An appellate court, commonly called a court of appeal(s), appeal court, court of second instance or second instance court, is any court of law that is empowered to hear an appeal of a trial court or other lower tribunal. In much of the world, court systems are divided into at least three levels: the trial court, which initially hears cases and reviews evidence and testimony to determine the facts of the case; at least one intermediate appellate court; and a supreme court (or court of last resort) which primarily reviews the decisions of the intermediate courts, often on a discretionary basis. A particular court system's supreme court is its highest appellate court. Appellate courts nationwide can operate under varying rules.
Betts v. Brady, 316 U.S. 455 (1942), was a landmark United States Supreme Court case that denied counsel to indigent defendants prosecuted by a state. The reinforcement that such a case is not to be reckoned as denial of fundamental due process was famously overruled by Gideon v. Wainwright.
The Supreme Court of the United States handed down sixteen per curiam opinions during its 2005 term, which lasted from October 3, 2005, until October 1, 2006.
Philip Morris USA v. Williams, 549 U.S. 346 (2007), 556 U.S. 178 (2009), was a decision by the Supreme Court of the United States, which held that the due process clause of the Fourteenth Amendment limits punitive damages, and ordered a lower court to reconsider its damages awards on that basis.
This is a list of cases reported in volume 1 of United States Reports, decided by various Pennsylvania courts from 1754 to 1789.
This is a list of cases reported in volume 2 U.S. of United States Reports, decided by the Supreme Court of the United States from 1791 to 1793. Case reports from other federal and state tribunals also appear in 2 U.S..
This is a list of cases reported in volume 3 U.S. of United States Reports, decided by the Supreme Court of the United States from 1794 to 1799. Case reports from other tribunals also appear in 3 U.S..
This is a list of cases reported in volume 4 U.S. of United States Reports, decided by the Supreme Court of the United States in 1799 and 1800. Case reports from other tribunals also appear in 4 U.S..
Aetna Health Inc. v. Davila, 542 U.S. 200 (2004), was a United States Supreme Court case in which the Court limited the scope of the Texas Healthcare Liability Act (THCLA). The effective result of this decision was that the THCLA, which held Case Management and Utilization Review decisions by Managed Care entities like CIGNA and Aetna to a legal duty of care according to the laws of The State of Texas could not be enforced in the case of Health Benefit plans provided through private employers, because the Texas statute allowed compensatory or punitive damages to redress losses or deter future transgressions, which were not available under ERISA § 1132. The ruling still allows the State of Texas to enforce the THCLA in the case of Government-sponsored (Medicare, Medicaid, Federal, State, Municipal Employee, etc., Church-sponsored, or Individual Health Plan Policies, which are saved from preemption by ERISA. The history that allows these Private and Self-Pay Insurance to be saved dates to the "Interstate Commerce" power that was given the federal Government by the Supreme Court. ERISA, enacted in 1974, relied on the "Interstate Commerce" rule to allow federal jurisdiction over private employers, based on the need of private employers to follow a single set of paperwork and rules for pensions and other employee benefit plans where employers had employees in multiple states. Except for private employer plans, insurance can be regulated by the individual states, and Managed Care entities making medical decisions can be held accountable for those decisions if negligence is involved, as allowed by the Texas Healthcare Liability Act.
Frisbie v. Collins, 342 U.S. 519 (1952), is a decision by the United States Supreme Court, holding that kidnapping of a defendant by State authorities for the purpose of taking a suspect from one jurisdiction to another for criminal trial, is constitutional. The defendant was tried in Michigan after being abducted by Michigan authorities in Chicago, Illinois. The case relied upon Ker v. Illinois (1886). The Ker–Frisbie doctrine, continues to be used to uphold convictions based on illegal arrests.
United States v. Wunderlich, 342 U.S. 98 (1951), was a case decided before the United States Supreme Court.
Ware v. Hylton, 3 U.S. 199 (1796), also known as the British Debt Case, was a decision of the United States Supreme Court holding that treaties take precedence over state law under the U.S. Constitution. It was the first Supreme Court case concerned with treaties, the first to rule that treaty provisions were as binding as domestic U.S. law, and the first to affirm the supremacy of federal law over state law. Ware is also notable for articulating the legal doctrine that would later be known as judicial review, whereby federal courts have the authority to settle conflicts of law.
Cherokee Nation of Oklahoma v. Leavitt, 543 U.S. 631 (2005), was a United States Supreme Court case in which the Court held that a contract with the Federal Government to reimburse the tribe for health care costs was binding, despite the failure of Congress to appropriate funds for those costs.
O'Neale v. Thornton, 10 U.S. 53 (1810), is a ruling by the Supreme Court of the United States which held that neither the state of Maryland nor the government of the District of Columbia authorized the resale of foreclosed government land at a price less than the original sale price. In establishing the District of Columbia, the D.C. government had sold land to original investors at $66.50 per lot. The investors failed to pay, so the government foreclosed and resold the land to a second investor at the same price. The second investor failed to pay, so the government foreclosed again and sold the land to a third investor at a price lower than the original sale price. This third sale, the Supreme Court said, was illegal. Title should be returned to the second buyer, although the government was still free to seek foreclosure against that buyer on the basis of nonpayment.
FTC v. Actavis, Inc., 570 U.S. 136 (2013), was a United States Supreme Court decision in which the Court held that the FTC could make an antitrust challenge under the rule of reason against a so-called pay-for-delay agreement, also referred to as a reverse payment patent settlement. Such an agreement is one in which a drug patentee pays another company, ordinarily a generic drug manufacturer, to stay out of the market, thus avoiding generic competition and a challenge to patent validity. The FTC sought to establish a rule that such agreements were presumptively illegal, but the Court ruled only that the FTC could bring a case under more general antitrust principles permitting a defendant to assert justifications for its actions under the rule of reason.
Howes v. Fields, 565 U.S. 499 (2012), was a decision by the U.S. Supreme Court that an interrogation of a prisoner was not a custodial interrogation per se, and certainly it was not "clearly established federal law" that it was custodial, as would be required by the Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act (AEDPA). Instead, the Court said, whether the interrogation was custodial depended on the specific circumstances, and moreover, in the particular circumstances of this case, it was not custodial. This decision overturned the rule of the Sixth Circuit, and denied the prisoner's habeas corpus petition.
