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Appellate
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June 21, 2024
Uber, Lyft Can't Dodge Suit Via Arbitration, Calif. Tells Justices
California has urged the U.S. Supreme Court not to revive bids from Uber and Lyft to arbitrate allegations they unlawfully misclassified drivers as independent contractors, saying it's "commonly understood" that private parties' arbitration agreements have no bearing on whether state officials can sue for state law violations.
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June 21, 2024
Off The Bench: ACC-FSU Rematch, Supreme Win For Fla. Tribe
In this week's Off The Bench, the next round of venue tug-of-war begins between the Atlantic Coast Conference and Florida State University, the U.S. Supreme Court hands Florida and the Seminole Tribe a lucrative gaming win, and Roger Goodell and Jerry Jones defend the NFL's handling of its Sunday Ticket package.
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June 21, 2024
Ga. Panel Orders New Trial In $2M Case Over Car Accident
The Georgia Court of Appeals on Friday reversed a judgment, vacated an attorney fee award and ordered a new trial in a case in which a jury awarded a man $2 million in damages after he was rear-ended while heading home from work in 2018.
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June 21, 2024
Billing Report Order Was 'Overly Broad' In Injury Suit, Panel Says
A Georgia appeals court on Friday vacated a trial court order requiring a medical provider and its claims manager to produce a database report with financial and billing information during discovery in a car accident case, saying the order was overly broad and didn't do enough to protect the companies' confidential information.
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June 21, 2024
Mich. Appeals Panel Rescinds Coverage For Auto Policy Fraud
A Michigan appeals court panel said a trial court was wrong for not rescinding auto insurance coverage held by a woman who made misstatements on her insurance application before she was injured in an accident.
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June 21, 2024
Ayahuasca Church Is Not Tax-Exempt, DC Circ. Affirms
An Iowa church that used a psychedelic drug in its rites was correctly denied tax-exempt status, the D.C. Circuit affirmed Friday, saying the church's main purpose is using a federally illegal drug for which it lacked approval for religious use.
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June 21, 2024
Ex-GM Workers Can't Prove Anti-White Bias
A Michigan appeals court rejected efforts from two former General Motors workers to revive claims that they were fired because they are white, ruling that they fundamentally misunderstood the law and failed to rebut GM's argument that their persistent use of coarse language led to the firings.
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June 21, 2024
Wrong Address Dooms Removal Relief Bid, 11th Circ. Finds
The Eleventh Circuit won't reverse the long-ago removal in absentia of a Honduran woman who missed her removal hearing, citing the Board of Immigration Appeals' finding that she'd provided an inaccurate address to receive notice of the hearing.
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June 21, 2024
Ex-Chicago Alderman Burke Can't Delay Sentencing
Former Chicago Alderman Ed Burke can't postpone his Monday sentencing on charges of racketeering, extortion and bribery to await a U.S. Supreme Court ruling on the scope of federal bribery law, an Illinois federal judge ruled Friday, saying that decision will have "little or no impact" on Burke's fate.
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June 21, 2024
11th Circ. Rules Hotel Operator Liable For Wages As Employer
A hotel operator exercised enough control over a front desk worker to be his employer and is therefore liable for minimum wage and overtime, the Eleventh Circuit ruled, also noting that a lower court erred in calculating the damages.
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June 21, 2024
Atty Convicted Of Pot Bribe Wins Bail At 1st Circ.
A suspended Massachusetts attorney convicted last fall of attempting to bribe a police chief to help his client secure a cannabis license will remain free pending his appeal, the First Circuit ruled Friday, reversing a district judge's decision.
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June 21, 2024
Mich. Panel Says Default Judgment Covered Per No-Fault Law
A Progressive unit must pay a $250,000 default judgment in a motor vehicle negligence case even though the insurer said its policyholder failed to cooperate, a Michigan appeals court ruled, finding a state Supreme Court decision predating Michigan's no-fault insurance reform was still applicable.
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June 21, 2024
5th Circ. Knocks Out National Block On ACA Preventive Care
The Fifth Circuit on Friday struck down a national injunction against Affordable Care Act requirements forcing insurers to cover a range of preventive treatments, but kept a block in place that prevents its application to the individuals and businesses in Texas that sued.
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June 21, 2024
Pa. Justices Will Weigh If 'Skill Games' Are Slot Machines
The Supreme Court of Pennsylvania will take up a case and decide whether the "Pennsylvania Skill Games" that combine a chance-based game mode with a secondary memory game fall under the state's definition of "slot machines," potentially affecting many storefronts and bars where the game machines have proliferated.
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June 21, 2024
Ga. Appeals Seat Winner Aims To Nix Election Challenge
The winner of a Georgia appeals court seat says his opponent does not have any proof to support her allegations of his residency discrepancies and her motion to reverse the election should be dismissed.
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June 21, 2024
Novel Ruling Backs Contact Sanctions For Texas Pro Se Atty
Addressing an issue of first impression in the Lone Star State, a Texas appellate court has ruled that an attorney's pro se status did not save him from a sanctions ruling for violating the state's no-contact rule by sending communications directly to members of the Commission for Lawyer Discipline.
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June 21, 2024
9/11 Firm Consultant Acted Alone In Depo Leak, 2nd Circ. Told
A New York law firm representing victims of the 9/11 terrorist attacks in a multidistrict litigation told the Second Circuit that a consultant who leaked a deposition transcript to the press acted by himself, asking an appellate panel to reverse millions of dollars in sanctions.
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June 21, 2024
6th Circ. Says Counties Not On Hook For Mich. Dam Collapse
A Sixth Circuit panel agreed that two Michigan counties can't be forced to compensate homeowners for destructive flooding caused by a dam's collapse, finding Thursday that the counties did not cause the damage to the homeowners' properties.
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June 21, 2024
High Court Opens Expert Testimony Basis To Confrontation
The U.S. Supreme Court ruled Friday that Arizona prosecutors may have violated a criminal defendant's Sixth Amendment right to confront witnesses testifying against him by presenting a substitute expert witness at trial, and sent the case back down to state court for further proceedings.
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June 21, 2024
Justices Keep Domestic Abusers Disarmed, Clarify Bruen
The U.S. Supreme Court rejected a Texas man's constitutional challenge to a federal law prohibiting people subject to domestic violence restraining orders from possessing firearms Friday, providing limited guidance to lower courts on how to apply the high court's Second Amendment historical analogue test.
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June 21, 2024
Justices Strengthen Jury Trial Rights For Stiffer Sentences
The constitutional rights to due process and trial by jury extend to a pivotal prong of a prominent sentencing enhancement for recidivism, the U.S. Supreme Court held in a Friday decision that casts doubt on many incarcerations and promises to reshape future trials.
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June 21, 2024
Justices Won't Allow Citizens To Contest Denied Spouse Visas
The U.S. Supreme Court ruled Friday that Americans do not have a constitutional right to challenge the U.S. Department of State's denial of spousal visa applications, rejecting a woman's bid to review the department's rejection of her Salvadoran husband's visa.
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June 21, 2024
Justices Say No Feds, No Dice In Texas-NM Water Deal
The U.S. Supreme Court on Friday ruled that Texas, New Mexico and Colorado improperly excluded the federal government from an agreement that resolved a Rio Grande water sharing dispute, rejecting the states' argument that the conflict was theirs alone to settle.
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June 20, 2024
TikTok Says Alternatives To 'Dangerous' Ban Were Ignored
TikTok said Thursday that federal lawmakers likely didn't even consider its "exhaustive, multi-year efforts" to address national security concerns before deciding to ban the social media platform, slamming the law as "unprecedented" and warning that it sets "a dangerous precedent."
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June 20, 2024
5th Circ. Starts Clock For Redo Bid In CFPB Payday Rule Case
The Fifth Circuit said Wednesday that payday lender trade groups will have an opportunity to ask for another shot at litigating the validity of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau's payday lending rule after their constitutional challenge fell flat at the U.S. Supreme Court.
Expert Analysis
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10 Years After Alice, Predictability Debate Lingers
A decade after the U.S. Supreme Court’s Alice ruling, critics continue to argue that the subject matter eligibility framework it established yields inconsistent results, but that contention is disproved by affirmance data from the Federal Circuit, district courts and the Patent Trial and Appeal Board, say Dennis Abdelnour and David Thomas at Honigman.
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Cannabis Ruling Lights Path For Bankruptcy Protection
A recent Massachusetts bankruptcy appellate court ruling in Blumsack v. Harrington leaves the door open for those employed in the cannabis industry to seek bankruptcy relief where certain conditions are met, but rescheduling marijuana as a Schedule III drug may complicate matters, say Jane Haviland and Kathryn Droumbakis at Mintz.
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This Earth Day, Consider How Your Firm Can Go Greener
As Earth Day approaches, law firms and attorneys should consider adopting more sustainable practices to reduce their carbon footprint — from minimizing single-use plastics to purchasing carbon offsets for air travel — which ultimately can also reduce costs for clients, say M’Lynn Phillips and Lisa Walters at IMS Legal Strategies.
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Questions Persist After Ruling Skirts $925M TCPA Award Issue
After an Oregon federal court's recent Wakefield v. ViSalus ruling that the doctrine of constitutional avoidance precluded it from deciding whether a $925 million Telephone Consumer Protection Act damages award was constitutionally sound, further guidance is needed on when statutory damages violate due process, says Michael Klotz at O'Melveny.
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Discord Stock Case Toss Means Little For Fraud Defendants
A Texas federal court’s recent dismissal of fraud charges related to a "pump and dump" scheme on Discord is an outlier after the U.S. Supreme Court scrapped the right-to-control theory of fraud last year, and ultimately won't deter the government from pursuing routine securities prosecutions, says William Johnston at Bird Marella.
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Clarifying Legal Elements To Support A Genocide Claim At ICJ
Reporting on South Africa’s dispute against Israel in the International Court of Justice largely fails to clearly articulate what a case for genocide alleged in the context of war requires — a technical analysis that will evaluate several key factors, from the scale of the devastation to statements by officials, say Solomon Shinerock and Alex Bedrosyan at Lewis Baach.
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Policy Misrepresentations Carry Insurance Rescission Risks
The Second Circuit's recent decision in Medical Mutual v. Gnik, finding that material misrepresentation in a clinic's insurance applications warranted policy rescission, is a clear example of the far-reaching effects that misrepresentations can have and provides a reminder that policyholders should employ relatively straightforward steps to decrease risks, say attorneys at Hunton.
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Back Labels In False Ad Cases Get Some Clarity In 9th Circ.
Courts in the Ninth Circuit have recently delivered a series of wins to advertisers, making clear that any ambiguity on the front of a product's package can be resolved by reference to the back label — which guarantees defendants a powerful tool to combat deceptive labeling claims, say attorneys at Patterson Belknap.
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What Bankruptcy Deadline Appeal May Mean For Claimants
If the Third Circuit reverses a recent appeal made in In re: Promise Healthcare, litigation claimants within the circuit will not be able to rely on the proof of claim process to preserve the claim — but if the court affirms, the U.S. Supreme Court may need to step in to resolve the circuit split on this issue, say attorneys at DLA Piper.
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Why Fed. Circ. Should Resolve District Split On Patent Statute
A split exists among district courts in their analysis of when marking cannot be done on a patented article due to its character, and the Federal Circuit should consider clarifying the analysis of Section 287(a), a consequential statute with important implications for patent damages, say Nicholas Nowak and Jamie Dohopolski at Sterne Kessler.
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Employers Beware Of NLRB Changes On Bad Faith Bargaining
Recent National Labor Relations Board decisions show a trend of the agency imposing harsher remedies on employers for bad faith bargaining over union contracts, a position upheld in the Ninth Circuit's recent NLRB v. Grill Concepts Services decision, says Daniel Johns at Cozen O'Connor.
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Practicing Law With Parkinson's Disease
This Parkinson’s Awareness Month, Adam Siegler at Greenberg Traurig discusses his experience working as a lawyer with Parkinson’s disease, sharing both lessons on how to cope with a diagnosis and advice for supporting colleagues who live with the disease.
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When Trade Secret Protection And Nat'l Security Converge
The Trump administration's anti-espionage program focused on China is over, but federal enforcement efforts to protect trade secrets and U.S. national security continue, and companies doing business in high-risk jurisdictions need to maintain their compliance programs to avoid the risk of being caught in the crosshairs of an investigation, say attorneys at Baker McKenzie.
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Why Incorporating By Reference Is Rarely Good Practice
The Federal Circuit’s recent ruling in Promptu Systems v. Comcast serves as a reminder that while incorporating by reference may seem efficient, it is generally prohibited by courts and can lead to sanctions when used to bypass a word count limit, says Cullen Seltzer at Sands Anderson.
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Strategies For Defense Attys To Subpoena A Nonparty Witness
Federal criminal defendants seeking to subpoena potentially exculpatory information from nonparty witnesses must satisfy a stringent standard and should consider several often overlooked arguments to assure courts they’re not engaging in a fishing expedition, says James Roberts at Schlam Stone.