Donald Roe Ross
Judge Ross no longer hears cases. This profile is preserved as a historical record of how they ruled.
How Judge Ross decides
Patterns drawn from this judge's own signed orders. Every observation links to the order it came from.
What persuades
Ross required courts to preserve factual disputes and reasonable inferences before ending a case on summary judgment.
“Thus, the court must view the facts in the light most favorable to the opposing party and must give that party the benefit of all reasonable inferences to be drawn from the facts.”
He enforced confidentiality where disclosure threatened both future investigations and cooperating witnesses.
“there is a high probability of reprisal for those who chose to cooperate in the investigation.”
Procedural preferences
He treated summary judgment as an exceptional remedy requiring unusually clear entitlement.
“Further, this court has noted on many occasions that summary judgment is an extreme remedy, and should not be entered unless the movant has established its right to a judgment with such clarity as to leave no room for controversy and unless the other party is not entitled to recover under any discernible circumstances.”
He compelled a second arbitration even though the claims could have been included in an earlier proceeding.
“We regret that the claims against Hereth were not included in the previous MSRB arbitration; however, that fact does not deter us from compelling additional arbitration at this time.”
Cautions
He deferred to agency expertise while still requiring remedies to remain bounded and reviewable.
“Nonetheless, the rule of deference to the Board’s choice of remedy does not constitute a blank check for arbitrary action.”
He rejected conclusory motive allegations that would impose discovery burdens without evidence of a constitutional violation.
“We conclude that appellee’s charges concerning appellants’ state of mind are no more than an attempt to elevate constitutionally acceptable conduct to which appellee objected into a constitutional violation by conclusory allegations of lack of good faith.”
Signed rulings
A grounded sample of orders signed by this judge, with the verbatim dispositive language.
“The enforcement of the order of the Board will be granted with the modifications indicated herein.”
“The Board is directed to amend its order and notice, and as so amended, its order is hereby enforced.”
“We grant enforcement and deny the petition for review.”
“We reverse the judgment of the district court and remand for further proceedings on the merits.”
“Accordingly, we reverse the order of the district court as it requires disclosure of prison officials’ identities with directions to enter judgment for the appellants.”
“Since the record does not uphold the decision of the ALJ that the disability had ceased, we reverse the district court’s af-firmance and order an continuing disability benefits to Lee.”
“We reverse and remand for development of an adequate record and for proper consideration of Orr’s allegations of pain.”
“We affirm the judgment because the appellant has failed to preserve error.”
“For the reasons discussed above, the judgment of the district court is affirmed.”
“We vacate the decision of the district court and remand the case with directions to remand to the Secretary to evaluate Hunt’s complaint consistent with this opinion.”
“Because these factual findings are not clearly erroneous, and no error of law appears, we affirm the district court.”
“Having rejected Wright’s arguments, we affirm his conviction.”
Caseload & timing
From public federal docket records for this judge.
Not applicable to this circuit-court record.
A historical record
Judge Ross no longer hears cases. This profile stays available as a record of how they ruled. If you're preparing for a matter, start from the court's current bench.