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TERRY CASH-DARLING, as Personal Representative of the Estate of Paul Cash, Decedent,
Plaintiff-Appellant,
v.
RECYCLING EQUIPMENT, INC.,
Defendant-Appellee.
   No. 22-5346
Appeal from the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Tennessee at Greeneville.
No. 2:19-cv-00034—Clifton Leland Corker, District Judge.
Argued: January 25, 2023
Decided and Filed: March 17, 2023
Before: GILMAN, McKEAGUE, and GRIFFIN, Circuit Judges.


_________________________
OPINION
_________________________

RONALD LEE GILMAN, Circuit Judge. Paul Cash died when a hammermill shredder exploded at his workplace. The Tennessee Occupational Safety and Health Administration (TOSHA) determined that the explosion was primarily caused by the accumulation of combustible aluminum dust produced by the shredding process. Cash’s sister, Terry Cash-Darling, brought this lawsuit as the personal representative of his estate against Recycling Equipment, Inc. (REI), the company that assembled and sold the shredder to Lighting Resources LLC (LR), Cash’s employer.

The estate asserts four product-liability claims. REI moved for summary judgment, arguing that because it “did not design the hammermill system at issue, and instead assisted LR with locating primarily used components that LR requested based on the design of LR’s existing system, REI is not legally responsible for any alleged defect in the system as a whole.”

The district court agreed and granted summary judgment in favor of REI, dismissing all of the estate’s claims. For the reasons set forth below, we REVERSE the judgment of the district court and REMAND for further proceedings consistent with this Opinion.



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STEVEN LEE MOSS,
Petitioner-Appellee,
v.
GARY MINIARD, Warden,
Respondent-Appellant.
   No. 21-1655
Appeal from the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Michigan at Flint.
No. 4:18-cv-11697—Linda V. Parker, District Judge.
Argued: October 20, 2022
Decided and Filed: March 17, 2023
Before: COLE, GIBBONS, and BUSH, Circuit Judges.


_________________________
OPINION
_________________________

JULIA SMITH GIBBONS, Circuit Judge. The Warden appeals the district court’s grant of petitioner Steven Moss’s habeas petition based on ineffective assistance of counsel analyzed under United States v. Cronic, 466 U.S. 648 (1984). The Warden argues that the district court erred in three ways: (1) finding that Moss’s untimely petition was entitled to equitable tolling; (2) excusing the procedural default of Moss’s ineffective assistance of trial counsel claim based on the ineffective assistance of appellate counsel; and (3) granting Moss habeas relief on his claims, rather than deferring to the state court’s adjudication of the issues under Strickland v. Washington, 466 U.S. 668 (1984).

Because the state court’s denial of Moss’s ineffective assistance claims under Strickland was not contrary to nor an unreasonable application of clearly established federal law, we defer to its decision that Moss is not entitled to habeas relief. We therefore hold that the district court erred in granting Moss relief and reverse and remand with instructions to deny the petition with prejudice.



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IN RE: FLINT WATER CASES.

______________________________________________________
LUKE WAID,
Plaintiff,

INDIVIDUAL PLAINTIFFS; SETTLEMENT CLASS PLAINTIFFS,
Plaintiffs-Appellees,
v.
RICHARD DALE SNYDER, et al.,
Defendants,

RAYMOND HALL and ASHLEY JANKOWIAK (22-1185); HELEN CHAPMAN, DOROTHY CHAPMAN, SHAMIYA CHAPMAN, LASHONDA JONES, SHIRLEY GLOVER on behalf of herself and her children, J.S. and A.S., TRISHA WALTER, TOMMIE LOWERY, JR. on behalf of himself and his children, T.L., I.L., and M.L., LINDA WELCHE, REKIYAH WILLIAMS on behalf of herself and her children, M.W., O.B., D.W., and D.W., ASHLEY SUBLET on behalf of herself and her children, E.W. and E.W., ELIZABETH FRANKLIN on behalf of herself and her children, E.W. and E.W., FLORLISA STEBBINS, ALBERT HARRIS, SHEILA HARRIS, NADINE ROBERTS on behalf of herself and her foster daughter, D.J., and EARL WELCHE (22-1197); NADINE ROBERTS on behalf of herself and her foster daughter, D.J. (22- 1605),
Objectors-Appellants.
   Nos. 22-1185/1197/1605
Appeal from the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Michigan at Ann Arbor.
No. 5:16-cv-10444—Judith E. Levy, District Judge.
Argued: March 14, 2023
Decided and Filed: March 17, 2023
Before: CLAY, McKEAGUE, and STRANCH, Circuit Judges.


_________________________
OPINION
_________________________

McKEAGUE, Circuit Judge. Following the Flint Water Crisis,1 thousands of cases were brought by minors, adults, property owners, and business owners against alleged tortfeasors for the harms they endured as a result of lead-contaminated water. Putative class action lawsuits and individual lawsuits were consolidated in the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Michigan. There, the district court appointed Co-Lead Class Counsel and Co-Liaison Counsel to represent the putative class and individual plaintiffs, respectively. After years of negotiation, Co-Lead Class Counsel and Co-Liaison Counsel, together with the Settling Defendants, reached a record-breaking settlement.

In connection with the work they performed in reaching the settlement, Counsel requested attorneys’ fees and reimbursement for expenses. The court approved the underlying settlement and awarded Counsel attorneys’ fees. Three Objector-Appellant groups, the Hall Objectors, the Chapman Objectors, and the Roberts Objector, now appeal that award. Together they allege that they were entitled to more detailed discovery of Counsel’s billing and costs records, that the fee award’s common benefit structure constitutes an abuse of discretion, and that a $500 charge for bone lead scans performed by Co-Liaison Counsel was unreasonable.

We conclude that the Objectors are not entitled to the discovery they seek, that they lack standing to appeal the common benefit structure of the district court’s attorneys’ fee award, and that the district court did not otherwise abuse its discretion in awarding Counsel fees and expenses. Accordingly, we AFFIRM the district court.



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KNOX COUNTY, TENNESSEE,
Plaintiff-Appellant (21-5556) / Appellee (22-5268),
v.
M.Q., the student; N.Q. and J.Q., the student’s parents/guardians,
Defendants-Appellees (21-5556) / Appellants (22-5268).
   Nos. 21-5556/22-5268
Appeal from the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Tennessee at Knoxville.
Nos. 3:20-cv-00125; 3:20-cv-00173—Clifton Leland Corker, District Judge.
Argued: December 6, 2022
Decided and Filed: March 17, 2023
Before: SUHRHEINRICH, CLAY, and DAVIS, Circuit Judges.


_________________________
OPINION
_________________________

DAVIS, Circuit Judge. M.Q., a student attending public school in Knox County, Tennessee, and his parents (collectively, “M.Q.”) sued Knox County Schools (“KCS”) for violations of the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (“IDEA”), 20 U.S.C. §§ 1400 et seq.; Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act (“Section 504”), 29 U.S.C. § 794; and Title II of the Americans with Disabilities Act (“ADA”), 42 U.S.C. §§ 12101 et seq. They allege that KCS improperly excluded M.Q. from the general education classroom setting and placed him in a self-contained classroom1 for students with disabilities for nearly all his kindergarten academic instruction. The district court held that this placement violated the IDEA but rejected M.Q.’s claims that also it also violated Section 504 and the ADA. For the reasons outlined below, we AFFIRM the judgment of the district court.