Smartmatic, Newsmax Defamation Suit Heads To Del. Trial

By Jeff Montgomery

A Delaware Superior Court judge on Thursday teed up a four-week trial starting Sept. 30 on voting machine provider Smartmatic USA Corp. claims that it was defamed by unsubstantiated Newsmax Media Inc. reports tying the voting tech company to alleged conspiracies to steal the 2020 presidential election.

3 documents attached | Read full article » | Save to favorites »

Crypto Lobbyist Hit With FTX Campaign Finance Charges

By Rachel Scharf

Manhattan federal prosecutors announced Thursday that Michelle Bond, a crypto industry lobbyist and the girlfriend of convicted former FTX executive Ryan Salame, has been charged with getting the now-defunct digital asset exchange to illegally finance her unsuccessful 2022 congressional campaign.

Indictment attached | Read full article » | Save to favorites »

Analysis

Judge Delays AI Trial In Thomson Reuters, ROSS IP Row

By Ivan Moreno

A Delaware federal judge on Thursday delayed the first trial involving an artificial intelligence product, postponing a highly anticipated clash in which Thomson Reuters is accusing tech startup ROSS Intelligence of creating an AI legal research platform using copyrighted material from the media company's Westlaw database.

Read full article » | Save to favorites »

3rd Circ. Denies Liberian Bank Whistleblower's Asylum Bid

By Rae Ann Varona

The Third Circuit ruled Thursday that a Liberian man can't claim asylum despite having "suffered horrors" after unearthing a fraud scheme involving Liberian government officials' relatives and refusing a politician's bribe, saying he did not show evidence that his alleged perpetrators targeted him for having an anti-corruption political opinion.

Opinion attached | Read full article » | Save to favorites »

Del. Jury Says No Infringement, Axes Data Storage IP Claims

By Lauren Berg

A Delaware federal jury found Thursday that Scale Computing Inc. did not infringe DataCore Software Corp.'s data storage patent and determined that the asserted claims are invalid as anticipated.

2 documents attached | Read full article » | Save to favorites »

Notable Q2 Updates In Insurance Class Actions

Mark Johnson and Mathew Drocton at BakerHostetler discuss the muted nature of the property and casualty insurance class action space in the second quarter of the year, with no large waves made in labor depreciation and total-loss vehicle class actions, but a new offensive theory emerging for insurance companies.

Read full article » | Save to favorites »

Series

Playing Golf Makes Me A Better Lawyer

Golf can positively affect your personal and professional life well beyond the final putt, and it’s helped enrich my legal practice by improving my ability to build lasting relationships, study and apply the rules, face adversity with grace, and maintain my mental and physical well-being, says Adam Kelly at Venable.

Read full article » | Save to favorites »

Client Wants Atty's Wife Held In Contempt In Malpractice Case

By Daniel Ducassi

A couple awarded a $1.2 million default malpractice judgment against their former lawyer have asked a Colorado state judge to hold the attorney's wife in contempt after she said in a deposition she failed to check whether she and her husband had joint bank accounts or to bring documents, as required by a subpoena. 

3 documents attached | Read full article » | Save to favorites »

Girardi Says High Court Holding Should Gut His Fraud Case

By Craig Clough

Tom Girardi has urged a California federal judge to toss the majority of the wire fraud charges he is facing ahead of closing arguments in his trial, saying a 1960 U.S. Supreme Court case demonstrates he was charged for nothing more than receiving legally required wire transfers.

2 documents attached | Read full article » | Save to favorites »

Ex-Reed Smith Atty Wants Pay Data In Bias Suit Against Firm

By Jake Maher

A former Reed Smith LLP attorney suing the firm for gender discrimination has told a New Jersey state court that the firm must turn over pay data for nonequity partners stretching back years for her to make her case.

Read full article » | Save to favorites »

In Case You Missed It: Hottest Firms And Stories On Law360

For those who missed out, here's a look back at the law firms, stories and expert analyses that generated the most buzz on Law360 last week.

Read full article » | Save to favorites »

DOJ Sues RealPage For Helping Fix Rental Rates

By Matthew Perlman

The U.S. Department of Justice filed an antitrust lawsuit Friday accusing RealPage of helping residential landlords across the country fix rental prices through the use of its revenue management software.

Complaint attached | Read full article » | Save to favorites »

Law360's Legal Lions Of The Week

By Kevin Penton

Gibson Dunn & Crutcher LLP, Fillmore Law Firm LLP, Bradley Arant Boult Cummings LLP, Sullivan & Cromwell LLP, the U.S. Chamber Litigation Center and the Business Roundtable lead this week's edition of Law360 Legal Lions, after a Texas federal judge blocked a Federal Trade Commission ban on noncompete agreements in employment contracts.

Read full article » | Save to favorites »

UK Litigation Roundup: Here's What You Missed In London

By Max Austin

The past week in London has seen Google sue several Russian media outlets in response to challenges to the tech giant's response to international sanctions, easyGroup bring an intellectual property claim against delivery company Easycargo, and e-money business Nyavo challenge action by the Financial Conduct Authority.

Read full article » | Save to favorites »

On Final Night Of DNC, Prosecutors Ruled The Stage

By Courtney Bublé

Vice President Kamala Harris invoked her experience as a prosecutor and an attorney general in her speech Thursday night in Chicago accepting the Democratic nomination for president.

Read full article » | Save to favorites »

Messner Reeves Commercial Litigator Jumps To Gordon Rees

By Madison Arnold

A former Messner Reeves LLP partner has jumped to Gordon Rees Scully Mansukhani LLP in San Diego to bolster its services in product and general liability matters, catastrophic brain injury cases and commercial litigation.

Read full article » | Save to favorites »

Ohio Judge Dinged For Public Posts About Guardianship Spat

By Emily Sawicki

The Ohio Supreme Court has publicly reprimanded a probate court judge for allowing staff to make inaccurate comments to the press about a guardianship case and for posting comments about the case on the court's Facebook page, including accusing a man of elder abuse without evidence.

Decision attached | Read full article » | Save to favorites »

Client Says Negligence Led To NJ Firm's Ransomware Attack

By Adrian Cruz

A client of The Wacks Law Group LLC hit the New Jersey firm with a proposed class action claiming that its negligence in properly securing its data storage led to the theft of hundreds of clients' personal information in a March cyberattack.

Complaint attached | Read full article » | Save to favorites »

GC Cheat Sheet: The Hottest Corporate News Of The Week

By Sue Reisinger

A U.S. court in Texas has agreed with tax company Ryan LLC's general counsel that the Federal Trade Commission's ban on noncompete agreements is illegal. And women still hold fewer than 26% of law firm equity partnerships, according to Law360 Pulse's 2024 Women in Law report.

Read full article » | Save to favorites »

NJ Panel Backs Dismissal Of Whistleblower Suit

By James Boyle

A former New Jersey assistant prosecutor did not provide a clear enough link between complaints he filed against his boss and an alleged retaliatory disciplinary action, a New Jersey appellate panel ruled Friday when it dismissed his whistleblower suit.

Opinion attached | Read full article » | Save to favorites »

Attys Fight Over Fee Award In Conservative Group's IRS Win

By Jared Foretek

A prominent conservative lawyer says like-minded election integrity group True the Vote owes his firm over $500,000 in attorney fees for a suit against the Internal Revenue Service that was settled years ago, telling a D.C. federal judge Friday that it's time for TTV to pay up.

Read full article » | Save to favorites »

Georgia Cases To Watch In The Last Half Of 2024

By Kelcey Caulder

The prosecutions of former President Donald Trump and his election interference case codefendants, along with Atlanta rapper Young Thug's bid to have the judge overseeing his racketeering trial removed from the case, will take center stage in Georgia's courts as we enter the second half of 2024.

Read full article » | Save to favorites »

ABA Guides Lawyers On Avoiding Criminal Transactions

By Emily Sawicki

Just over a year after the American Bar Association formalized long-standing due diligence rules for attorneys' interactions with clients, an ABA committee on Friday released its first ethics opinion providing guidance on interpreting the rules amendment.

Read full article » | Save to favorites »

Brief

2 Veteran Public Defenders Tapped For Mass. Bench

By Julie Manganis

Two longtime public defenders have been nominated as associate justices in Massachusetts state court, Gov. Maura Healey announced Friday.

Read full article » | Save to favorites »

LegalShield Used AI To Record Clients, Suit Says

By Nadia Dreid

Online legal service company LegalShield has been letting a call center software company use artificial intelligence to intercept, analyze and record its customer calls and chats, according to a lawsuit recently pulled into California federal court.

Complaint attached | Read full article » | Save to favorites »