Atty Not 'Annoying' Enough For Restraining Order

By Y. Peter Kang

A California appeals court affirmed Monday a finding that a personal injury attorney's aggressive behavior toward another attorney only rose to the level of "annoying" and thus didn't warrant a permanent restraining order, saying the behavior must rise to the level of "seriously annoying" to be considered harassment.

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Analysis

Top Personal Injury, Med Mal News: 2024 Midyear Report

By Y. Peter Kang

A high court ruling over whether bump stocks can be considered machine guns under a federal agency's rule banning the devices and a huge railroad settlement over a Norfolk Southern derailment disaster are among Law360's top personal injury and medical malpractice cases for the first six months of 2024.

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Philly Developer's Co. Must Pay $68.5M Over Worker's Death

By P.J. D'Annunzio

The family of a man who died after falling 50 feet from a scaffolding while installing siding on a luxury townhome has been awarded $68.5 million by a Philadelphia jury, sticking prominent city developer Ori Feibush's construction company with a hefty tab.

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Hunter Biden Says Fox News 'Humiliated' Him With Mock Trial

By Hailey Konnath

Hunter Biden has accused Fox News of humiliating and harassing him with its fictional, six-part "mock trial" series, which he called a politically motivated attack that featured sexually explicit photos of him, according to a privacy and personal injury lawsuit filed Sunday in New York state court.

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July 4 Parade Shooting Survivors In Ill. Sue Smith & Wesson

By Mike Curley

The families of victims of the 2022 July Fourth parade shooting in Highland Park, Illinois, are suing Smith & Wesson and firearm retailers in state court, alleging they deliberately marketed the M&P-15, an AR-15-style rifle, to appeal to people like the shooter.

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Workers Accuse Kanye West Of 'Extreme' Racism On The Job

By Dorothy Atkins

Eight young app developers have sued "Heartless" rapper Ye, formerly known as Kanye West, his company and its former chief of staff, conservative firebrand Milo Yiannopoulos, in California federal court, alleging they fostered a hostile and abusive working environment, subjecting them to "extreme racism," bullying and harassment without pay.

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Talc Victims Can't Block J&J From Filing For Ch. 11 Outside NJ

By Mike Curley

A New Jersey federal judge has denied a bid for a restraining order from a group of patients suing Johnson & Johnson over claims they were injured by its talc products, saying their concern that the company would try to file for bankruptcy outside the Garden State is based on speculation and not ripe for litigation.

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NJ Judge Tosses J&J Unit's Libel Claim Over Talc Study

By George Woolston

A New Jersey federal judge has tossed a bankrupt Johnson & Johnson unit's libel suit over a scientific article linking talcum powder to mesothelioma, ruling the challenged statements in the article are scientific conclusions protected by the First Amendment.

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4th Circ. Hikes Damages In 'Unite The Right' Rally Suit

By Travis Bland

The Fourth Circuit ruled Monday that Virginia's punitive damages cap must be applied on a per-plaintiff basis, reversing a federal district court ruling that had limited a nearly $24 million verdict against white supremacists accused of planning violence at the 2017 "Unite the Right" rally to a total of $350,000.

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Fla. Court Releases 2006 Epstein Grand Jury Transcripts

By David Minsky

A Florida state court judge on Monday made public the 2006 grand jury transcripts of the Jeffrey Epstein sex abuse investigation after a newspaper persuaded him to reconsider releasing them in light of a new law signed by Gov. Ron DeSantis earlier this year.

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Nev. Supreme Court Won't Give Gruden 2nd Try Against NFL

By David Steele

The Nevada Supreme Court will not rehear a decision to send to arbitration former Las Vegas Raiders head coach Jon Gruden's defamation lawsuit against the NFL, a three-member court panel ruled Monday.

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Feds Say Ex-Magellan Officer's Atty May Have Conflict

By Julie Manganis

A Donnelly Conroy & Gelhaar LLP attorney's prior representation of co-defendants in a pending fraud case against former executives of medical device company Magellan Diagnostics may have created a disqualifying conflict of interest, lawyers for the government told a Massachusetts federal judge.

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GSK Wants Lab's Zantac Whistleblower Suit Moved To Florida

By Matthew Santoni

GlaxoSmithKline wants a Connecticut laboratory's federal whistleblower lawsuit moved from Pennsylvania to Florida, where a West Palm Beach court has already overseen four years of a multidistrict litigation that GSK said was touched off by the same lab's claims that Zantac breaks down into a cancer-causing chemical.

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Colo. Justices To Mull If Xcel Is Immune From Injury Suits

By Daniel Ducassi

Colorado's justices announced Monday that they will consider whether a state-approved utility tariff governing Xcel's relationship with its customers can immunize the company from lawsuits about powerline injuries, including those brought by noncustomers.

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Conn. Lawmaker Says Cops Mishandled Her Sexual Assault

By Ryan Harroff

A Connecticut state lawmaker took the city of Hartford to federal court, alleging that its Police Department "discounted" her reports of sexual assault and subsequent injuries, and "leaked biased and skewed information" to news outlets after a man attacked her outside a prayer event officers were patrolling.

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Crumbl Aims To Burn Privacy Suit Over Info-Tracking Cookies

By Rae Ann Varona

Crumbl LLC has urged a California federal judge to dismiss a proposed class action alleging the cookie maker helped payments processor Stripe Inc. illegally track customer activity and collect sensitive information via website cookies, saying the plaintiff's "poorly drafted" complaint fails to allege an underlying privacy violation.

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Parsing Justices' Toss Of Purdue's Controversial Ch. 11 Plan

The U.S. Supreme Court's recent nixing of OxyContin manufacturer Purdue Pharma's Chapter 11 proposal prevents the Sackler family from settling thousands of civil opioid lawsuits without the consent of all of the plaintiffs, and holds profound implications for bankruptcy cases, say attorneys at MoloLamken.

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Calif. Long-Tail Ruling Continues Policyholder-Friendly Trend

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.

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Opinion

Atty Well-Being Efforts Ignore Root Causes Of The Problem

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.

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Northwestern Hires 'Mediocre' Minorities Over Men, Suit Says

By Lauren Berg

Northwestern University's law school favors hiring women and minority faculty candidates with "mediocre and undistinguished records" over better-credentialed white men, a conservative group claims in a lawsuit filed Tuesday in Chicago federal court, a year after the U.S. Supreme Court struck down affirmative action in higher education admissions.

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Ex-Senior Apple Atty To Pay SEC $1.1M For Insider Trading

By Gina Kim

Apple's former director of corporate law must pay $1.1 million to securities regulators stemming from criminal insider trading charges to which he pled guilty in 2022, a New Jersey federal judge said Tuesday, finding that his "egregious" violations warrant the penalty since "his very job" was to ensure compliance with securities laws.

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Giuliani Disbarred In New York Over Election Falsehoods

By Alex Wittenberg

A New York appellate court Tuesday barred Rudolph Giuliani from practicing law in New York, citing ample evidence that the former New York City mayor made repeated false statements about the 2020 presidential election.

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Trump's NY Sentencing Pushed To Sept. After Immunity Ruling

By Frank G. Runyeon

A New York judge on Tuesday delayed Donald Trump's criminal sentencing from July 11 until Sept. 18 to give prosecutors and the former president's attorneys time to argue over whether the U.S. Supreme Court's immunity decision vacates his conviction.

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Bond-Rigging Suit Revived Over Judge's Wife's Stock Conflict

By Katryna Perera

The Second Circuit on Tuesday revived a proposed class action accusing big banks of rigging corporate bonds, ruling that the New York federal judge who previously dismissed the suit should have recused himself due to his wife's ownership of Bank of America stock.

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Ex-Bankruptcy Judge Will Be Deposed Over Atty Romance

By Ryan Boysen

The former Texas bankruptcy judge whose secret relationship with a Jackson Walker LLP attorney ignited a major judicial ethics scandal has agreed to sit for a seven-hour deposition to answer questions about the episode.

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Armstrong Teasdale Pulls Back From SLC As 7 Join Dentons

By Andrea Keckley

Armstrong Teasdale LLP told Law360 Pulse on Tuesday that it plans to redirect resources from Salt Lake City, saying it is "not the right time for us to be there" after a Dentons member firm announced the day prior that it had hired seven of Armstrong Teasdale's Utah-based litigators.

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Data Breach Suits Drive Consumer Protection Docket Growth

By Allison Grande

Federal consumer protection lawsuits are back on the rise after nearly a decade of steady decline, with disputes over increasingly prevalent data breaches fueling the uptick, according to a Wednesday report by Lex Machina.

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After Fischer, Judge Releases Atty Convicted In Jan. 6 Riot

By Brandon Lowrey

A D.C. federal judge ordered the release of a Georgia attorney imprisoned for storming the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, saying his pending appeal would likely result in his freedom after the U.S. Supreme Court narrowed an obstruction of Congress law used to convict him and others involved in the assault.

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YSL Judge Shares Transcript Of Secret Witness Meeting

By Kelcey Caulder

The transcript of a secret meeting involving Fulton County prosecutors, a key state's witness and the judge overseeing the Young Slime Life case was released Monday, shortly after it was announced that proceedings in the case would be paused until an outside judge reviews motions for the judge's recusal.

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Pa. Clerk Named After Departures Spur 'Judicial Emergency'

By James Boyle

Dauphin County, Pennsylvania's president judge has selected an interim clerk of courts to take over the office's duties following last week's sudden resignation of the elected clerk and the Supreme Court's declaration of a judicial emergency.

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Depo Gets Dad Ousted From Sesame Place Race Bias Case

By Matthew Santoni

The father of a child who was allegedly snubbed by costumed performers at a Pennsylvania theme park has been removed from consolidated race bias litigation after plaintiffs' counsel said the father had lied during a deposition, with a Pennsylvania federal judge on Tuesday granting a bid by other families to sever their case from his.

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Dentons Says Ex-Client Can't Escape $4.7M Fee Suit In Texas

By Emily Johnson

International law firm Dentons Europe CS LLP urged a Texas federal court Tuesday to keep alive its suit accusing a Houston-area crisis response business of failing to pay more than $4.7 million in legal fees and said the correct venue was Texas, not England, as the business has argued.

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DLA Piper Tells Judge Fired Associate Got Proper Discovery

By Pete Brush

Counsel for DLA Piper LLP told a Manhattan federal judge on Tuesday the firm has provided responsive information to a former associate who claims she was unlawfully fired while pregnant, adding it is confident her termination was lawful.

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