Robert E. Bacharach
How Judge Bacharach decides
Patterns drawn from this judge's own signed orders. Every observation links to the order it came from.
What persuades
In malicious-prosecution and false-arrest suits he traces Fourth Amendment liability precisely to what the officer knew or recklessly disregarded at the time legal process was sought, not to hindsight about how the case turned out.
“we have held that the Fourth Amendment prohibits officers from knowingly or recklessly relying on false information to institute legal process when that process results in an unreasonable seizure.”
In asylum and withholding cases he engages substantively with country-conditions evidence and will grant relief when the record leaves no reasonable room for the agency's contrary finding.
“any reasonable adjudicator would be compelled to find a pattern or practice of persecution against transgender women in Honduras.”
Procedural preferences
He enforces the finality of post-judgment rulings strictly: a second motion to alter or amend a judgment cannot simply reurge or elaborate on arguments a court already rejected in an earlier such motion, even after the case is reassigned to a new judge.
“Rule 59(e) motions are not appropriate to revisit issues already addressed or advance arguments that could have been raised in prior briefing.”
He does not require a district court to belabor an explanation once the record makes the reasoning apparent; a brief, common-sense statement of why a change occurred can be enough to survive review.
“the district court's simple explanation was adequate to inform the parties why the settlement would constitute a material change in economic circumstances.”
Cautions
He holds civil-rights plaintiffs to a demanding, precedent-specific standard on qualified immunity: general principles or sympathetic facts are not enough without a materially similar precedent putting the specific conduct beyond debate.
“The assertion of qualified immunity imposes a heavy burden on the plaintiffs, requiring them to point to existing precedent or the clear weight of authority establishing the existence of a constitutional violation.”
In speedy-trial and similar multi-factor constitutional challenges, he treats the absence of concrete, particularized prejudice as close to fatal to the claim, regardless of how the other factors weigh.
“the lack of prejudice is "nearly fatal" to a claim.”
Signed rulings
A grounded sample of orders signed by this judge, with the verbatim dispositive language.
“But we also conclude that genuine issues of material fact existed on: (1) the claim against the County under the Whistleblower Act and the First Amendment claim based on closing of the Justice Court, and (2) the claims against Judge Storey based on the Fourteenth Amendment's Equal Protection Clause. Accordingly, on these claims, we reverse the award of summary judgment.”
“Thus, § 2255(f)(3) does not apply and all reasonable jurists would conclude that the § 2255 motion was untimely. In these circumstances, we decline to issue a certificate of appealability and dismiss the appeal.”
“Because Mr. Brown was not incarcerated beyond the terms of the Muskogee sentence, the § 1983 claim fails as a matter of law... Thus, we affirm the award of summary judgment to the Defendants.”
“We conclude no reasonable fact-finder could infer retaliation; thus, we affirm the district court's award of summary judgment to the Department of Interior.”
“We deny Mr. Mena Flores's petitions to review the Board's three orders, which affirmed the denial of his application to adjust his status to permanent residency and denied his requests to reopen the proceedings and to reconsider the refusal to reopen.”
“We reverse because the direct-threat jury instruction constituted error.”
“We agree with the government based on (1) deference to the way the Board of Immigration Appeals has interpreted § 1226(c) and (2) the continued duty to impose mandatory detention even if the Attorney General had waited too long to take custody of Mr. Olmos. For both reasons, we reverse.”
“Mr. Hancock then turned to federal district court, seeking a writ of habeas corpus. The court denied relief, and Mr. Hancock has appealed. We affirm.”
“As a result, the district court properly granted summary judgment to the defendants on the claims involving the Americans with Disabilities Act.”
“We affirm the district court's denial of the defendants' motion to dismiss on the basis of qualified immunity; and we dismiss the defendants' appeal of the district court's ruling on the statute of limitations, holding that we lack jurisdiction on this part of the appeal.”
Put Judge Bacharach's record to work
Ezel drafts and answers grounded in this exact profile: how Judge Bacharach actually rules, not a generic AI guess.
Opens in Ezel Pro. Every answer is grounded in Judge Bacharach's own signed orders and cites them.