmed as plaintiff was Delta's employee at all pertinent times, and as such, plaintiff is barred from bringing suit against Delta under Massachusetts workers' compensation law.
[03/23] United Techs. Corp. v. US Dep't of Defense
In "reverse-FOIA" actions seeking to prevent the release of certain Defense Contract Management Agency (DCMA) documents evaluating plaintiff defense contractors' respective quality control processes, summary judgment for defendants is reversed where DCMA's decision to release the documents was arbitrary and capricious in that it failed to properly apply Exemption 4 of the Freedom of Information Act.
[03/22] Carmona v. Southwest Airlines Co.
In an action claiming that the termination of plaintiff's employment violated Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 (Title VII) and the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA), partial judgment for defendant is reversed where: 1) there was sufficient evidence for a reasonable jury to find that plaintiff was an "individual with a disability" within the meaning of the ADA, because there was sufficient evidence for a reasonable jury to conclude that he had an impairment, psoriatic arthritis, that substantially limited his major life activity of walking; 2) there was sufficient evidence that defendant's own actions reflected that attendance on scheduled days was not required to qualify for the position of flight attendant; and 3) a reasonable jury could have found defendant's proffered explanation for plaintiff's discharge was false and that the true reason was his disability.
[03/22] ATK Thiokol, Inc. v. US
The decision of the Court of Federal Claims that Development Effort costs for plaintiff's upgraded rocket motor were chargeable as indirect independent research and development (IR&D costs) is affirmed as it was proper for plaintiff to treat its Development Effort costs as indirect costs as the research and development costs were related to a contract with Mitsubishi, but not specifically required by that contract.
[03/12] News & Observer Publ'g. Co. v. Raleigh-Durham Airport Auth.
In newspaper publishers' First Amendment challenge to a public airport's total ban on newspaper racks inside its terminals, grant of summary judgment in favor of plaintiffs is affirmed as the government interests asserted to justify the total ban do not counterbalance its significant restriction on protected expression.
[02/26] Pasternack v. NTSB
In a petition for review of the FAA's revocation of petitioner's airman certificates on the ground that petitioner refused to take a mandatory drug test, the petition is granted where the FAA erred by relying on an "implicit credibility determination" by the Administrative Law Judge (ALJ), when in fact the ALJ made no such credibility determination.
