US v. Covia Smith — 4th Cir. (Oct 30, 2026)

The Seventh Circuit considers how far police could go after a traffic stop in Wisconsin. After roadside searches found no drugs, deputies handcuffed Justin Bartz, took him to the county jail, and used a body scanner to look for concealed contraband. The scan found no drugs, and he was released. He sued the county and its officers for what he says were unreasonable searches and seizures under the Fourth Amendment. The district court ruled for the defendants, finding that officers already had probable cause to arrest him and that the additional searches were reasonable. Bartz's lawyer will argue that the detention was used to gather the evidence needed to justify an arrest, rather than to secure a prompt check by a judge. The defendants will argue that the officers could gather more evidence after an arrest that was already justified. The judges also ask about qualified immunity, which can protect individual officers from damages when existing law did not clearly establish that their conduct was unlawful.

The Fourth Circuit hears a challenge to the Army Corps of Engineers' approval of the Point Farm Mitigation Bank in coastal South Carolina. Mitigation banks provide credits developers can use to compensate for permitted wetland damage elsewhere. The plaintiffs say this bank generates credits by preserving marsh that already had legal protection. So, in their view, the credits do not provide a real environmental offset. The government disputes that premise. The district court dismissed the suit for lack of standing, treating construction-related harms as over and future development harms as too speculative. Standing requires a concrete personal injury connected to the challenged approval that a court can remedy. The plaintiffs will argue that ongoing credit sales still threaten wetlands they use and enjoy. The government will argue that those concerns depend on hypothetical projects, and that reversing this approval would not remedy the claimed harm. The appeal is about who can bring suit, not yet whether the bank was lawfully approved.

The Fourth Circuit considers whether Timothy Guess can bring another challenge to his federal sentence after receiving a sentence reduction. A judge shortened his prison term but did not give him the full reduction he requested. The order he received did not explain the judge's reasons, a problem noted in the earlier appeal of that reduction. Section twenty-two fifty-five allows federal prisoners to challenge the legality of their convictions or sentences. But strict rules limit second or successive motions. The judges will explore two different ideas: whether a later reduction creates a new judgment, and whether a newly arising claim should count as a repeat challenge. Guess seeks to have his proposed motion treated as a first motion. This hearing concerns whether the motion can proceed, not whether its underlying challenge should win.

The Ninth Circuit hears a prisoner's appeal concerning his return to prison after surgery at an outside hospital. He says he had trouble breathing and was coughing up blood, but the transport officers refused his requests for more medical care. His attempts to complain then ran into two different grievance systems. The health care process rejected his complaint as belonging in the custody process; that process rejected his later grievance and appeal as late. The trial court ended the lawsuit without deciding the medical-care allegations, finding he had not exhausted administrative remedies. Exhaustion means completing the required internal grievance and appeals process before going to court. Under the Prison Litigation Reform Act, only remedies that are actually available must be exhausted. The prisoner will argue that rejections and confusing directions left him without an available path to follow. The officer will argue he could still have used custody review and timely appealed, but did not complete its steps.

The Fourth Circuit considers a damages claim arising from a mistaken arrest in a federal drug investigation. DEA agents traced a vehicle they were watching to the plaintiff through its registration, then wrongly identified him as the person they had seen. His lawsuit says he spent about three weeks in jail, lost two jobs, and the charges were later dismissed. He sued the United States under the Federal Tort Claims Act, a law allowing certain damages claims for federal employees' negligence. The district court dismissed his remaining claim under the discretionary-function exception. That exception protects certain government policy judgments, even when officials abuse their discretion. The plaintiff will argue that the misidentification reflected careless inattention, not a protected policy choice. The government will argue that the claim challenges the kind of investigative judgment the exception protects. The judges also ask what the district judge had to address after the plaintiff objected to a magistrate judge's recommendation of dismissal.