[00:00:01] Speaker 02:
Case number 25-1158, James K. Knight, Petitioner versus National Transportation Safety Board and Federal Aviation Administration. Ms. Foster Brown for the Petitioner, Ms. Favaz Gomez for the Respondents.

[00:00:18] Speaker 03:
Good morning, Council.

[00:00:21] Speaker 00:
Good morning, your honors. May it please the court. I'm Elizabeth Thasher Brown on behalf of petitioner James Knight. He is present in the courtroom and I have reserved two minutes for rebuttal.

[00:00:33] Speaker 00:
Petitioner Mr. Knight is a commercial pilot, and he mistakenly ingested his son's Vyvanse ADHD medication instead of his own cholesterol medication. Three days later, he tested positive on a random DOT drug test. At the time of the medication mix-up, Mr. Knight was dealing with a family crisis. His son was gravely ill. He was on multiple trips to the ER. He was sleep-deprived, frantic. and didn't realize that he had taken his son's medication.

[00:01:07] Speaker 00:
The FAA revoked all of his FAA certificates and he appealed because he did not intentionally take the medication and he never felt the effects of it. And importantly, case law is settled that an accidental ingestion is a reason for the FAA to consider a different sanction than revocation.

[00:01:28] Speaker 04:
Oh, sorry. Go ahead. Council, I mean, the dispute here between Mr. Knight and the NTSB is really just about the appropriate whether it should be revocation or there should be some mitigation to a suspension. But there's no dispute that this substance was taken. So, I mean, given that it's just about the penalty and both penalties are available to the NTSB, I'm not sure how that means.

[00:02:05] Speaker 04:
I'm not sure how those circumstances can sustain an argument that the board was not substantially or that the FAA was not substantially justified in pursuing revocation, where it's just about the penalty.

[00:02:19] Speaker 00:
Right. But the case law, Your Honor, is that an accidental ingestion is a reason to mitigate the sanction from revocation.

[00:02:28] Speaker 04:
It's a reason to mitigate, but it's not as though mitigation is required. Revocation is also an appropriate penalty.

[00:02:39] Speaker 00:
I don't believe so, Your Honor. In this particular case, it was stipulated. Mr. Knight, he admitted that he had taken the medication, that there was a violation, there was a positive drug test. But all of the case law gives the pilot, the respondent in the underlying enforcement action, the opportunity to bring that evidence before the NTSB.

[00:03:04] Speaker 04:
And he did, and he got mitigation. But I mean, we're not here litigating the merits of that decision. We're talking about the EAJA attorney's fees. And it's a pretty high bar to secure those.

[00:03:21] Speaker 00:
And I agree with that, Your Honor, but Egypt is always based on reasonableness. This was an accidental case. This wasn't intentional conduct. So they're basically placing Mr. Knight in the same category as somebody who intentionally took...

[00:03:38] Speaker 00:
a prohibited drug, perhaps cocaine or something like that. That's not this case. In those cases, I agree that revocation is warranted. Not in this case when you have an innocent act and that And instead of taking all those facts into consideration, they just went with revocation.

[00:03:59] Speaker 01:
And if you look at the Henry... Didn't he know that he took that medication before he submitted himself to the drug test?

[00:04:05] Speaker 00:
That is correct, Your Honor. But also you have to look at the context of that. At the time that he realized that he had taken his son's Vyvanse medication...

[00:04:15] Speaker 00:
He had been to the ER twice, sleep-deprived, frantic, still worrying about his son. So at the moment when he was cleaning up, realizing, hey, I probably took this, he actually even called off work because he wasn't fit to fly because he didn't have proper crew rest. So at the time when he realized it, he really wasn't, if you will say, cogent like we are here today. Like, oh, I took something I shouldn't have. I probably need to report it. So at that time, you have to put that in context as to why he didn't report it.

[00:04:48] Speaker 00:
And he never thought of it as being in his system. It was a medication for a 12-year-old child, small 12-year-old child, to focus at school. So he never put the two and two together and said, well, I should have reported it. And I have to say, Your Honor, he was sanctioned for that. He did receive a 90-day suspension, which he wound up actually serving about a 900-day suspension as he litigated this case.

[00:05:19] Speaker 03:
To me, this is a tremendously sympathetic case. But you have a couple things going against you here.

[00:05:29] Speaker 03:
One is standards of review. This is a double deference case. Tell me if you disagree with this. But it seems to me it's a double deference case because...

[00:05:43] Speaker 03:
board has to give some deference to the FAA's choice of sanction under Martin v. Oshirk at the merits level. And then at the EJA level, the board is deciding whether the sanction is reasonable. And then on the EJA level, at the Aegis stage, we're deciding whether or the board is deciding whether the FAA's position is reasonable.

[00:06:16] Speaker 03:
So it's reasonableness on top of reasonableness, which is pretty tough.

[00:06:21] Speaker 00:
But I do agree with that, Your Honor.

[00:06:23] Speaker 03:
But recall that the ALJ and the So it was unreasonable to think that the FAA's choice of sanction was reasonable.

[00:06:35] Speaker 00:
Well, no, the board and the ALJ both said it was unreasonable. They both said it was excessive. So that's in the underlying enforcement action. Now, when we switch over to EJA, the main reason the board overturned the administrative law judge was because it said, well, the FAA proved that the violation of the statute, the regulation, 120.33 Charlie, sorry, Bravo.

[00:07:03] Speaker 00:
and um but that was conceded before the hearing they didn't need to prove that that was gifted to them there was a stipulation mr knight actually stipulated that the that that there was a verified positive drug result they didn't need to prove it there was no need for a hearing they know they didn't need to go through all of that make him uh incur all those legal fees when they had as as judge tapia said were gifted it on a silver platter they didn't need a hearing

[00:07:32] Speaker 03:
They had a meritorious case for some sort of action, right? They established violations.

[00:07:40] Speaker 03:
It's the same proceeding, whether it ends up in revocation or suspension. Of course, they had reason to pursue something.

[00:07:51] Speaker 00:
They did.

[00:07:52] Speaker 03:
Your argument is where your argument is compelling to me is just on the choice of sanction question.

[00:07:59] Speaker 00:
Correct. But I think it has to be reasonable. And they have to follow their own precedent. In Henry and in Myers, it's the very same situation. Pilots tested positive after taking a family member's medication. And they tested positive during a random drug test. In both of those cases, and let me point out, in neither of those cases could I find any stipulations that the pilots stipulated that there was a verified positive drug test, nor did the FAA stipulate no intentional ingestion and no impairment.

[00:08:36] Speaker 00:
Those are really important facts. That was all before the- Was revocation an option? It is an option, but it's not reasonable, Your Honor. And in Henry and in Myers, they did go for revocation. The FAA did.

[00:08:52] Speaker 01:
It sounds like the reason revocation is reasonable is because you could be affected by that medication. And so right now... you seem to be giving us arguments that suggest that, well, he didn't say anything before the actual drug test because he didn't feel the effects. And he also thought that because it was a 12 year old's medication that he wouldn't feel those effects. But revocation is a particular possible sanction for when anybody takes any medication.

[00:09:21] Speaker 00:
But he just didn't think about it.

[00:09:23] Speaker 01:
At the time that he wrote... That's not my question. My question is, is revocation a possible sanction for when anybody takes medicine, inadvertent or not, because of the potential effects of the medication?

[00:09:35] Speaker 00:
Yes, Your Honor. But also, if you look at the totality of the circumstances here, revocation is not reasonable, and it didn't follow FAA precedent. If you look at Henry and Myers, very same cases, The FAA did go for revocation. The administrative law judge said that's not reasonable. It was excessive, just like Mr. Knight. And they reduced him to suspensions. The FAA didn't appeal. They didn't appeal because that was a...

[00:10:06] Speaker 00:
That comported with their safety mandate. There was punishment, and it was reasonable based on the fact.

[00:10:13] Speaker 01:
Mr. Knight— But can't there be two outcomes, meaning two things are true? Revocation is a possible sanction. It's just that you don't think it was reasonable in this circumstance.

[00:10:25] Speaker 00:
Not just me, Your Honor. The NTSB and the administrative law judge both found that that was excessive.

[00:10:34] Speaker 00:
So then when we get to the EGIS standard, it has to be reasonable in law and fact. And in both cases, it wasn't reasonable. Obviously, the NTSB found that it was excessive. Now, the reason why they denied each of these was simply because they said the FAA proved that he violated the regulation, but it was given to them on a silver platter, as Judge Tapia said.

[00:11:06] Speaker 00:
It was admitted before the hearing. There was no need for them to have to prove it. They had the burden of proof. They had a stipulation. That was the reason why the board denied Egypt fees. They just said that because of the FAA proved that that regulation, the violation of that regulation, that the FAA was substantially justified.

[00:11:31] Speaker 03:
What do you do with the medical certificate requirements. You have a very appealing case assuming there's remedial discretion to select a sanction, an appropriate sanction.

[00:11:54] Speaker 03:
But those regs, as I understand them, there is a legal rule that You have to have the medical certificate in order to get the flying certificate.

[00:12:10] Speaker 03:
And there is a bright line eligibility requirement that if you have a positive test within two years, which was the case here, you can't keep the medical certificate. And those aren't discretionary judgments. Those are legal rules.

[00:12:31] Speaker 00:
So you are right, Your Honor. So when a pilot has an airman certificate, in this case, a commercial pilot or an ATP, an air transport pilot certificate, that's one. Doesn't mean you can fly because you have to have a medical certificate. So the FAA did revoke everything. But the law judge and the NTSB board both said that wasn't reasonable.

[00:12:52] Speaker 03:
Now, they weren't... Just focus on the medical.

[00:12:56] Speaker 00:
Right. So on the medical. So then the question is...

[00:13:01] Speaker 00:
Well, the FAA did, I'm sorry, the NTSB did give him his medical back. Then the next step would be for them to do something like make him reapply because of that. And if he did reapply, then they would look at his record and then decide whether or not that two-year would apply. But that's not valid at this stage, Your Honor.

[00:13:26] Speaker 03:
Sorry, just help me out. I'm not getting this yet.

[00:13:31] Speaker 03:
Why was it unreasonable for the FAA to take the position that if there is a positive drug test within two years under our regs, we must revoke the medical certificate?

[00:13:52] Speaker 00:
Well, under FAMU.

[00:13:54] Speaker 00:
It's still there's still a spam. And that's it's cited in our briefs. And it's actually even in the FAA brief. And it's a case from this court. And it is. Oh, yeah.

[00:14:04] Speaker 03:
Right. Right. I'm going to I'm starting with the regs. My next question is going to be fam, which seemed to say that those regs are mandatory.

[00:14:13] Speaker 00:
I don't think that's what FAM says. I think FAM says you have to, it's discretionary.

[00:14:19] Speaker 00:
It's not strict liability. You still have to apply reasonableness.

[00:14:24] Speaker 03:
The FAA wanted to revoke.

[00:14:28] Speaker 03:
The board reduced the revocation to a suspension. And we set aside the reduction and said...

[00:14:38] Speaker 03:
the board order would be contrary to law, not just arbitrary and capricious, contrary to law, if it allowed a certificate, medical certificate, less than two years after, in that case, it was refusing the drug test, but it's the same set of eligibility rights. Less than two years after the violation, no discretionary.

[00:15:02] Speaker 00:
So in that case, if the FAA would have suspended, so he would have had a 90-day suspension, and then he can reapply for a medical.

[00:15:15] Speaker 00:
It wasn't that Mr. Knight was not sanctioned. He was sanctioned. I get that. And so that would include the medical.

[00:15:23] Speaker 03:
The regs are eligibility requirements, right? Right.

[00:15:30] Speaker 03:
Positive drug test within two years, no medical certificate. It sounds pretty harsh to me, but that's what the reg says.

[00:15:38] Speaker 00:
Well, exactly. And the board disagreed with that. And that was never appealed. Well, there was a notice of appeal, and then it was withdrawn. And maybe if this had been decided by a federal court, there would have been a different outcome. I don't think so, Your Honor. But with respect to the medical, it was suspended. Now, was it mandatory for two years that he couldn't fly? That's a separate question. It has nothing to do with the revocation.

[00:16:09] Speaker 00:
And the NTSB sanctioned him for 90 days.

[00:16:14] Speaker 00:
And actually, it turned out to be two years anyway. Okay.

[00:16:19] Speaker 03:
Judge Charles, anything else? Judge Rao? Okay, we'll give you some time on rebuttal.

[00:16:24] Speaker 00:
Thank you, Your Honors.

[00:16:31] Speaker 03:
Ms. Cabaz-Gomez? Yes, Your Honor. Welcome. Thank you.

[00:16:39] Speaker 05:
May it please the Court, Jessica Cabaz-Gomez for the FAA. Your Honor, I'd like to clarify a couple of points.

[00:16:46] Speaker 05:
First, the petitioner in this case holds an airline transport pilot, not a commercial pilot certificate. That is the highest level of pilot certificate an individual can hold. And he did fly for a commercial airline.

[00:16:58] Speaker 03:
I might be getting the terms wrong, but he has a license certificate to fly the ground transport, and both of those are predicated on his having a medical certificate.

[00:17:13] Speaker 05:
Correct. He can only exercise his flying privileges when he has a valid medical certificate. The ground instructor certificate, there are portions that he can exercise without a valid medical certificate, Your Honor.

[00:17:25] Speaker 03:
So let's just cut to the chase on this. The FAA's position is, in this case, was that in this case, Really unusual case, accidental ingestion in the middle of a family emergency, right? The sanction for that is going to be revoking all his licenses.

[00:17:51] Speaker 03:
Yes. Why is that?

[00:17:54] Speaker 03:
Assuming for a second that there's discretion to pick a sanction, why is that a reasonable choice?

[00:18:04] Speaker 05:
Yes, Your Honor. So first, I will clarify, it is really not an unusual case. So the FAA sees these cases of accidental ingestion claims day in and day out.

[00:18:13] Speaker 03:
Yeah, a lot of claims, like I didn't know there was pot in the brownies. Sure, that's not this case. Come on.

[00:18:19] Speaker 05:
This case is quite compelling on the record, Your Honor. This is a case where the petitioner, by his own admission, reported for pilot duties as a commercial airline transport pilot certificate, knowing he had taken a prescription drug not prescribed to him, knowing it was intended to affect a person's mental state, not knowing what was in the drug, making no efforts to find out, not attempting to remove himself from safety-sensitive work, not attempting to report the ingestion to his employer, but rather reporting for work and putting the public at risk, knowing of his ingestion.

[00:18:53] Speaker 05:
Those are compelling facts where it would have been unthinkable for the agency not to enforce its safety regulations.

[00:18:59] Speaker 03:
And the other point I would like to clarify— Unthinkable to impose no sanction.

[00:19:06] Speaker 05:
And that's an important point, Your Honor. Revocation? The petitioner has made a claim that the underlying case was about sanction, and that is simply incorrect.

[00:19:14] Speaker 03:
Even in the middle of the hearing, the petitioner— I'll spot you all that. You were reasonable in bringing the action. You were reasonable in forcing a hearing to see if this would be credible. You were reasonable in developing the facts to figure out what the most appropriate sanction was.

[00:19:36] Speaker 03:
I mean, you did all that. The ALJ made, forget if it was his or her, but the ALJ made the findings. And then you took the appeal on the purely legal question that just bright line rule, even on these facts, we're just going to take away all his licenses.

[00:19:57] Speaker 05:
Yes. So there was a cross appeal, Your Honor. And the appeal on petitioner side claimed that it was a valid affirmative defense. An affirmative defense is exculpatory. And that was a petition that he took and requested dismissal of the case in its entirety. In other words, the finding a violation.

[00:20:13] Speaker 03:
There's a lot of confusion in the case, in these cases with loose usage of the phrase affirmative defense, right? It's It is not an affirmative defense in the sense of eliminating any wrongdoing or exposure, right? Which it would be if and only if the drug were taken for legitimate medical use. So just put all that aside.

[00:20:43] Speaker 03:
It's just a question of...

[00:20:47] Speaker 03:
The exculpatory significance of the fact surrounding this ingestion, which is accidental in the middle of a family emergency, where he takes one of his kids' pills by mistake.

[00:21:06] Speaker 05:
Correct, Your Honor. You are correct. Those are the facts of the case. However, the regulation at issue doesn't address the circumstances or thoughts of the individual at the time of consumption of the drug. It regulates an individual reporting for a safety-sensitive function, putting the public at risk. having the prohibited drug in their system. And this is a case where a petitioner knew he had a substance in his system, made no efforts to mitigate that, or remove himself from safety-sensitive duties, and reported for work.

[00:21:37] Speaker 05:
There's even testimony that He was concerned when he was called for random drug testing by his employer. He had testimony that he did discuss the accidental ingestion with his wife. So contrary to the representations made moments before, Your Honor, this wasn't something made or something that occurred that he brushed off and never thought of again.

[00:22:01] Speaker 05:
Throughout the days leading up to his random drug test, there's testimony that he thought of it, yet he made no effort to remove himself from safety-sensitive functions. And FAA has published sanction policy, making it very clear that this conduct, reporting for safety-sensitive work, is so egregious that it warrants revocation. And FAA's

[00:22:27] Speaker 03:
I don't think the guidance helps you. The guidance cuts against you. Guidance says that violation generally supports revocation.

[00:22:39] Speaker 05:
Correct, Your Honor.

[00:22:41] Speaker 03:
That implies that there are going to be unusual cases where it doesn't.

[00:22:46] Speaker 05:
And on the facts of this case, where the petitioner knew he had ingested a prescription medication that was not prescribed to him, he knew it was a medication intended to affect one's mental state. And yet he reported for safety-sensitive duties to an air carrier to pilot and fly the public. That shows a willful disregard for public safety and aviation safety. And the FAA was, at a minimum, it's a low bar, right, was reasonable. They had a plausible claim in pursuing this case, and they did. And just to emphasize, where petitioner in this case repeatedly throughout the litigation requested dismissal of the case in its entirety, In other words, repeatedly throughout the record, in the middle of the hearing, dismissal, a finding of no violation, to post hoc characterize it as this case was all about sanction is simply incorrect and revisionist history of the record as it stands.

[00:23:38] Speaker 03:
Let me ask you about the medical eligibility requirements, which I think is the strongest part of your case. But suppose you had the same facts here Accidental one-pill family emergency. And now change the actual facts to the pilot goes to the office or the field or whatever and immediately does not make himself available to fly, goes in and self-reports and said, this is what happens.

[00:24:20] Speaker 03:
And then you do a drug test.

[00:24:24] Speaker 03:
automatic revocation on those facts?

[00:24:28] Speaker 05:
Your Honor, I'm having trouble with the hypothetical because in this case we have random drug testing. So is it DOT drug testing? So anything like a random reasonable suspicion when available to perform a safety sensitive function is what triggers those testing.

[00:24:41] Speaker 03:
It seems like on your theory there would be a mandatory revocation no matter how accidental or fault-free the circumstances were. I'm trying to take out of the case the inculpatory facts from that Thursday morning when the pilot shows up and makes himself available and doesn't disclose until he gets hit with a drug test.

[00:25:22] Speaker 05:
Right. So if you're asking about the Part 67 medical standards, is that correct? Under those standards, there's no mens rea requirement. It does require a verified positive drug test, which implicitly means the DOT verified positive drug test. So in your hypothetical, where the individual would not have been subject to DOT random drug testing because they removed themselves from safety-sensitive duties and were not available to perform, it would not be a DOT drug test. Right. And that's something that he could have done. He could have gone to his doctor. He could have had requested a drug test to see what was in his system, to see if he was in a position where he could report for safety sensitive work.

[00:25:59] Speaker 05:
He didn't do that. And all of that would have made it.

[00:26:02] Speaker 03:
You don't think there would have been a drug test on facts like this?

[00:26:07] Speaker 05:
The DOT drug testing regulations provide for several different types of drug testing. The drug testing at issue in this case was a random drug test. So it was fortuitous that his employer even found.

[00:26:18] Speaker 03:
It was spectacularly bad luck.

[00:26:21] Speaker 05:
Correct. Correct. And the agency would argue good luck, right, in the interest of aviation safety.

[00:26:27] Speaker 03:
I get that.

[00:26:27] Speaker 05:
But the only other testing that would be possible would be reasonable suspicion testing.

[00:26:32] Speaker 03:
I'm pushing you on whether you are really...

[00:26:37] Speaker 03:
Will I really want to own the rule that any positive drug test automatically compels revocation?

[00:26:49] Speaker 05:
On the facts of this case?

[00:26:50] Speaker 03:
No, no.

[00:26:52] Speaker 05:
On a non-DOT drug test? On any case.

[00:26:56] Speaker 03:
There's accidental ingestion and no attempt to report for work.

[00:27:03] Speaker 05:
So the medical regulations require a verified positive drug test. Verified goes into the requirements for MRO verification, which is tied to DOT drug testing. So if there is a DOT positive drug test that's verified, that does require mandatory revocation of the medical certificates because the individual is not medically qualified, does not meet the Part 67 medical standards.

[00:27:27] Speaker 01:
So even self-reporting doesn't assist?

[00:27:31] Speaker 05:
Your Honor, if there is a positive DOT-verified drug test, then the individual does not meet the medical standards.

[00:27:39] Speaker 05:
They will need to reapply once the two years pass.

[00:27:46] Speaker 01:
So a person who self-reports, are they still subject to the drug test?

[00:27:50] Speaker 05:
An individual who removes themselves from safety-sensitive duties would no longer be subject to DOT drug testing because they're not available to perform.

[00:27:58] Speaker 03:
I'm sorry. The drug test that triggers the automatic revocation can only happen when an individual has reported for safety-sensitive functions?

[00:28:15] Speaker 05:
Correct. So if an individual is not available to perform, they are not subject to DOT drug testing.

[00:28:21] Speaker 03:
Let's say facts of this case except the pilot stayed home on Thursday morning.

[00:28:30] Speaker 03:
He would not have drawn the drug test?

[00:28:34] Speaker 03:
It's not just a system where, okay, on Thursday, we're going to test.

[00:28:38] Speaker 05:
No, no. So there's, there's random drug testing. Usually it's done on a quarterly basis. The facts in this case are quite compelling. The petitioner did call in sick. He should have reported a day earlier to work than he didn't. He apparently was so sleep deprived. He chose to call in sick for a day. He knew how to do that.

[00:28:56] Speaker 05:
If he had reported for work, it's very likely that they would have tested him that day. The very next day when he did report for work, two days after ingesting the medication, that is when he was subjected to the random drug testing.

[00:29:06] Speaker 03:
What happens if there is a revocation of the medical certificate and or the pilot's license?

[00:29:16] Speaker 03:
Can that individual reapply?

[00:29:19] Speaker 03:
Yes, your individual. How would the FAA treat this?

[00:29:25] Speaker 03:
I mean, are you effectively asking for a lifetime ban on these facts?

[00:29:31] Speaker 05:
No, Your Honor. A revocation is not a lifetime ban. It's in place for a year, and then the individual is free to reapply.

[00:29:37] UNKNOWN:
Okay.

[00:29:40] Speaker 03:
Anything else, Judge Rao?

[00:29:43] UNKNOWN:
Okay.

[00:29:43] Speaker 03:
Thank you.

[00:29:47] Speaker 00:
Thank you, Your Honors.

[00:29:49] Speaker 00:
I do want to clear up something. With respect to Mr. Knight, knowing that he had that prohibited substance in his system, he testified that he didn't know that. As a layperson, he doesn't know how long that was stayed in his system.

[00:30:04] Speaker 01:
And with respect to this sanction... But that doesn't help because he's still reporting, not knowing how long something is in the system.

[00:30:12] Speaker 00:
Well, at the time, again, when he realized he had probably taken the medication, he was still dealing with a very ill child and not thinking ahead. He wasn't thinking ahead, and that was his testimony. It just never really dawned on him again. It was a...

[00:30:31] Speaker 00:
He never felt the effects of the medication.

[00:30:33] Speaker 01:
But those sound like arguments for mitigation.

[00:30:36] Speaker 00:
Right. Mitigation from revocation to suspension. Yes, Your Honor.

[00:30:42] Speaker 01:
But starting with the premise that revocation was generally available for this situation.

[00:30:47] Speaker 00:
Not under Henry and Myers, Your Honor.

[00:30:51] Speaker 00:
I would say that those cases are directly on point, and they even address your question, Your Honor, and that is about the medical certificate. In both of those cases, the revocation was removed and not affirmed, and a suspension was put in place. That applied to their medical as well.

[00:31:10] Speaker 03:
Yes, sir.

[00:31:13] Speaker 03:
ALJ decisions or?

[00:31:15] Speaker 00:
Yes, Your Honor. Those were ALJ decisions and the FAA did not appeal them. The FAA accepted those outcomes. So they do have a safety mandate. We're not disputing that. But then it still has to be reasonable as to the sanction that the FAA imposes.

[00:31:33] Speaker 00:
And with respect to wanting this case to be dismissed, I ask you to look at my trial brief, which was submitted before the hearing. This was always about the sanction. Mr. Knight didn't say, you know, I made a mistake and there should be no sanction. It was just the point that it shouldn't have been revocation.

[00:31:53] Speaker 03:
Okay. Judge Childs, Judge Rao?

[00:32:01] Speaker 03:
Anything else?

[00:32:02] Speaker 00:
Just in leaving you today, I just say that this case was not, this is not a case of wrongdoing. This was an unintentional act that led to a two-year suspension, which should have been a 90-day suspension. We don't think the FAA was reasonable and that the NTSB board erred when they found that finding us the sanction of, I'm sorry, a violation of the regulation supported substantial justification, and we just say that that is not the case.

[00:32:41] Speaker 00:
We ask that the case be remanded and each of these rewarded. Thank you very much.

[00:32:47] Speaker 03:
Case is submitted.