A federal District Court in Illinois (Sara J. Ellis) has preliminarily enjoined Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers from violating the Constitutional rights of protesters in Chicago, filing an extensive written opinion to follow her oral temporary restraining order issued on October 9 and modified on October 17.  The modified order required all federal agents trained in using body-warn cameras to activate them when engaged in enforcement activity.

Another U.S. appellate court has ruled that chimpanzees are not “persons” under the law and have no right to the benefits of a writ of habeas corpus to bring their legal claims before a court.  The Court of Appeals of Michigan has affirmed a trial court decision denying petitions brought by the nonprofit Nonhuman Rights Project on behalf of seven chimps owned by a “roadside” zoo open on weekends on the Upper Peninsula of the state.

Can a nonprofit employee’s wrongful termination lawsuit be remanded to state court when she waives the right to collect damages in excess of the $75,000 minimum amount in controversy necessary to sustain federal court diversity jurisdiction?  A federal District Court for the District of Columbia has held that the waiver precludes the federal court from considering the case that the defendant sought to remove from state court.

A former director’s derivative suit for breach of fiduciary duty against the CEO of a nonprofit corporation has been dismissed by a trial court and appellate court in California on the ground that the plaintiff was not actually a director at the time he filed the suit.  The former director claimed that he was still on the board because the deciding vote to oust him was cast by a director who had been automatically dropped from the board by a bylaw terminating anyone who had missed three consecutive meetings.

An “Emeritus Trustee” of the University of Pittsburgh, who can be invited to be a non-voting observer at the University board meetings, does not have a director’s rights to information as spelled out in the Pennsylvania Nonprofit Corporation Law, a trial court in Pittsburgh has held.  The Court has said that the Emeritus Trustee has no managerial oversight over the activities of the University and is therefore not entitled to the information.

A federal District Court in Virginia has issued a temporary injunction enjoining the enforcement of constitutionally questionable questions asked by the state Attorney General in an investigation for violation of the state’s charitable solicitation registration law.  It has found that the charity is likely to prevail on its claim that demanding donor lists in a Civil Investigative Demand (”CID”) likely violates the right of free association guaranteed by the First and Fourteenth Amendments.