Mehran Tavakoli v. Sreya Vuth

The Fourteenth Amendment forbids a State from depriving any person of property without due process of law. This Court has held that due process requires, at a minimum, notice and a meaningful opportunity to be heard before a deprivation of property, Mathews v. Eldridge, 424 U. S. 319 (1976); Mullane v. Central Hanover Bank & Trust Co., 339 U. S. 306 (1950), and that a court may penalize a litigant for misconduct only “in compliance] with the mandates of due pro­ cess,” including a finding of bad faith and fair notice, Chambers v. NASCO, Inc., 501 U. S. 32 (1991). The questions presented are:

1. Whether the Due Process Clause permits a state court to impose a monetary sanction on a litigant for filing an unsuccessful motion, where the opposing party never sought sanctions and never alleged bad faith, and the court made no finding of bad faith, friv­ olousness, or intransigence and identified no sanction­ able conduct, and whether an appellate court may sus­ tain that penalty by inferring the missing findings af­ ter the fact.

2. Whether the Due Process Clause permits a state court to order one spouse to transfer his concededly separate property to the other under an openended “just and equitable” standard without identify­ ing or valuing the property at issue, so that the depri­ vation rests on no ascertainable factual basis and is insulated from meaningful review.