The Supreme Court handed a partial but significant victory to cities today, holding that the Fair Housing Act allows the city of Miami to bring a lawsuit alleging that two banks, Bank of America and Wells Fargo, violated the law when they issued riskier but more costly mortgages to minority customers than they had offered to white borrowers. But it was hardly a complete win for the city, as the court also ruled that the lower court should have applied a tougher test to determine whether the city can recover compensation for its losses. This means that the case will now return to the lower court for it to decide whether there is enough of a connection between the banks’ lending practices and the city’s economic injuries to hold the banks liable.That means that Judge D will get the case back. Fun times.
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Doesn't seem clear that the case will necessarily return to Judge D. The references to "lower court" in the scotusblog post are to the 11th Cir. (that's the court that "should have applied a tougher test to determine whether the city can recover compensation for its losses" -- the 11th Cir. reversed Judge D's ruling on a motion to dismiss that proximate cause was not sufficiently made out in the complaint). And while the appellate panel could send the case back down to the district court for reconsideration in light of the standard the Supreme Court majority set forth, I don't think it necessary has to. It could, it seems, just as easily apply the Supreme Court decision to Judge D's proximate cause analysis and either affirm or reverse. And then see if the Supremes would want to weigh in again.
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