10th Circ. Side-Eyes Gas Royalty Claims Against Chevron Unit

By Juan-Carlos Rodriguez

Tenth Circuit judges on Wednesday seemed skeptical of a Colorado oil and gas company's class claim that a Chevron Corp. subsidiary owes it a royalty payment on infrastructure improvements undertaken by a third company.

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10th Circ. Questions Sunoco Bid To Nix $180M Royalty Ruling

By Keith Goldberg

Tenth Circuit judges on Wednesday weighed Sunoco Inc.'s latest bid to undo a $180 million judgment for withholding late interest payments on oil royalties to Oklahoma landowners, and sharply questioned the company's argument that the class action should never have been certified.

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Colo. Justices Doubtful Students' COVID Fee Suit Will Survive

By Thy Vo

Colorado's justices were skeptical Wednesday that Colorado State University students seeking fee refunds for coronavirus campus shutdowns can bring an unjust enrichment claim, with one justice saying the students' attorney is advocating for an "enormous" extension of existing law.

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Beasley Allen And J&J Tussle Over Atty Sanctions Bid

By Madison Arnold

Beasley Allen Law Firm accused a Johnson & Johnson talc unit of using "deposition notices as weapons" in its quest to sanction a firm lawyer, while the company said the firm "refused to meaningfully subject itself or its members to any discovery" in its bankruptcy case.

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Girardi Pushes For New Trial Over Competency Claims

By Cara Salvatore

Counsel for Tom Girardi told a federal judge the disbarred attorney is plainly mentally incompetent and deserves a new trial over charges he defrauded clients of $15 million worth of settlement money.

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Wells Fargo Must Turn Over E-Docs In TelexFree Litigation

By Julie Manganis

A Massachusetts magistrate judge on Wednesday ordered Wells Fargo Advisors LLC to hand over electronic files maintained by a compliance manager who investigated potential misconduct by an employee handling accounts of TelexFree associates under investigation in a $3 billion Ponzi scheme.

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Xerox Faces Investor Suit Over 'Reinvention' Strategy

By Sydney Price

Business technology company Xerox Inc. has been hit with a proposed shareholder class action in New York federal court alleging the company's stockholders were harmed by a "reinvention" strategy it introduced in 2023 that yielded lower sales and revenue.

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Advance Notice Bylaw Measures Fuel Chancery Battle

By Jeff Montgomery

Arguing that recent corporate advance notice bylaws have resulted in "real, actual harm" to stockholders of Owings Corning and The AES Corp., attorneys for shareholders of both urged a Delaware vice chancellor on Wednesday to reject calls to dismiss challenges to the measures.

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Bumble Brass Fumbled App Revamps, Investor Suit Says

By Emilie Ruscoe

Current and former brass of dating app Bumble's parent company face shareholder derivative claims that they projected overconfidence about revamping its app, then saw trading prices crater when Bumble lowered its 2024 growth projections amid the tinkering.

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Lululemon Execs Hit With Derivative Suit Over DEI Program

By Bonnie Eslinger

Lululemon leadership was hit with a shareholder derivative suit Wednesday claiming they made false statements related to the company's new "Inclusion, Diversity, Equity and Action" program that artificially boosted the company's stock price and also concealed problems with the company's inventory allocation.

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Firms For Ohio Funds Aim To Steer ZoomInfo Investor Suit

By Ryan Harroff

Two Ohio retirement funds asked a Washington federal judge to name their attorneys from Labaton Keller Sucharow LLP and Byrnes Keller Cromwell LLP as lead counsel and liaison counsel in investor claims brought against ZoomInfo Technologies Inc. over its allegedly misguided attempts to maintain a pandemic-era customer boom.

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Ex-Pharma CEO Demands Legal Fees For SEC Probe

By Sydney Price

Cancer treatment development company Eagle Pharmaceuticals Inc.'s founder and ex-CEO told Delaware's Chancery Court Wednesday that he is entitled to legal fees he says the company owes him in connection with a U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission probe into the company's accounting practices, saying he continues to incur fees in addition to the $875,000 he has already requested.

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6th Circ. Revives 401(k) Fund Suit Against Parker-Hannifin

By Kellie Mejdrich

A split panel of the Sixth Circuit on Wednesday revived a proposed class action against Parker-Hannifin Corp. from workers who alleged mismanagement of their employee retirement plan, finding a lower court erred in dismissing claims that high-fee and poorly performing investment offerings in the plan violated federal benefits law.

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Mass. Town To Pay $102K To Settle Firefighters' OT Claim

By Brian Dowling

Nearly 120 firefighters in Brookline, Massachusetts, have agreed to a $101,604 settlement to resolve claims that the town shorted them on overtime calculations, according to a Wednesday filing.

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Worker Says He Was Fired For Flagging Class Action Form

By Emmy Freedman

A Denver restaurant group failed to fully compensate employees and fired a worker who refused to sign a form that would bar him from joining a wage and hour class action previously filed against the company, a lawsuit filed in Colorado state court said.

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CVS Can't Dodge Proposed Action Over 'Non-Drowsy' Claims

By Rae Ann Varona

CVS Pharmacy must continue facing a proposed class action alleging it "dangerously" markets over-the-counter medicine as "non-drowsy" despite containing a substance known to cause drowsiness after a Missouri federal judge on Wednesday refused to toss claims lodged under Missouri and other states' consumer protection laws.

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Veggie Co. Hit With False Ad Suit Over E. Coli Outbreak

By Mike Curley

A proposed class of consumers is suing Grimmway Enterprises Inc., alleging that it failed to disclose that its whole and baby carrot products were or could be contaminated with e. coli, deceiving buyers into thinking they were safe for consumption.

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Data Security Co. Shakes Suit Over Auto-Renewal Model

By Allison Grande

A North Carolina federal judge has axed a proposed class action accusing a digital security provider of tricking consumers into pricey subscriptions that were difficult to cancel, finding that while the dispute raises "legitimate societal concerns," the plaintiff failed to show that he was injured by this alleged conduct.

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Burger King Franchisee Escapes BIPA Coverage Counterclaim

By Celeste Bott

An Illinois federal judge has axed an AIG subsidiary's counterclaim in a Burger King franchisee's lawsuit seeking coverage for an underlying case accusing it of violating Illinois' biometric privacy law, concluding that the counterclaim is redundant and "adds nothing that will not be decided through resolution of the motions for summary judgment."

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DACA Recipient Fights To Keep NJ Apartment Bias Suit Alive

By Grace Dixon

A Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals recipient urged a New Jersey federal court not to toss her suit alleging a landlord wrongly refused her housing application, saying she was rejected because she didn't turn over documentation that is unavailable to DACA recipients.

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Attys Slam Deceptive NIL Settlement Services In NCAA Case

By Elaine Briseño

Class counsel in the massive NCAA name, image and likeness lawsuit have asked a California federal court to intervene with third-party servicing companies that are using misleading information while offering claims-filing services to class members in order to profit from the proposed $2.78 billion settlement.

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$3B TD Bank AML Settlement Is A Wake-Up Call For All Banks

TD Bank’s historic settlement over anti-money laundering violations, resulting in over $3 billion in penalties, reminds banks of all shapes and sizes why they need to take financial crime compliance seriously, and highlights three areas that may be especially vulnerable to enforcement, says Jack Harrington at Bradley Arant.

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What Cos. Can Learn from Water Microplastics Class Actions

Class actions against companies whose bottled spring water allegedly contains microplastics, challenging claims such as "natural" and "100% spring water," seem to be drying up — but these cases serve as a good reminder to other businesses to review regulatory standards, and carefully vet plaintiff allegations at the outset, say attorneys at Keller and Heckman.

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Bonus Spotlight

BigLaw Begins Matching Milbank On Associate Bonuses

By Aebra Coe

Following the news Tuesday that Cravath Swaine & Moore LLP will pay associates year-end and special bonuses in line with those handed out by Milbank LLP this year, the firms' peers have begun to respond, with swift matches Wednesday by Paul Hastings LLP and McDermott Will & Emery LLP.

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DOJ Settles With Atty Who Reported Judge's Sexual Misconduct

By Lauren Berg

A former Alaska federal prosecutor who made allegations of sexual misconduct against then-U.S. District Judge Joshua Kindred has reached an undisclosed settlement with the U.S. Department of Justice resolving claims she suffered retaliation for speaking up, the U.S. Office of Special Counsel said Wednesday.

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Foley Shouldn't Face Data Breach Claims, Calif. Panel Says

By Dorothy Atkins

A California appellate panel affirmed the dismissal of Accellion Inc.'s cross-complaint against law firm Foley & Lardner LLP in an insurance company's lawsuit claiming the software-maker should be held liable for a $1 million ransomware attack that targeted the law firm, finding that Accellion's cross-claims are untimely.

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Weil Litigation Leaders Jump To Paul Weiss In NY

By Tracey Read

The co-chair of Weil Gotshal & Manges LLP's global litigation department and the co-head of Weil's patent litigation practice will soon be joining Paul Weiss Rifkind Wharton & Garrison LLP in New York, the latter firm announced Wednesday.

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Akerman Opens In Charlotte With 2 Moore & Van Allen Hires

By Xiumei Dong

Akerman LLP announced Wednesday the firm opened its second North Carolina office in Charlotte and brought on two new partners from Moore & Van Allen PLLC, including the former head of its renewable energy project finance team and a tax law expert.

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Judiciary Touts Reforms In Handling Workplace Complaints

By Ryan Boysen

The federal judiciary is successfully reforming the controversial process that aims to protect its 30,000 employees from sexual harassment in the workplace, according to a new internal report released Wednesday, even as lawmakers have called for scrapping that process altogether and replacing it with a new one.

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Trump Wants 'Immediate Dismissal' Of NY Hush Money Case

By Frank G. Runyeon

President-elect Donald Trump's legal team told the New York judge who presided over his hush money trial that his conviction should be thrown out due to his "overwhelming victory" at the polls, according to a filing released Wednesday.

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Musk, Ramaswamy Say High Court Rulings OK Federal Cuts

By Lauren Berg

Billionaire Elon Musk and former presidential candidate Vivek Ramaswamy, President-elect Donald Trump's picks to lead a newly created "Department of Government Efficiency," on Wednesday said two recent U.S. Supreme Court rulings will give them the authority to cut off power to regulatory agencies and conduct massive federal layoffs.

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House Dem Proposes Vote Forcing Release Of Gaetz Report

By Hailey Konnath

U.S. Rep. Sean Casten on Wednesday introduced a resolution that would require the House of Representatives to vote on whether the House Ethics Committee must release its report on the allegations against former U.S. Rep. Matt Gaetz, a proposal unveiled the same day the ethics committee failed to reach a consensus.

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Fed. Judges Still Seek New Bench Seats Amid Dems' Loss

By Courtney Bublé

The Federal Judges Association is urging the House to pass the bipartisan bill that would expand the federal courts in order to meet rising caseloads, even as the Biden administration appears to be cooling on the idea it once supported.

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Calif. Judicial Nominee Asked About Race, Parenting Writings

By Courtney Bublé

A California judicial nominee's previous writing about the murder of George Floyd in 2020, which sparked a national reckoning on race, was the subject of debate during a Senate nomination hearing on Wednesday.

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Washington State, DC District Court Picks Secure Seats

By Courtney Bublé

The Senate on Wednesday voted 50-48 to confirm Washington Court of Appeals Judge Rebecca L. Pennell to the Eastern District of Washington and 50-49 to confirm Amir Ali, former president and executive director of the MacArthur Justice Center and co-director of the Criminal Justice Appellate Clinic at Harvard Law School, to the District of Columbia.

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