Re-Opening After the Pandemic: Employer Vaccination Policy Considerations

One threshold question is whether an employer can require its employees to get the vaccine? The answer is likely yes, with some exceptions.

United States v. McGee, 992 F.3d 1035 (10th Cir. Mar. 29, 2021)

Enacted in 2018, the First Step Act, Pub. L. 115-391, §§ 101 et seq., 132 Stat. 5194, reduced the mandatory life sentence required for certain drug crimes under 18 U.S.C. 841.  The Act also provides a separate mechanism for “compassionate release”…

Frank v. Crawley Petroleum Corp., 992 F.3d 987 (10th Cir. Mar. 29, 2021)

The plaintiffs in this putative class action filed a motion for voluntary dismissal of the complaint without prejudice.  The district court granted the motion, but included a provision in the order saying that the plaintiffs’ lawyer could not file similar…

Frasier v. Evans, 992 F.3d 1003 (10th Cir. Mar. 29, 2021)

This Section 1983 case involved the police allegedly retaliating against a citizen filming another’s interactions with the police resulting in the police grabbing the plaintiff’s tablet out of his hand and searching it.  The district court denied the officers’ qualified…

Sixteen SCM Attorneys Named 2021 Utah Legal Elite™ by Utah Business Magazine

On behalf of our firm, we’d like to congratulate these attorneys on their inclusion on the 2021 Utah Legal Elite list.

No Good Deed Goes Unpunished

By: Bryson R. Brown

Under Utah law, a person who supplies a “chattel” – a fancy legal term for personal property – to another potentially faces legal liability, if the chattel causes physical injury to the person who uses the chattel.    

Awuku-Asare v. Garland, 991 F.3d 1123 (10th Cir. Mar. 16, 2021)

In this immigration appeal, plaintiff was in the United States on a nonimmigrant F-1 visa, which required him to maintain a full course of study.  He, however, was incarcerated for 13 months on a charge that he was ultimately acquitted…

Lawyer Discipline Rules Amended

By: Keith A. Call

Some of the rule changes are designed to foster greater independence between the Office of Professional Conduct and the Utah State Bar.

S. Furniture Leasing, Inc. v. YRC, Inc., — F.3d —, 2021 WL 800248 (10th Cir. Mar. 3, 2021) – AMP

The Tenth Circuit affirmed the district court’s dismissal of this putative class action against several trucking companies for allegedly overcharging shippers by using inflated shipment weights when determining shipment prices.  The court interpreted § 13710(a)(3) of the Trucking Industry Regulatory Reform…

Tanner v. McMurray, — F.3d —, No. 19-2166 (10th Cir. 2021) (Mar. 2, 2021), Tanner v. McMurray, — F.3d —, Nos. 20-4024, 20-4025 (10th Cir. 2021) (Mar. 2, 2021)

These cases both involved 42 U.S.C. § 1983 claims based upon pre-trial inmate deaths while in custody and claims of deliberate indifference involving private contractors working at the jail.  In both cases, private contractors asserted qualified immunity.  In Tanner, the Tenth…