DISCLAIMER: The following unofficial case summaries are prepared by the clerk's office
as a courtesy to the reader. They are not part of the opinion of the court.
133264P.pdf 12/22/2016 Branden Kittle-Aikeley v. Donald Claycomb
U.S. Court of Appeals Case No: 13-3264
and No: 14-1145
U.S. District Court for the Western District of Missouri - Jefferson City
[PUBLISHED] [Wollman, Author, on behalf of the Court En Banc]
Civil case - Student Drug Testing. In this case, the district court
granted the students of Linn State Technical College a permanent
injunction prohibiting the school from fully implementing a new
drug-testing policy which required students to submit to urinalysis; a
divided panel of this court reversed the permanent injunction and the
attorneys' fees award to plaintiff students - see Kittle-Aikeley v.
Claycomb, 807 F.3d 913 (8th Cir. 2015). The court en banc granted the
students' petition for rehearing en banc and the district court's order
permanently enjoining the school from drug testing students "who were not,
are not and will not be enrolled" in safety-sensitive programs is
affirmed;however that portion of the district court's order directing the
defendants to refund any fees that the school had charged for
unconstitutional testing is reversed as such a claim is barred by the
Eleventh Amendment; the court dismisses for lack of jurisdiction the
school's appeal from the district court's tentative grant of attorneys'
fees and costs as the amounts had not been quantified. Judge Beam, with
whom Judge Loken joins, concurring and dissenting.
133264P.pdf 12/07/2015 Brandon Kittle-Aikeley v. Donald Claycomb
U.S. Court of Appeals Case No: 13-3264
and No: 14-1145
U.S. District Court for the Western District of Missouri - Jefferson City
[PUBLISHED] [Beam, Author, with Bye and Smith, Circuit Judges]
Civil case - Drug Testing. For the court's prior opinion in the matter,
see Barrett v. Claycomb, 705 F.3d 315 (8th Cir. 2013)where the court
reversed the grant of a preliminary injunction in favor of plaintiffs on
their facial challenge to Linn State Technical College's drug-testing
policy. On remand, plaintiffs clarified their claims to assert an
"as-applied" challenge to the same policy, and the district court enjoined
the policy in part and prohibited the testing of students who were not
enrolled in five enumerated programs. The district court erred in
enjoining the policy as to the students not enrolled in the five
enumerated programs as, on balance, testing the entire student population
entering the college is reasonable and hence a constitutional and
effective means of addressing the college's interest in providing a safe,
healthy workplace given the fact that the students at this particular
technical college are engaged in safety-sensitive and potentially
dangerous activities. Judge Bye, dissenting.