Judge Kayatta – Year 1

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Following up on our last two entries,

1.  The fallout has begin on the MERS case discussed in my last entry.  See the attached memorandum decision from the Law Court.  [ Download Mem 14-102]

2.  Going back to my July 18 entry, since that date, we now have another dissent from Judge Kayatta in another case – In re: Atlas IT Export, Corp., issued on August 4.  In that dissent (majority Judges Thompson and Lipez), Judge Kayatta gently suggests that ruling in a way opposite to every single other circuit in the country might not be the way to go.

Judge Kayatta's first written decision was about a year ago, so I thought I'd check to see how many dissents he's issued in that period.  I see four.  This data set is too low to make any legitimate comparisons (but why let that stop us?).  As far as I can tell from my limited cursory Westlaw perusal, this is slightly higher than the average number of dissents for a First Circuit judge.  The judge who appears to dissent most often is Judge Torruella.

Let's see if anyone files a motion for en banc rehearing in Atlas, given its apparent Ninth-Circuit-like go one's own way approach.  (The deadline for filing such a motion hasn't passed yet).  PACER says that no one has filed as of today.  With respect to the previous dissent in the decision blogged upon July 18, no one did file a rehearing motion and the mandate has issued.  Both dissents were in rulings with only one active First Circuit judge on the other side, making an en banc motion a little more realistic an avenue.