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YI ZHANG LIN,
Petitioner,
v.
MERRICK B. GARLAND, Attorney General,
Respondent. |
No. 22-3807 |
On Petition for Review from the Board of Immigration Appeals;
No. A 206 060 936.
Argued: May 17, 2023
Decided and Filed: September 1, 2023
Before: GRIFFIN, STRANCH, and DAVIS, Circuit Judges.
_________________________
OPINION
_________________________
DAVIS, Circuit Judge. Yi Zhang Lin, a native and citizen of China, petitions for review
of the Board of Immigration Appeals’ (“BIA” or “the Board”) final order affirming an
immigration judge’s (“IJ”) denial of his requests for asylum, withholding of removal, and
protection under Article III of the Convention Against Torture (“CAT”). The question before us
is whether the BIA’s determinations are supported by substantial evidence. As will be explained
below, the BIA’s rationale does not allow us to make that determination. So we grant Lin’s
petition and remand for further proceedings. |
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UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,
Plaintiff-Appellee,
v.
EDWARD LEONIDAS LEWIS,
Defendant-Appellant. |
Nos. 22-5593/5800 |
Appeal from the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Kentucky at Frankfort.
No. 3:21-cr-00021—Gregory F. Van Tatenhove, District Judge.
Decided and Filed: September 1, 2023
Before: MOORE, CLAY, and GIBBONS, Circuit Judges.
_________________________
OPINION
_________________________
KAREN NELSON MOORE, Circuit Judge. Kentucky State Police officers searched
Edward Lewis’s laptop, cell phone, and thumb drive and found evidence of child pornography.
Lewis moved to suppress the evidence, arguing that it was obtained through an unlawful search
and seizure of his electronic devices. The district court found that the good-faith exception to the
exclusionary rule applied and denied Lewis’s motion, and Lewis pleaded guilty while reserving
his right to bring this appeal. We REVERSE the district court’s order denying Lewis’s motion
to suppress, VACATE Lewis’s conviction, and REMAND for further proceedings. |
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PHILLIP TRUESDELL; LEGACY MEDICAL TRANSPORT,
LLC,
Plaintiffs-Appellants,
v.
ERIC FRIEDLANDER, in his official capacity as
Secretary of the Kentucky Cabinet for Health and
Family Services; ADAM MATHER, in his official
capacity as Inspector General for the Kentucky
Cabinet for Health and Family Services; CARRIE
BANAHAN, in her official capacity as Deputy Secretary
of the Kentucky Cabinet for Health and Family
Services,
Defendants-Appellees,
FIRST CARE OHIO, LLC, fka Patient Transport
Services, Inc.,
Intervenor-Defendant-Appellee. |
No. 22-5808 |
Appeal from the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Kentucky at Frankfort.
No. 3:19-cv-00066—Gregory F. Van Tatenhove, District Judge.
Argued: March 8, 2023
Decided and Filed: September 1, 2023
Before: GRIFFIN, BUSH, and MURPHY, Circuit Judges.
_________________________
OPINION
_________________________
MURPHY, Circuit Judge. Legacy Medical Transport, a small family-owned business,
provides nonemergency ambulance services in several Ohio counties that border Kentucky.
After receiving many inquiries from Kentucky hospitals and nursing homes, Legacy sought to
expand into the Commonwealth. But Kentucky required Legacy to show a “need” for its
services and to apply for a “certificate of need” with the Kentucky Cabinet for Health and Family
Services. Unsurprisingly, existing ambulance providers (Legacy’s potential competitors)
objected to Legacy’s request. The Cabinet denied Legacy’s application partly on the ground that
these providers offered an adequate supply. Legacy then sued various Cabinet officials, alleging
that Kentucky’s certificate-of-need law violated the “dormant” or “negative” part of the
Commerce Clause. The district court granted summary judgment in favor of the Cabinet
officials. We affirm in part and reverse in part.
We affirm with respect to Legacy’s request to offer intrastate ambulance transportation
in Kentucky. Under the modern approach to the dormant Commerce Clause, a law’s validity
largely depends on whether it discriminates against out-of-state businesses in favor of in-state
ones. See Nat’l Pork Producers Council v. Ross, 143 S. Ct. 1142, 1152–53 (2023). Yet
Kentucky’s law treats in-state and out-of-state providers the same. Legacy responds that such a
neutral law can still violate the dormant Commerce Clause if its interstate burdens exceed its
local benefits under the “balancing” test from Pike v. Bruce Church, Inc., 397 U.S. 137 (1970).
And the company raises valid concerns about the wisdom of the law’s limits on market
competition. For the most part, however, Legacy’s evidence suggests that these limits will harm
Kentucky’s own “consumers”; it has not shown a “substantial harm” to interstate commerce.
Nat’l Pork Producers, 143 S. Ct. at 1162–63 (plurality opinion).
That said, we reverse with respect to Legacy’s request to offer interstate ambulance
transportation between Kentucky and Ohio. In Buck v. Kuykendall, 267 U.S. 307 (1925), the
Court held that States may not deny a common carrier a license to provide interstate
transportation on the ground that the interstate market contains an “adequate” supply. Id. at 316.
This bright-line rule barring States from obstructing interstate “competition” does not turn on a
finding that a State has discriminated against out-of-state entities. And while the district court
thought that later cases had repudiated Buck, we find that claim debatable. Besides, the Court
has told us that we must follow a directly controlling case even if later decisions call it into
doubt. Buck controls here. |
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