Elite IT Partners, Inc., dba Elite IT Home, et al. v. Federal Trade Commission

In 2019 the Federal Trade Commission filed a complaint under seal and obtained an ex parte temporary restraining order against Petitioners—a (now-shuttered) small IT company and its owner. Pursuant to the TRO, the company’s operations were immediately halted, and Petitioners’ business and personal assets were frozen in anticipation of a disgorgement award under Section 13(b) of the Federal Trade Commission Act, 15 U.S.C. § 53(b). Petitioners intended to vigorously defend their innocence, but their motion for release of some funds to pay counsel was denied. Thus cornered, Petitioners acceded to a judgment that included “equitable monetary relief” in the amount of $13,537,288.75. Just over a year later, this Court unanimously held that §13(b) authorizes only “purely injunctive, not monetary, relief.” AMG Cap. Mgmt., LLC v. FTC, 593 U.S. 67, 75 (2021). Because §13(b) never allowed “the Commission to seek, and a court to award, equitable monetary relief such as restitution or disgorgement,” AMG, 593 S. Ct. at 70, Petitioners moved to vacate the district court’s order under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 60(b)(6). The district court denied relief, and the Tenth Circuit affirmed because “a change in case law doesn’t justify vacatur under Rule 60(b)(6)” and Petitioners “weren’t involved in the events giving rise to AMG.” The question presented, on which the courts of appeals are openly and squarely divided, is: Whether Rule-60(b)(6) relief based on a post-judgment change in decisional law is categorically unavailable.