The Court of International Trade (CIT) and the Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit (CAFC) made the following antidumping and countervailing duty law determinations in the first half of August 2010.

On August 9, 2010, a federal jury in U.S. District Court for the District of Hawaii found Noshir S. Gowadia, of Maui, guilty of five criminal offenses relating to his design for China of a low signature cruise missile exhaust system capable of rendering a Chinese cruise missile resistant to detection by infrared missiles. The jury also convicted Gowadia of illegally communicating classified information on three other occasions and unlawfully exporting technical information on those three occasions, illegally retaining defense information, and filing false tax returns for the years 2001 and 2002. The jury acquitted Gowadia of three other offenses alleging illegal communication of information to China. Gowadia faces life imprisonment on two counts, and 5 to 10 years for other counts.

In Aromont USA Inc., v. U.S., the Court of International Trade determined that certain food flavorings (derived from veal, chicken, duck, lamb, beef, fish, lobster, mushroom or vegetable stock), imported from France should not be classified as soups or broths, but instead as unfinished food preparations, principally used as ingredients in gravies, sauces, and salad dressings.

The Court of International Trade rejected the International Trade Administration’s approach to combined antidumping (AD) and countervailing duty (CVD) tariffs on imports from non-market economies, and ordered the agency to forego imposing CVDs on off-the-road (OTR) tires from China. The ruling is likely to mean lower combined rates in the future for diverse imports from China and other non-market economy countries¹ that are subject to both types of trade remedy tariffs.

Reversing prior limitations on the ability of food producers to challenge rulings of the Agricultural Marketing Service, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit (CADC) has allowed California almond producers to proceed with a challenge to an AMS rule on bacteria reduction requirements that largely ended the marketing of domestically produced raw almonds.

The Court of International Trade (CIT) and the Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit (CAFC) made the following antidumping and countervailing duty law determinations in the second half of July 2010.

In Ford Motor Company, v. U.S. et al., the Court of International Trade denied Ford’s request to liquidate and refund duties paid on ten reconciliation entries of imported Jaguar brand vehicles. The CIT dismissed all of Ford’s claims on grounds ranging from lack of case or controversy, lack of jurisdiction, mootness, or in some instances, at the Court’s discretion.

The Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit (CADC) has ruled that manufacturers may appeal Environmental Protection Agency “misbranding” actions in district court when the agency’s actions effectively threaten to cancel a product’s registration without due hearings and argument.

On July 23, 2010, in National Corn Growers Association, Et Al. v. Environmental Protection Agency Et Al., the Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit granted NCGA’s petition requiring review of its objections to the EPA’s total ban of the pesticide Carbofuran¹ in imported foods, and cancelled EPA’s final rule to the extent that it revoked any Carbofuran tolerance levels² in imported food.

The Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit heard an exporter’s appeal of a Bureau of Industry and Security enforcement action, but ruled that while the Export Administration Act of 1979 (EAA) is lapsed because it has not been reauthorized by Congress, jurisdiction for such appeals passes to district court.