Opinion ID: 1441390
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Federal RFRA Claim

Text: The district court rejected Olsen's federal RFRA claim based on collateral estoppel. Collateral estoppel or issue preclusion has five basic elements: (1) the party sought to be precluded in the second suit must have been a party, or in privity with a party, to the original lawsuit; (2) the issue sought to be precluded must be the same as the issue involved in the prior action; (3) the issue sought to be precluded must have been actually litigated in the prior action; (4) the issue sought to be precluded must have been determined by a valid and final judgment; and (5) the determination in the prior action must have been essential to the prior judgment. Robinette v. Jones, 476 F.3d 585, 589 (8th Cir.2007), citing Anderson v. Genuine Parts Co., Inc., 128 F.3d 1267, 1273 (8th Cir.1997). Collateral estoppel does not apply if controlling facts or legal principles have changed significantly since Olsen's prior judgments. See Montana v. United States, 440 U.S. 147, 155, 99 S.Ct. 970, 59 L.Ed.2d 210 (1979). Collateral estoppel is designed to prevent repetitious lawsuits over matters which have once been decided and which have remained substantially static, factually and legally. Commissioner v. Sunnen, 333 U.S. 591, 599, 68 S.Ct. 715, 92 L.Ed. 898 (1948). According to Olsen, his claim is not barred by collateral estoppel because RFRA, as interpreted in Gonzales v. O Centro Espirita Beneficente Uniao Do Vegetal, 546 U.S. 418, 126 S.Ct. 1211, 163 L.Ed.2d 1017 (2006), changed the method for determining whether the government has a compelling interest in prohibiting his sacramental use of marijuana. To the contrary, an explicit purpose of RFRA was to restore the compelling interest test as set forth in Sherbert v. Verner, 374 U.S. 398, 83 S.Ct. 1790, 10 L.Ed.2d 965 (1963) and Wisconsin v. Yoder, 406 U.S. 205, 92 S.Ct. 1526, 32 L.Ed.2d 15 (1972) and to guarantee its application in all cases where free exercise of religion is substantially burdened. ... 42 U.S.C. § 2000bb-1. Olsen claims O Centro requires that the compelling interest of a challenged law must be evaluated with respect to the particular claimant whose religious exercise is substantially burdened, and that this requirement did not exist pre- Smith. In fact, O Centro says that Sherbert and Yoder looked beyond broadly formulated interests justifying the general applicability of government mandates and scrutinized the asserted harm of granting specific exemptions to particular religious claimants. O Centro, 546 U.S. at 431, 126 S.Ct. 1211. The pre- Smith standard required a particularized evaluation. See, e.g., Quaring v. Peterson, 728 F.2d 1121, 1126-27 (8th Cir. 1984) (applying Sherbert and Yoder by evaluating whether a government interest in requiring driver's license photographs is compelling as applied to a particular free-exercise claimant), aff'd by an equally divided court, 472 U.S. 478, 105 S.Ct. 3492, 86 L.Ed.2d 383 (1985). The pre- Smith standard applicable in Olsen, Rush, and DEA is the same standard applicable to Olsen's current claim. There is no difference in the controlling law. Olsen's federal RFRA claim is barred by collateral estoppel.