Documente Academic
Documente Profesional
Documente Cultură
No. 14-2202
LEE PELE,
Plaintiff - Appellant,
v.
PENNSYLVANIA HIGHER EDUCATION
American Education Services,
ASSISTANCE
AGENCY,
d/b/a
Defendant Appellee.
-----------------------------JON H. OBERG,
Amicus Supporting Appellant.
Appeal from the United States District Court for the Eastern
District of Virginia, at Alexandria. James C. Cacheris, Senior
District Judge. (1:13-cv-01531-JCC-TRJ)
Argued:
Decided:
PER CURIAM:
Plaintiff
Higher
Lee
Education
Pele
filed
Assistance
suit
against
Agency
the
(PHEAA)
Pennsylvania
under
the
Fair
Concluding that
in
suit,
the
judgment
the
Commonwealths
district
and
court
dismissed
Eleventh-Amendment
granted
the
PHEAAs
action.
We
immunity
motion
for
from
summary
vacate
the
district
valid
Congressional
consent
by
the
state
or
This
immunity
also
protects
state
agents
and
state
and
government
purpose
of
politic
constituting
instrumentality,
24
improv[ing]
access
Pa.
to
public
Stat.
higher
corporation
5101,
and
for
the
education
by
States
(Oberg
ex
rel.
II),
Oberg
745
v.
F.3d
Pa.
131,
Higher
135
Educ.
(4th
Assistance
Cir.
Agency
2014).
After
the
evidence
developed
through
discovery
in
arm-of-state
question,
see,
e.g.,
Md.
Stadium
Auth.
v.
Ellerbe Becket Inc., 407 F.3d 255, 261 (4th Cir. 2005), the
district court concluded that PHEAA had carried its burden of
proving that it is an arm of the Commonwealth, see Hutto v. S.C.
Ret. Sys., 773 F.3d 536, 543 (4th Cir. 2014) (holding that in
the Eleventh-Amendment context, whether a state-created entity
is an arm of its creating state is an affirmative defense that
must be proven by the entity asserting immunity).
Pele appeals.
instead
establish
that
PHEAA
is
not
an
arm
of
the
Commonwealth.
II.
Whether a state-created entity is an arm of its creating
state and therefore entitled to assert the states sovereign
at 542.
In an opinion also filed today, we addressed PHEAAs status
as an arm of the Commonwealth in connection with claims asserted
against PHEAA under the False Claims Act (FCA), 31 U.S.C.
3729-33.
of
the
independent
Commonwealth
from
the
because:
PHEAA
Commonwealth
and
is
financially
supports
itself
with
PHEAA
control
notwithstanding
Pennsylvania
directors,
is
statutorily
over
its
vested
commercially
the
deposit
of
Treasury;
and
PHEAA,
sets
policy
and
makes
these
the
with
and
generated
fact
revenues,
revenues
through
in
in
the
its
board
of
substantive
fiscal
and