Boston Lawyer Blog

First Circuit Holds that School Districts, Not Parents, Decide School Policy and Rejects “Parental Rights” Argument to Out Transgender and Non-Binary Students

Published on: February 20, 2025 | by Naomi Shatz

Since 2012, Massachusetts laws have prohibited discrimination based on gender identity, including in education. The Massachusetts Department of Education has had longstanding guidance in place instructing schools to use students’ preferred names and pronouns while at school. This week, in Foote v. Ludlow School Committee, the First Circuit Court of Appeals decided whether a school policy that followed this state law and DOE guidance violates parents’ constitutional right to direct the upbringing of their child. The school won. CONTINUE READING ›

Appeals Court Takes Step Backwards in Fighting Racial Discrimination in Jury Selection

Published on: February 16, 2025 | by Tom Miller

More than forty-five years ago, the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court led the nation in combatting racial discrimination by prosecutors in jury selection. In its landmark decision in Commonwealth v. Soares, the SJC held that the use of peremptory challenges by prosecutors to exclude members of racial (or other) minorities from a jury violated a defendant’s right under the Massachusetts Constitution to trial before an impartial jury of his or her peers. Seven years later, the federal Supreme Court cited Soares in reaching a similar decision (under the principle of equal protection) in Batson v. Kentucky. Unfortunately, last week the Massachusetts Appeals Court took a serious step backwards in this area. Its decision in Commonwealth v. Lopez-Ortiz takes an artificially narrow view of what discrimination in jury selection can look like, and seeks to limit the power of appellate courts to correct it. CONTINUE READING ›

Courts Enjoin Enforcement of Trump Executive Order Targeting Incarcerated Transgender People

Published on: February 16, 2025 | by Zalkind Duncan & Bernstein LLP

By Anton Kernohan, legal intern

Throughout history, the LGBTQ+ community has persisted despite repeated laws and attempts to restrict the community’s rights. Since assuming office, President Trump has undertaken the most recent iteration of actions that once again threaten the lives of LGBTQ+ persons, especially transgender, non-binary, and intersex individuals. CONTINUE READING ›

Massachusetts Law Prohibits Schools from Complying with Anti-Trans Athlete Executive Order

Published on: February 8, 2025 | by Naomi Shatz

Youth sports are a huge part of the American education system, something many parents, schools, and communities place a high value on maintaining. Studies demonstrate the many mental, social, emotional, and physical benefits children derive from participating in organized athletics. In fact, during Trump’s previous presidency the President’s Council on Sports, Fitness, and Nutrition Science Board published a pamphlet noting that “Research shows that participating in youth sports can lead to immediate and long-term benefits for youth, their families, and communities.” By executive order and federal agency guidance, President Trump is now trying to deny those benefits to trans girls and women who want to participate in sports with the rest of their peers. The Massachusetts Declaration of Rights, Title IX, and Massachusetts anti-discrimination statutes prohibit schools, colleges, universities, and athletic organizations from following the new executive order. CONTINUE READING ›

SJC Opinion Reverses Murder Conviction After Judge Fails To Adequately Investigate Possible Racial Bias On Jury

Published on: February 5, 2025 | by Tom Miller

The nineteenth-century French philosopher Alexis de Tocqueville famously described the jury in the United States as “a free school which is always open and in which each juror learns his rights,” making it not only “the most energetic means of making the people rule,” but also “the most efficacious means of teaching it to rule well.” Unfortunately, the reality of juries is often somewhat more complicated. In particular, the risk of racial bias in jury deliberations has long been recognized, but efforts to combat it have run up against one of the most important features of jury deliberations: their secrecy. CONTINUE READING ›

What is the Current Status of Title IX and its Enforcement?

Published on: February 4, 2025 | by Naomi Shatz and Niamh Gibbons

In the last month, actions by the courts, the President, and Congress have significantly impacted and may further change how Title IX is enforced across the country.

Title IX: Background and Enforcement

Title IX is a federal law prohibiting sex discrimination in education. It is one of the shortest laws on the books, with the operative provision stating: “No person in the United States shall, on the basis of sex, be excluded from participation in, be denied the benefits of, or be subjected to discrimination under any education program or activity receiving Federal financial assistance.” Laws like this can be enforced in two ways: through the courts and through administrative agencies. Individuals have a right to bring lawsuits under Title IX in court, where it is the job of the court to interpret what the law means. In addition, federal agencies has enforcement powers to investigate and address violations of federal law. For Title IX, that agency enforcement power rests with the U.S. Department of Education and the U.S. Department of Justice. People whose right to be free from discrimination in education have been violated can file complaints with those agencies, which can then investigate the educational institutions and impose corrective action, including the withholding of federal funds. The U.S. Department of Education issues regulations interpreting the laws it enforces and explaining how it will apply those laws when it engages in enforcement action. In 2020 the first Trump administration issued regulations overhauling Title IX enforcement; in 2024 the Biden administration issued a new set of regulations that was immediately challenged in federal courts in various red states. CONTINUE READING ›

Massachusetts Earned Sick Time Law: What it Does and Who it Covers

Published on: December 11, 2024 | by Naomi Shatz

In 2014 voters in the Commonwealth approved a ballot measure that created the Massachusetts Earned Sick Time Law (G.L.c. 149 § 148C) (MESTL), which guarantees most Massachusetts workers up to 40 hours of earned sick time per year. Last month the coverage of the law expanded to cover physical and mental health needs arising from pregnancy, surrogacy, assisted reproductive technology, or adoption loss.

Who does the law apply to?

The law applies to almost all employees whose primary place of work is Massachusetts. The regulations under the law define “primary” place of work as a place the employee works more than any other place; for an employee who works in multiple states it is the state in which she spends the most of her time. For example, if an employee works remotely for a company, and spends 40% of her time working from Massachusetts, 30% working from Florida, and 30% working from California, Massachusetts would be the primary place of work. CONTINUE READING ›

SJC to Consider Admissibility of Alleged Victims’ Subsequent Violent Actions

Published on: December 2, 2024 | by Jennifer M. Herrmann

This week, the Supreme Judicial Court will hear argument in Commonwealth v. Andrade, a case in which I wrote an amicus brief on behalf of the Massachusetts Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers. This case addresses an important question about what evidence a criminal defendant can introduce to argue that they were not the first aggressor in a violent altercation.

Twenty years ago, the Supreme Judicial Court decided Commonwealth v. Adjutant, holding that a defendant can offer evidence of an alleged victim’s violent reputation and conduct to prove that the victim, rather than the defendant, was the first aggressor. This holding is one of a few limited exceptions to the general rule barring propensity evidence, or evidence of a person’s character trait to prove that they acted in accordance with that trait. The court in Adjutant decided that evidence reflecting a victim’s propensity for violence, whether or not the defendant knew about that propensity, would help the jury “make an informed decision about the identity of the initial aggressor.”

Andrade concerns a domestic dispute between a father and son. At trial, the court did not allow the defendant—the son—to introduce evidence that about one year after the charged incident, the father assaulted his wife. On appeal, Andrade presents a narrow, but new, question to the court: does the holding in Adjutant that a defendant can introduce evidence of a victim’s violent acts include conduct that happened after the charged incident?

Attorney Ana Muñoz Speaks to Massachusetts Lawyers Weekly About New SJC Decision

Published on: September 13, 2024 | by Ana Muñoz

Attorney Ana Muñoz spoke to Massachusetts Lawyers Weekly this week about the SJC’s decision in Patel et al. v. 7-11 Inc., et al. The Court answered a certified question from the First Circuit about how to address claims by franchisees that they have been misclassified as independent contractors. Muñoz, who wrote an amicus brief in the case on behalf of the Massachusetts Employment Lawyers Association (MELA), noted that in its decision “the SJC also reaffirmed its commitment to ensuring that people are paid for their work by adopting a broad reading of the Wage Act under which a label like ‘franchisee’ will not be determinative.” Read the full story here: Bar sees balance in SJC’s ruling in 7-Eleven case | Massachusetts Lawyers Weekly (masslawyersweekly.com)

Supreme Judicial Court Holds That a Switchblade is Protected Under the Second Amendment

Published on: September 10, 2024 | by Ana Muñoz and Niamh Gibbons

As we recently wrote, states’ firearms regulations have faced legal challenges across the country since the Supreme Court’s 2022 decision in New York State Rifle & Pistol Association, Inc. v. Bruen, which held that individuals have a Second Amendment right to carry a handgun in public for self-defense. But how does Bruen affect regulations of other weapons besides firearms? Last week, the Supreme Judicial Court (SJC) held that its logic governed whether a switchblade qualifies as an “arm” under the Second Amendment. In Commonwealth v. Canjura, the defendant challenged the Massachusetts switchblade ban. Massachusetts General Laws Chapter 269, § 10(b) outlawed switchblade knives, defined as knives with a spring release device, as well as several other dangerous weapons. Violations of the statute are punishable by up to five years in state prison. In Canjura, the SJC held that the ban violated the Second Amendment under the two-part test the United States Supreme Court set out in Bruen. That means the switchblade band is no longer enforceable.

What is the Bruen test?

Under Bruen, the party challenging a weapons regulation must first show that their conduct falls within the plain text of the Second Amendment and is therefore presumptively protected. If the conduct is protected, the burden then shifts to the government to show that its regulation is “consistent with the Nation’s historical tradition of [weapons] regulation.”