Brothers Market LLC No. 2 v. United States

── Brothers Market LLC No. 2 v. United States ── Court: Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit Date: April 08, 2026 Category: General FOR PUBLICATION UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE NINTH CIRCUIT BROTHERS MARKET LLC NO. 2, No. 24-6374 a California limited liability D.C. No. company; BRAD BROWN, an 2:23-cv-06436- individual, WLH-E Plaintiffs - Appellants, OPINION v. UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, Defendant - Appellee. Appeal from the United States District Court for the Central District of California Wesley L. Hsu, District Judge, Presiding Argued and Submitted October 7, 2025 Pasadena, California Filed April 8, 2026 Before: Johnnie B. Rawlinson, Eric D. Miller, and Anthony D. Johnstone, Circuit Judges. Opinion by Judge Johnstone 2 BROTHERS MARKET LLC NO. 2 V. USA SUMMARY * Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program The panel affirmed the district court’s summary judgment for the government in Brothers Market LLC No. 2’s challenge to the final decision of the Food and Nutrition Service of the United States Department of Agriculture (the “Agency”) permanently disqualifying the Market from participating in the federal Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (“SNAP”). The Agency charged the Market with trafficking in SNAP benefits. The panel held that Plaintiffs—the Market and its owner Brad Brown—failed to raise a genuine dispute over whether transactions flagged by the Agency evidenced SNAP trafficking. The government produced evidence of several suspicious transaction patterns that establish an inference of SNAP trafficking. Although Plaintiffs had several opportunities to refute the suspicious patterns with evidence, they did not. Given the overwhelming evidence of SNAP trafficking and Plaintiffs’ lack of a meaningful showing to the contrary, the panel affirmed the district court’s grant of summary judgment for the government. * This summary constitutes no part of the opinion of the court. It has been prepared by court staff for the convenience of the reader.  BROTHERS MARKET LLC NO. 2 V. USA 3 COUNSEL Andrew Z. Tapp (argued), Metropolitan Law Group PLLC, Brandon, Florida, for Plaintiffs-Appellants. Zakariya K. Varshovi (argued), Assistant United States Attorney; David M. Harris, Assistant United States Attorney, Chief, Civil Division; Joseph T. McNally, Acting United States Attorney; Office of the United States Attorney, United States Department of Justice, Los Angeles, California; for Defendant-Appellee. OPINION JOHNSTONE, Circuit Judge: Brad Brown owns Brothers Market LLC No. 2 (“the Market”), a small convenience store in downtown Los Angeles. The Food and Nutrition Service of the United States Department of Agriculture (“the Agency”) authorized the Market to participate in the federal Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (“SNAP”). Many of the Market’s customers receive SNAP benefits and purchase food using an electronic benefits transfer (“EBT”) card, which transfers funds from a customer’s SNAP account to a SNAP retailer. The Agency prohibits both customers and retailers from “trafficking” in SNAP benefits: exchanging benefits for cash or consideration other than eligible food. If the Agency determines that a store trafficked in SNAP benefits, it shall disqualify the store from the program. In February 2022, the Agency began to detect suspicious patterns in the Market’s SNAP transactions. Over six 4 BROTHERS MARKET LLC NO. 2 V. USA months, the Market recorded more than 600 unusually large transactions, nearly 200 transactions that fully or nearly depleted a SNAP household’s monthly benefits, more than 100 sets of rapid transactions made by the same house