Justia New Hampshire Supreme Court Opinion Summaries

Petitioner City of Keene appealed a superior court order dismissing its claims of tortious interference with contractual relations, negligence, and civil conspiracy, and denying its request for preliminary and permanent injunctive relief. The City filed suit against respondents James Cleaveland, Garrett Ean, Kate Ager, Ian Bernard (a/k/a Ian Freeman), Graham Colson, and Pete Eyre, because they followed closely behind the City’s parking enforcement officers (PEOs) on their daily patrols through downtown Keene, videotaping them, criticizing their work, and "saving" cars by putting money into expired parking meters before a parking ticket was issued. Respondents testified that they engaged in these activities to protest parking enforcement because they believed that parking was not a criminal act, and that parking tickets were a "threat against [the] people." After an evidentiary hearing, the trial court dismissed the action, ruling that the City’s claims were barred by the First Amendment to the United States Constitution; the trial court also denied the City’s petition for preliminary and permanent injunctive relief. On appeal, the City does not challenge the trial court’s conclusions that the content of the respondents’ speech is protected by the First Amendment because it relates to a matter of public concern, and that the respondents’ activities take place in a traditional public forum. The City nonetheless asserts that specific aspects of the respondents’ conduct — “following closely, chasing, running after, approaching quickly from behind, lurking outside bathrooms, yelling loudly, and filming from close proximity” — is not protected by the First Amendment, and had a tortious impact on the PEOs. The Supreme Court affirmed in part and reversed in part, concluding that the trial court erred when, solely because it had dismissed the underlying tortious interference claim, it denied injunctive relief without considering all the factual circumstances of the case. The Court remanded the case for further proceedings. View "City of Keene v. Cleaveland" on Justia Law

Respondent City of Nashua appealed a Superior Court order ruling that it could properly consider a tax abatement for the 2012 tax year for petitioner-taxpayer Nashua Coliseum, LLC. On appeal, the parties proposed contrary interpretations of RSA 76:17-c, II (2012), the statutory provision that addressed the effect of a successful abatement appeal on subsequently assessed taxes. The City argued that, under the plain language of the statute, Coliseum had not satisfied all of the prerequisites for the statute to apply. The City further argued that the statute was inapplicable because of the parties’ settlement agreement, which stated that the abated value would not be deemed to be the correct assessment value for purposes of the statute. Based upon a plain reading of the statutory language, the Supreme Court agreed with the City that the statute required the superior court to find that the assessment value was incorrect in order for the taxpayer to be excused from complying with the filing deadlines otherwise applicable to tax abatement requests. Accordingly, the trial court's order was reversed and the case remanded for further proceedings. View "Nashua Coliseum, LLC v. City of Nashua " on Justia Law

Defendant Armando Lisasuain was convicted by jury of, among other offenses, two counts of aggravated felonious sexual assault. On appeal, the argued that the trial court: (1) erred by finding that the State presented sufficient evidence to prove lack of consent by the victim on the aggravated felonious sexual assault charges; (2) may have erred by not disclosing more documents from its in camera review of certain of the victim’s records; and (3) erred by not allowing cross-examination of a police officer as to the nature and duration of his interrogation of the defendant. Finding no reversible error, the Supreme Court affirmed. View "New Hampshire v. Lisasuain" on Justia Law

In June 2012, after the parties had been married for more than 30 years, petitioner Susan Achille filed for a no-fault divorce. At the time, the parties lived in separate residences at the same address. One night in early 2012, respondent George Achille, Jr. went to petitioner's home with a box that contained a gun and told her that he was going to use it. Respondent yelled at petitioner, pursued her through the home, grabbed her by the hair, threw her against a counter, choked her, slammed a door on her, and pushed her to the floor. According to petitioner, respondent had also “hit [her] plenty of times” in the past, including in June 2012 when the respondent had “hit [her] across the face and dislocated [her] jaw.” Respondent denied that the abuse occurred, and testified that, on December 4, the petitioner hit him with an umbrella and fell after tripping over a pair of boots. The next day, petitioner reported the incident to the police. At that time, she did not tell the police about the gun, press criminal charges against the respondent, or seek a protective order. Later that day, the parties had dinner together at a restaurant. On December 6, they drove together to Manchester for mediation regarding the divorce. On December 7, petitioner filed a domestic violence petition in which she described the incident that occurred in her home days earlier. The court issued a temporary domestic violence protective order and scheduled a final hearing for later that month. On December 27, petitioner wrote to police seeking to press charges against respondent arising out of the early December incident. Criminal charges were subsequently filed against respondent. During the next year, at respondent's request, the trial court repeatedly continued the final hearing in the domestic violence case. In December 2013, the trial court ordered that the hearing be rescheduled for “after October 1, 2014” when “[respondent's] criminal matters have been resolved.” Nonetheless, on January 24, 2014, sua sponte, the trial court vacated its earlier scheduling order and ordered that the matter be set for a final hearing, which happened to be the same day as the hearing on the merits in the parties' divorce. Respondent appealed several orders the domestic violence court made, specifically: (1) when the court vacated its earlier order continuing the final hearing in the domestic violence proceeding; (2) when the court denied respondent's motion to recuse the presiding judge from the proceeding, despite having granted the respondent's motion to recuse in the parties' divorce proceeding; and (3) when the court entered a final domestic violence protective order. Finding no reversible error, the Supreme Court affirmed. View "Achille v. Achille" on Justia Law

Petitioner Kingston Place, LLC appealed a Superior Court order granting summary judgment to respondent New Hampshire Department of Transportation (DOT) on petitioner's claims that the DOT's long delay in taking a portion of the subject property by eminent domain created a cloud on petitioner's title violated RSA 498-A:4, III(a) (2010) and RSA 230:17 (2009), and constituted a taking by inverse condemnation. Finding no reversible error, the Supreme Court affirmed. View "Kingston Place, LLC v. New Hampshire Dept. of Transportation" on Justia Law

The State appealed a circuit court order that dismissed the habitual offender prosecution of defendant Steven Laux based upon the State’s failure to provide discovery prior to the preliminary, or probable cause, hearing in accordance with the court’s standing discovery order. When the State indicated it would not comply with the order, the court postponed the probable cause hearing and allowed the parties “to brief the issue of whether or not discovery could be ordered by the Circuit Court for a Probable Cause Hearing.” The court concluded that it had inherent authority to order discovery and granted the defendant’s motion to dismiss the case for the State’s noncompliance. On appeal, the State argued that the circuit court lacked authority to order discovery of police reports prior to a probable cause hearing. After review, the Supreme Court found the circuit court exceeded its authority in requiring, through promulgation of section IV of its standing discovery order, the disclosure of prepared police reports in all cases. The case was reversed and remanded for further proceedings. View "New Hampshire v. Laux" on Justia Law

Petitioner New Hampshire Retirement System (NHRS) appealed a decision of the New Hampshire Public Employee Labor Relations Board (PELRB) denying the NHRS’s petition to modify the composition of respondent Local 1984 (a bargaining unit represented by the State Employees’ Association (SEA)) to exclude from the unit certain supervisory positions. The NHRS filed its modification petition looking to exclude from the bargaining unit the Team Lead, Public Information Officer, and Controller positions on the grounds that circumstances had changed and that the positions were now supervisory within the meaning of RSA 273-A:8, II (Supp. 2014). The SEA objected to the petition to modify, arguing that the circumstances regarding those positions had not changed to a degree warranting modification of the bargaining unit and that the positions were not otherwise improperly included within the unit. Following an evidentiary hearing, a PELRB hearing officer denied the petition to modify the bargaining unit. Specifically NHRS argued that modification of the bargaining unit under the changed circumstances was mandated by RSA 273-A:8, II, which prohibited supervisors and the employees they supervise from belonging to the same bargaining unit. Upon review, the Supreme Court agreed that the change in the contested positions to “supervisors-in-fact” constituted a material change in circumstances warranting modification of the unit. The Court reversed the PELRB and remanded the case for further proceedings. View "Appeal of New Hampshire Retirement System" on Justia Law

In 2011, Lincoln police charged defendant Jeffrey Maxfield with criminal mischief, a class A misdemeanor offense. The complaint alleged that defendant had recklessly damaged another’s property at a motel in Lincoln. A justice of the peace issued an arrest warrant one week later, but defendant was not arrested until 2013. The State filed the complaint in court three days after the defendant’s arrest. Defendant moved to dismiss the charge, arguing that the delay between the issuance of the arrest warrant and his arrest violated his rights to a speedy trial, due process, and fundamental fairness under both the New Hampshire and United States Constitutions. The trial court denied this motion. Defendant then filed a motion to reconsider, which the court also denied. Defendant filed a second motion to dismiss, arguing that the charge was barred by the one-year statute of limitations applicable to misdemeanor level offenses. The trial court granted this second motion to dismiss. In denying the State’s motion to reconsider, the trial court stated that it “was unreasonable for there to be a delay of eighteen months between the commencement of prosecution and the commencement of the adversarial proceeding.” This appeal followed. The Supreme Court found in its review of the State's arguments on appeal that under the plain language of the statute, the one-year limitations period for the defendant’s criminal mischief charge began to run on December 15, 2011, the day after all the elements of the alleged offense had occurred. Because the language of RSA 625:8 was plain and unambiguous, and because the Court refused to "add language to a statute that the legislature did not see fit to include," the trial court erred by reading a reasonableness standard into the statute. The Court found that the statute of limitations was not violated in this case, and that the trial court erred in dismissing the State's complaint. View "New Hampshire v. Maxfield" on Justia Law

Defendants Gerald Mandelbaum, Christopher Lajoie, Nicholas Meuse, Michael Garrity, and Wayne Bickford, were charged with operating a taxicab business without a license from the City of Manchester. The circuit court granted the defendants’ motion to dismiss on federal preemption grounds. The State appealed, arguing that the local ordinances were not preempted by federal law and that the circuit court had jurisdiction over the charges. The Supreme Court concluded after review of the case that defendants did not show that they could not comply with the requirements of both federal law and the City Ordinances in the operation of their respective businesses. Therefore, they failed to demonstrate that state and federal law actually conflicted. Accordingly, the trial court erred in dismissing the case. "If the trial court concludes that the defendants’ transportation service falls within the scope of the City Ordinances, they must comply with the requirements of those ordinances." The case was remanded for further proceedings. View "New Hampshire v. Bickford" on Justia Law

The State appealed a superior court order denying its motion for summary judgment and granting that of petitioners, Annemarie. Guare, Cody Blesedell, Garret Healey, Joan Ashwell, and the League of Women Voters, on their petition for declaratory and injunctive relief. When this case was decided by the trial court, petitioners Guare, Blesedell, and Healey were students enrolled at the University of New Hampshire, and petitioner Ashwell was a volunteer with the New Hampshire League of Women Voters. The order on appeal made permanent a preliminary injunction issued in 2012, pursuant to which the State was required to delete from the standard voter registration form the following language: “In declaring New Hampshire as my domicile, I am subject to the laws of the state of New Hampshire which apply to all residents, including laws requiring a driver to register a motor vehicle and apply for a New Hampshire[ ] driver’s license within 60 days of becoming a resident.” The trial court issued the permanent injunction after concluding that the challenged language violated Part I, Article 11 of the New Hampshire Constitution. On appeal, the State did not challenge the trial court’s issuance of injunctive relief. Rather, the State focused its appellate arguments to the trial court’s determination that the challenged language violated Part I, Article 11. Finding that the challenged language unreasonably burdened the fundamental right to vote, and because, the State failed to advance a "sufficiently weighty interest" to justify the language, the Supreme Court affirmed the trial court’s determination that the challenged language violated Part I, Article 11 of the State Constitution. View "Guare v. New Hampshire" on Justia Law