California

  • August 12, 2024

    TikTok Hit With Another Children's Privacy Breach Suit

    A group of parents has filed a proposed class action against TikTok and its parent company in California federal court alleging invasion of privacy and unfair business practices targeting millions of children under age 13 across the United States.

  • August 12, 2024

    UK Competition Watchdog Looking Into $35B Software Deal

    The U.K.'s competition regulator said Monday it is delving into whether Synopsys Inc.'s $35 billion acquisition of Ansys Inc. will hurt competition in the region.

  • August 12, 2024

    Beyond Meat Escapes Investor Suit Over Production Woes

    A California federal judge has tossed a proposed class action accusing vegan burger manufacturer Beyond Meat of securities fraud, saying investors will need to be more specific about what the company's CEO knew at the time he touted the company's allegedly faltering partnerships with fast-food restaurants like McDonald's.

  • August 12, 2024

    King & Spalding Adds Freshfields M&A Ace In Silicon Valley

    King & Spalding LLP is expanding its corporate team, announcing Monday it is bringing in a Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer LLP mergers and acquisitions expert as a partner in its Silicon Valley office.

  • August 12, 2024

    Catching Up With Delaware's Chancery Court

    Multimillion-dollar share conversions, power struggles in a classic rock band, a good deal for fandom collectibles, and a pindown by two heavyweights were all part of the spectacle in Delaware's Court of Chancery last week. New cases involved pharmaceutical companies, cannabis, drones and liquid-gas exports. In case you missed it, here's the latest from the Chancery Court.

  • August 12, 2024

    Celebrity Photo Companies Hit Ye With $1.5M Copyright Suit

    Ye, the musical artist formerly known as Kanye West, was hit with a $1.5 million copyright infringement suit by two celebrity photography companies that claimed he posted at least 10 of their photos to his Instagram account and his Yeezy website without permission.

  • August 09, 2024

    Ex-Twitter Board Member Says X Owes Him $23M From Stock

    A former member of Twitter's board of directors who helped oversee the sale of the social media company to Elon Musk in 2022 claimed X Corp. owes him more than $23 million worth of vested and unvested shares, according to a lawsuit filed in California state court.

  • August 09, 2024

    Google Beats Users' Challenge To Apple Pact, For Now

    A California federal judge on Friday dismissed, for now, consumers' suit alleging that Google made an illegal pact with Apple to serve as the iPhone's default search engine, a decision that comes days after a D.C. federal court held that Google is a monopolist in a separate antitrust case.

  • August 09, 2024

    Real Estate Recap: Big 4 Market Views, Gas-Ban Backfire, AI

    Catch up on this week's key developments by state from Law360 Real Estate Authority — including what the largest commercial real estate brokers expect from capital markets in the second half of the year, how municipalities are reacting to the Ninth Circuit striking down Berkeley, California's natural gas-hookup ban, and why Brookfield Corp. is betting big on AI.

  • August 09, 2024

    Split 9th Circ. Affirms Ax Of Meta Anti-Vax Censorship Suit

    A split Ninth Circuit panel Friday affirmed the dismissal of Children's Health Defense's lawsuit challenging Meta's policy of censoring its anti-vaccine Facebook posts, with the majority concluding that the Robert F. Kennedy Jr.-founded nonprofit failed to show Meta was acting on the government's behalf to state viable constitutional claims.

  • August 09, 2024

    9th Circ. Wipes Out BNSF's Retaliation Win

    The Ninth Circuit on Friday overturned BNSF Railway Co.'s win in a late conductor's retaliation suit on Friday, saying the railroad failed to show it would've terminated the worker regardless of his refusal to stop conducting a brake test — even though the employer has insisted he was mainly fired for insubordination and misreporting his time card.

  • August 09, 2024

    Valeant's Legal Gripe A Total 'Nothingburger,' Justices Told

    A lawyer who assembled a whistleblower lawsuit against a major pharmaceutical company using publicly available patent board filings says the larger legal question of whether he can do that is way too niche for the U.S. Supreme Court to bother thinking about.

  • August 09, 2024

    Tesla Can't Duck Workers' PAGA Case Under Anti-SLAPP

    A California appellate court has rejected Tesla's attempt to ditch a Private Attorneys General Act case brought by former employees seeking personnel records, agreeing with a lower court that the workers' status as members of a class in a related action against Tesla doesn't entitle the electric-car maker to protection under anti-SLAPP.

  • August 09, 2024

    SVB's $1.9B FDIC Suit Won't Open 'Floodgates,' Judge Says

    A California federal judge trimmed claims from the parent of Silicon Valley Bank's lawsuit against the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. seeking $1.93 billion, but rejected the agency's arguments that allowing some claims to move forward will "open the floodgates" for every failed bank's uninsured depositors to bring a claim.

  • August 09, 2024

    Rugby League's US Subscribers Say Private Info Was Stolen

    The international streaming service for Australian professional rugby disclosed personal information to Meta and other parties without the subscribers' knowledge or consent, according to a proposed class action from subscribers filed on Friday in California federal court.

  • August 09, 2024

    Meta Urges Justices To Ax Investors' Risk Disclosure Suit

    Meta Platforms Inc. filed its opening brief Friday urging the U.S. Supreme Court to reverse a Ninth Circuit decision that kept alive a class action stemming from the Cambridge Analytica data abuse scandal, arguing that decision would create unnecessary disclosure obligations and encourage "fraud by hindsight" lawsuits.

  • August 09, 2024

    Lucid Narrows Securities Suit Over EV Production Targets

    A California federal judge has trimmed a suit alleging electric-vehicle startup Lucid Group Inc. misled investors about its production target, trimming the case down to four out of 30 statements the investors said were misleading.

  • August 09, 2024

    Aetna Illegally Axed Exec's Disability Benefits, Judge Says

    A California federal judge said Aetna was wrong to end an executive's disability benefits after it found he suffered from a mental illness instead of a physical disability, stating the insurer used flawed doctor opinions and may have been motivated by cutting costs.

  • August 09, 2024

    Justices Urged To Turn Away $1.3B Sovereign Immunity Case

    A commercial division of India's space agency is urging the U.S. Supreme Court not to revisit a Ninth Circuit decision refusing to enforce a $1.3 billion arbitral award issued to a satellite communications company, arguing that the jurisdictional question raised in the petition has been long settled.

  • August 09, 2024

    Former Syrian Prison Chief Accused Of US Immigration Fraud

    Federal grand jurors in California have charged a former Syrian official with covering up his time running a Syrian prison where political dissidents were physically abused on U.S. immigration applications.

  • August 09, 2024

    Investor Can't Drop Fraud Suit Against Crowdfunding CEO

    A California cannabis investor cannot withdraw his lawsuit against a CEO he accused of helping to operate a $2 million crowdfunding scheme, a federal judge ruled, saying the investor now needs the defendant's permission.

  • August 09, 2024

    Fisher Phillips Adds Tharpe & Howell Litigator In Calif.

    Labor and employment firm Fisher Phillips added a new partner from Tharpe & Howell LLP in California to bolster its bench of attorneys handling high-stakes class action matters and Private Attorneys General Act claims.

  • August 08, 2024

    Amazon Actors' Overtime Dispute Can Go Back To State Court

    A background actor can take her unpaid wages class action against Amazon Studios back to state court, a California federal judge concluded, finding federal labor law doesn't preempt the claims, which involved the payment of hourly rates that didn't fall under collective bargaining agreements with SAG-AFTRA.

  • August 08, 2024

    SPAC Investors Can't Sue Lucid Over Merger, 9th Circ. Says

    The Ninth Circuit on Thursday refused to revive investors' proposed class action alleging that Lucid duped them into buying stock in a special purpose acquisition company ahead of the electric-vehicle maker's $11.75 billion merger, saying an acquiring company's investors can't sue the target company over its alleged misstatements before the merger.

  • August 08, 2024

    Oracle's $115M Deal For Selling Internet Users' Data Gets OK

    A California federal judge on Thursday preliminarily approved Oracle's $115 million deal to end a proposed class action alleging that the software company illegally sold internet users' electronic profiles, but expressed concern over an "overly burdensome" opt-out process that Oracle's lawyer said would prevent "mass" opt-outs.

Expert Analysis

  • How To Clean Up Your Generative AI-Produced Legal Drafts

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    As law firms increasingly rely on generative artificial intelligence tools to produce legal text, attorneys should be on guard for the overuse of cohesive devices in initial drafts, and consider a few editing pointers to clean up AI’s repetitive and choppy outputs, says Ivy Grey at WordRake.

  • Calif. Ruling Heightens Medical Product Maker Liability

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    The California Supreme Court's decision in Himes v. Somatics last month articulates a new causation standard for medical product manufacturer liability that may lead to stronger product disclosures nationwide and greater friction between manufacturers and physicians, say attorneys at Cooley.

  • Constitutional Protections For Cannabis Companies Are Hazy

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    Cannabis businesses are subject to federal enforcement and tax, but often without the benefit of constitutional protections — and the entanglement of state and federal law and conflicting judicial opinions are creating confusion in the space, says Amber Lengacher at Purple Circle.

  • Series

    After Chevron: Various Paths For Labor And Employment Law

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    Labor and employment law leans heavily on federal agency guidance, so the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision to toss out Chevron deference will ripple through this area, with future workplace policies possibly taking shape through strategic litigation, informal guidance, state-level regulation and more, says Alexander MacDonald at Littler.

  • Series

    Boxing Makes Me A Better Lawyer

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    Boxing has influenced my legal work by enabling me to confidently hone the skills I've learned from the sport, like the ability to remain calm under pressure, evaluate an opponent's weaknesses and recognize when to seize an important opportunity, says Kirsten Soto at Clyde & Co.

  • Opinion

    Industry Self-Regulation Will Shine Post-Chevron

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    The U.S. Supreme Court's Loper decision will shape the contours of industry self-regulation in the years to come, providing opportunities for this often-misunderstood practice, says Eric Reicin at BBB National Programs.

  • 3 Ways Agencies Will Keep Making Law After Chevron

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    The U.S. Supreme Court clearly thinks it has done something big in overturning the Chevron precedent that had given deference to agencies' statutory interpretations, but regulated parties have to consider how agencies retain significant power to shape the law and its meaning, say attorneys at K&L Gates.

  • Roundup

    After Chevron

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    In the month since the U.S. Supreme Court overturned the Chevron deference standard, this Expert Analysis series has featured attorneys discussing the potential impact across 26 different rulemaking and litigation areas.

  • Navigating Scrutiny Of Friendly Professional Corps. In Calif.

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    In light of ongoing scrutiny and challenges to private equity participation in the California healthcare marketplace, particularly surrounding the use of the friendly professional corporation model, management services organizations should consider implementing four best practices, say attorneys at Holland & Knight.

  • Series

    Calif. Banking Brief: All The Notable Legal Updates In Q2

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    The second quarter of 2024 in California, which saw efforts to expand consumer protection legislation and enforcement actions in areas of federal focus like medical debt and student loans, demonstrated that the state's role as a trendsetter in consumer financial protection will continue for the foreseeable future, say attorneys at Sheppard Mullin.

  • Opinion

    Atty Well-Being Efforts Ignore Root Causes Of The Problem

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    The legal industry is engaged in a critical conversation about lawyers' mental health, but current attorney well-being programs primarily focus on helping lawyers cope with the stress of excessive workloads, instead of examining whether this work culture is even fundamentally compatible with lawyer well-being, says Jonathan Baum at Avenir Guild.

  • Calif. Long-Tail Ruling Continues Policyholder-Friendly Trend

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    The California Supreme Court's recent ruling in Truck Insurance Exchange v. Kaiser Cement & Gypsum, rejecting horizontal policy exhaustion, was the latest in a string of its decisions involving insurance coverage for continuous or progressive injury claims that favor policyholders, say Billie Mandelbaum and David Goodwin at Covington.

  • A Case Study For Calif. Cities In Water Utility Takeovers

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    With growing water scarcity and drier weather looming, some local governments in California have sought to acquire investor-owned water utilities by eminent domain — but the 2016 case of Claremont v. Golden State Water is a reminder that such municipalization attempts must meet certain statutory requirements, say attorneys at Nossaman.

  • Series

    Skiing And Surfing Make Me A Better Lawyer

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    The skills I’ve learned while riding waves in the ocean and slopes in the mountains have translated to my legal career — developing strong mentor relationships, remaining calm in difficult situations, and being prepared and able to move to a backup plan when needed, says Brian Claassen at Knobbe Martens.

  • Justices' Removal Ruling Presents Hurdles, But Offers Clarity

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    The U.S. Supreme Court’s recent decision in Campos-Chaves v. Garland and two other consolidated cases endorses a multistep notice practice that could impair noncitizens' access to adequate judicial notice, but its resolution of a longstanding circuit split also provides much-needed clarity, says Devin Connolly at Reeves Immigration Law Group.

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