Scott Hanson v. William Shubert, 968 F.3d 1014

Plaintiff Scott Hanson, practically blind in his right eye, sued deputies William Shubert and Jesus Gonzalez in 2016 alleging deliberate indifference to medical needs while jailed at Gooding County Jail (Eighth/Fourteenth Amendment claims).
Defendants moved for summary judgment (qualified immunity) in April 2018.
On July 9, 2018 the district court denied qualified immunity as a matter of law, finding genuine factual disputes about whether Hanson’s clearly established rights were violated.
On July 3, 2019 (≈11 months later) Shubert and Gonzalez filed a motion to reconsider the summary-judgment denial, citing City of Escondido v. Emmons; the district court denied reconsideration on September 19, 2019.
The defendants appealed both the underlying summary-judgment denial and the denial of reconsideration on October 1, 2019; the Ninth Circuit sua sponte considered appellate jurisdiction and dismissed the appeal for lack of jurisdiction.

Issue	Plaintiff's Argument	Defendant's Argument	Held
Timeliness of appeal of the July 9, 2018 summary-judgment order	Hanson: appeal of that order is untimely and jurisdictionally barred	Shubert/Gonzalez: their post-judgment motion tolled the appeal period (brought under Rule 59(e))	Appeal of the summary-judgment order was untimely; district-court order could not be appealed and appeal must be dismissed for lack of jurisdiction
Appealability of the denial of reconsideration (Sept. 19, 2019)	Hanson: denial of reconsideration is not independently appealable and can be reviewed after final judgment	Defendants: denial of reconsideration is immediately appealable as tied to qualified immunity collateral-order concerns	Court: where the underlying denial was not timely appealed, an order denying a Rule 59(e) motion to reconsider that denial is not an immediately appealable collateral order; no jurisdiction to hear it
Effect of Rule 60(b) or Rule 59(e) on tolling the appeals period	Hanson: late post-judgment motions do not toll the appeal window	Defendants: they invoked Rule 59(e) (and cited Rule 60(b)) to seek relief and tolling	Court: an untimely Rule 59(e) or Rule 60(b) motion does not toll the appeal period; Rule 60(b) tolling applies only when motion filed within 28 days under the appellate rules

Melendres v. Maricopa Cnty., 815 F.3d 645 (9th Cir. 2016) (appeal deadline is mandatory and jurisdictional)
Mitchell v. Forsyth, 472 U.S. 511 (U.S. 1985) (denial of qualified immunity turning on law is appealable under the collateral-order doctrine)
Cohen v. Beneficial Indus. Loan Corp., 337 U.S. 541 (U.S. 1949) (formulation of the collateral-order doctrine)
Powell v. Miller, 849 F.3d 1286 (10th Cir. 2017) (denial of reconsideration cannot be used to resurrect an untimely appeal of qualified immunity)
Lora v. O’Heaney, 602 F.3d 106 (2d Cir. 2010) (denial of reconsideration is not itself an important collateral order warranting immediate appeal)
Scott v. Younger, 739 F.2d 1464 (9th Cir. 1984) (an untimely post-judgment motion will not toll the appeal period)
Cel-A-Pak v. Cal. Agric. Labor Relations Bd., 680 F.2d 664 (9th Cir. 1982) (same principle on tolling by post-judgment motions)
Preaseau v. Prudential Ins. Co., 591 F.2d 74 (9th Cir. 1979) (order denying summary judgment is generally interlocutory and subject to reconsideration)