ERISA and Criminal Matters
The Eighth Circuit ruled in one ERISA case and another involving criminal sentencing today.
Carpenters Dist. Council v. JNL Const. Co., No. 08-2283, was an ERISA action on behalf of certain pension funds against a construction company claiming that defendants failed to contribute union employees' fringe benefits to the funds as required by collective bargaining agreements. The court of appeals reversed the district court's grant of summary judgment for plaintiffs, holding that plaintiffs did not produce sufficient evidence to show the absence of trialworthy issues on the issue of whether defendant corporation was used to perpetrate a fraud.
In US v. Lomeli, No. 09-1366, the Eighth Circuit affirmed defendant's drug and money laundering sentence, on the grounds that 1) the doctrine of specialty did not operate to bar consideration of all pre-extradition conduct when determining a defendant's punishment for the extradited offense; 2) the district court properly calculated defendant's offense level and criminal history and correctly determined his advisory Guidelines sentencing range; and 3) the district court's discussion of the 18 U.S.C. section 3553(a) factors was sufficient to comply with 18 U.S.C. section 3584 and U.S.S.G. section 5G1.3.