Verizon Commcns Inc. v. Fed. Commcns Commn
Split Score
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Case Summary
Disposition
Affirmed
Verizon petitioned for review of an FCC order imposing a $46.9 million forfeiture for failing to safeguard customer-location data in violation of 47 U.S.C. § 222. The Second Circuit held that device-location data is protected customer proprietary network information, the FCC’s liability and penalty determinations were reasonable and within statutory caps, and Verizon’s Seventh Amendment argument failed because it could have demanded a jury in a § 504(a) collection action. The court therefore denied the petition and affirmed the FCC’s order.
Circuit Split Identified
Legal Issue
Whether, in an FCC forfeiture collection action under 47 U.S.C. § 504(a), the district court’s “trial de novo” permits the defendant to raise statutory‐interpretation and constitutional challenges to the underlying forfeiture order, or whether such challenges are exclusively within the jurisdiction of the courts of appeals under 47 U.S.C. § 402(a) and the Hobbs Act.
Circuit Positions
Section 504(a) affords a true trial de novo in which the defendant may litigate statutory and constitutional challenges to the forfeiture order.
District courts conducting a § 504(a) action cannot consider legal or constitutional challenges; review of such questions is exclusive to the courts of appeals under § 402(a)/Hobbs Act.
Conflict Summary
The Second Circuit holds that the statutory command of a "trial de novo" in § 504(a) authorizes a district court to consider both factual and legal challenges—including constitutional claims—because the proceeding starts "afresh." The Fifth Circuit, in United States v. Stevens, 691 F.3d 620 (5th Cir. 2012), held the opposite: that district courts lack jurisdiction to revisit legal questions already decided by the FCC because exclusive jurisdiction lies with the courts of appeals under the Hobbs Act.