Opinion ID: 182739
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 4

Heading: Conflicting Prior Panel Decisions

Text: When the full precedential force of Kent, Brown, and Rush-Richardson is recognized, our precedents in this narrow area of the law do not squeeze into the analytical boxes in which the majority attempts to place them. Brown, for example, is irreconcilable with United States v. Mashek, 606 F.3d 922 (8th Cir.2010), and United States v. Coleman, 603 F.3d 496 (8th Cir. 2010). This is not surprising, because neither the Mashek opinion nor the Coleman opinion mentions Brown. [13] We now are faced with a tangle of conflicting prior panel opinions. Under this circuit's prior panel rule, when two or more previous panel decisions conflict, a subsequent panel is free to follow the decision which is more persuasive and faithful to the law. See Williams v. NFL, 582 F.3d 863, 879 n. 13 (8th Cir.2009), cert. denied, ___ U.S. ___, 131 S.Ct. 566, 178 L.Ed.2d 413 (2010). Elsewhere I have expressed my disagreement with this formulation of the prior panel rule, joining the dissent in Williams v. NFL, 598 F.3d 932, 934-35 (8th Cir.2009) (Colloton, J., dissenting from denial of rehearing en banc) (characterizing this circuit's prior panel rule as peculiar and fostering unpredictability in the law). But we may follow that rule here.