De Osorio v. Mayorkas In September 2012, the 9th Circuit overturned the previous decision and rejected the BIA's interpretation of the CSPA.

But the Fourth Circuit overturned that ruling on the ground that the state court rulings that denied his earlier appeals had been minimally adequate.

Mr. Williams then sought and obtained a Federal writ of habeas corpus from the Federal District Court in Alexandria, in a decision that the Fourth Circuit then overturned.

That refusal by the Fifth Circuit created a split between federal circuits: the 5th Circuit overturned the Texas law and the 11th Circuit upheld a nearly identical Alabama law.

(The District Court judge had reduced the award to $315,000, and in 1999 the Fourth Circuit overturned the award.)

However, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 1st Circuit overturned the conviction because the judge had committed prejudicial error in putting to the jury ten special yes-or-no questions.

Even at that point, and it has gotten more restrictive since, the Fourth Circuit was overturning 12 percent of the death sentences it reviewed: that compared with an average 40 percent reversal rate for federal appeals courts.

The main charges were eventually dropped by the Federal Government after the 9th Circuit overturned the conviction for contempt of court.

In 1987, the 11th Circuit overturned the District Court's dismissal and reinstated the white firefighters' discrimination suit.

The Fourth Circuit overturned the sentence, saying that much of Judge Brinkema's reasoning was flawed.