Aerospace & Defense

  • October 03, 2024

    Md. Woman Gets House Arrest For No-Show Contractor Job

    A Maryland woman will spend six months on home confinement for accepting nearly $500,000 in salary for a no-show job arranged by her boyfriend, a U.S. Army contracting officer, a Massachusetts federal judge has ordered.

  • October 03, 2024

    White House Directs Agencies On Responsible AI Acquisition

    The White House has issued guidance to agencies on responsible purchases of artificial intelligence, addressing issues such as mitigating associated privacy and performance risks, ensuring the market for AI remains competitive, and enabling related collaboration across the government.

  • October 03, 2024

    Aerospace Co. Says Conn. Town Wrongly Taxed $8M In Assets

    A unit of a U.K.-based aerospace manufacturer is claiming that a Connecticut town overvalued its taxable personal property by nearly $8 million after the company moved nearly $20 million worth of its property out of the jurisdiction, according to a suit filed in state court.

  • October 02, 2024

    Ex-Airline Exec Sentenced To 32 Months For $32M Scam

    A New York federal court has handed down a 32-month prison sentence to a businessman who confessed to a conspiracy to defraud his former employer, Polar Air Cargo Worldwide Inc., of more than $32 million.

  • October 02, 2024

    Sikorsky Must Face Chopper Crash Suit In US, Pa. Judge Says

    A Pennsylvania federal judge on Tuesday ordered a lawsuit against Sikorsky Aircraft by the estates of Canadian military personnel who died in a helicopter crash to remain in the U.S., finding the allegedly defective copter was designed, developed and upgraded here and litigating it in Pennsylvania would expedite resolution.

  • October 02, 2024

    Lawyers Fail To Overturn EU Ban On Legal Services To Russia

    The European General Court on Wednesday dismissed an attempt by French and Belgian lawyers to overturn prohibitions on providing legal advice to Russia, clarifying that the ban only applies when the advice has no link to judicial proceedings.

  • October 02, 2024

    Bid-Rig Charges Irrelevant To $26M Base Award, GAO Says

    The U.S. Government Accountability Office has shot down a contractor's protest over a rival company being awarded a $26 million Army hospital maintenance contract, finding that the awardee's conviction for bid-rigging in Korea had no bearing on its track record of successful operations.

  • October 01, 2024

    Latham, Milbank Guide StandardAero's Upsized $1.4B IPO

    StandardAero Inc., a private equity-backed aerospace services provider, announced Tuesday it raised more than $1.4 billion in an initial public offering that's larger than the issuer first intended and is one of the year's largest offerings, with Latham & Watkins LLP advising the company and Milbank LLP serving as counsel for the underwriters.

  • October 01, 2024

    Novel FCA Decision Amplifies Voices Of Whistleblower Critics

    A Florida federal judge's characterization of whistleblowers as self-appointed "special prosecutors" when they file lawsuits on the federal government's behalf amplifies the voices of critics questioning the constitutionality of a key enforcement tool for fighting fraud, while threatening to create a circuit split.

  • October 01, 2024

    Military Contractor's Widow Can Continue Death Benefit Suit

    A widow's pursuit of $670,000 in benefits following her husband's death in Afghanistan while training the country's police force can continue, an Illinois federal judge ruled, trimming claims against the man's employers and benefits administrators but leaving her breach of contract claim against an insurer intact.

  • October 01, 2024

    Steward Can't Be Forced To Reassign Contract In Ch. 11

    While a government contractor was within its rights to end a subcontracting agreement with embattled hospital group Steward Health, the Bankruptcy Code's provisions for assignment of contracts mean the debtor can't be compelled to reassign the agreement while in Chapter 11, a Texas bankruptcy judge said Tuesday.

  • October 01, 2024

    Ex-DHS GC Returns To Sheppard Mullin As Nat'l Security Head

    The U.S. Department of Homeland Security's former general counsel Jonathan Meyer has bounced between the agency and Sheppard Mullin Richter & Hampton LLP since 2016, and now after three years as DHS' top lawyer, the firm said Tuesday he's returning to lead its national security group in D.C.

  • October 01, 2024

    Army Judge Advocate General Joins Shook Hardy

    Shook Hardy & Bacon LLP announced Tuesday that it has added a retired Army Judge Advocate General in Washington, D.C., bolstering the firm's business litigation, government investigations and white collar practices.

  • September 30, 2024

    Plane Parts Exec Loses Appeal In Honeywell Fraud Case

    The Second Circuit refused Monday to free the president of an airplane parts supplier from a seven-year prison sentence over a $15 million fraud on Honeywell International Inc., rejecting his protest over evidence admitted for consciousness of guilt.

  • September 30, 2024

    DC Judge Won't Allow Single Trial In Admiral's Bribery Case

    A D.C. federal judge Monday denied the government's motion to reconsider a decision severing a retired Navy admiral's bribery trial from that of the defense contractors he is accused of steering federal contracts toward, reiterating a previous ruling that the court can split the case if consolidation appears to prejudice the parties.

  • September 30, 2024

    Commerce Dept. Seeks To Streamline AI Development Exports

    The U.S. Department of Commerce issued a final rule Monday to streamline the export of items to preapproved data centers in foreign countries, which is intended to help boost the development of artificial intelligence.

  • September 30, 2024

    DOE Plutonium Pit Plan Found To Violate Environmental Law

    A South Carolina federal judge on Monday backed antinuclear groups' challenge to a U.S. Department of Energy plan to boost production of plutonium cores used in nuclear weapons, saying the DOE hadn't properly considered the potential environmental impact of the plan.

  • September 30, 2024

    Resin Co. Seeks Probe Into 4 Countries' Hexamine Exports

    A resin-maker called on the U.S. Department of Commerce on Monday to investigate four countries' exports of a compound used to make explosives, saying foreign producers are selling their products in the U.S. at unfairly low prices.

  • September 30, 2024

    DC Circ. Urged To Revisit Retroactive FARA Registration

    The U.S. Department of Justice is pressing the D.C. Circuit to reconsider a ruling that barred the federal government from suing to compel former foreign agents to register their onetime foreign influence efforts, arguing that the precedent behind the ruling wrongly hamstrings the DOJ's ability to enforce the Foreign Agents Registration Act.

  • September 30, 2024

    Military Reservist Not Owed Top-Up Pay, Feds Tell High Court

    A federal employee who was denied top-up pay while on active duty as a military reservist is not owed any wages because he wasn't called to serve in a national emergency despite serving at the same time as one, the U.S. Department of Transportation told the U.S. Supreme Court on Friday.

  • September 30, 2024

    Feds Seek Prison In Tax Case Linked To 'China Initiative'

    Prosecutors have asked a Texas federal judge for an 18- to 24-month prison sentence for a Chinese-born engineer who pled guilty to tax crimes after being charged with export violations and fraud in a case the defense claims began as an espionage investigation under the U.S. Department of Justice's now-disbanded "China Initiative."

  • September 27, 2024

    Twitter Investors Win Cert. In Suit Over Musk's Backpedaling

    A California federal judge on Friday certified a class of thousands of Twitter investors over claims Elon Musk fraudulently tweeted about the social media company's alleged bot problem to get out of his $44 billion acquisition, rebuffing the billionaire businessman's contention that individual issues in the suit eclipse common questions.

  • September 27, 2024

    Fed. Circ. Urged To Block Gov't Bid To Rehear AI Deal Dispute

    An artificial intelligence company has asked the Federal Circuit not to revisit a high-profile decision reviving the firm's protest over its exclusion from a National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency procurement, saying the original ruling fit within the circuit court's precedent.

  • September 27, 2024

    Sen. Says Contractors Trying To Block DOD 'Right-To-Repair'

    Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., has chided defense contractors for seeking to "sabotage" efforts to require them to cough up parts and data allowing the U.S. Department of Defense to repair its own equipment, while urging the DOD to take action on related restrictions.

  • September 27, 2024

    GAO Says DOE Could Save Billions On Hanford Waste Plan

    A government watchdog said in a report Friday that the U.S. Department of Energy should heed experts who say the agency could save billions of dollars by distinguishing between high- and lower-level waste at the Hanford Nuclear Site in Washington, one of the biggest cleanups in the world.

Expert Analysis

  • Global Bribery Probes Are Complicating FCPA Compliance

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    The recent rise in collaboration between the U.S. Department of Justice and foreign authorities in bribery enforcement can not only affect companies' legal exposure as resolution approaches vary by country, but also the decision of when and whether to disclose Foreign Corrupt Practices Act violations to the DOJ, say Samantha Badlam and Catherine Conroy at Ropes & Gray.

  • Series

    Teaching Yoga Makes Me A Better Lawyer

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    Being a yoga instructor has helped me develop my confidence and authenticity, as well as stress management and people skills — all of which have crossed over into my career as an attorney, says Laura Gongaware at Clyde & Co.

  • A Vision For Economic Clerkships In The Legal System

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    As courts handle increasingly complex damages analyses involving vast amounts of data, an economic clerkship program — integrating early-career economists into the judicial system — could improve legal outcomes and provide essential training to clerks, say Mona Birjandi at Data for Decisions and Matt Farber at Secretariat.

  • Action Steps To Address New Restrictions On Outbound Data

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    Companies should immediately assess all their data-based operations so they can consider strategies to effectively mitigate new compliance risks brought on by recently implemented transaction restrictions, including a Justice Department proposal and landmark data legislation, say attorneys at Wiley.

  • E-Discovery Quarterly: Recent Rulings On Text Message Data

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    Electronically stored information on cellphones, and in particular text messages, can present unique litigation challenges, and recent court decisions demonstrate that counsel must carefully balance what data should be preserved, collected, reviewed and produced, say attorneys at Sidley.

  • 'Fat Leonard' Case Shows High Bar For Rescinding Guilty Plea

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    Prosecutors’ recent move in the “Fat Leonard” bribery case, supporting several defendants’ motions to withdraw their guilty pleas, is extremely unusual – and its contrast with other prosecutions demonstrates that the procedural safeguards at plea hearings are far from enough, says Sara Kropf at Kropf Moseley.

  • How New Rule Would Change CFIUS Enforcement Powers

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    Before the May 15 comment deadline, companies may want to weigh in on proposed regulatory changes to enforcement and mitigation tools at the disposal of the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States, including broadened subpoena powers, difficult new mitigation timelines and higher maximum penalties, say attorneys at Venable.

  • 8 Questions To Ask Before Final CISA Breach Reporting Rule

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    The Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency’s recently proposed cyber incident reporting requirements for critical infrastructure entities represent the overall approach CISA will take in its final rule, so companies should be asking key compliance questions now and preparing for a more complicated reporting regime, say Arianna Evers and Shannon Mercer at WilmerHale.

  • Series

    Swimming Makes Me A Better Lawyer

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    Years of participation in swimming events, especially in the open water, have proven to be ideal preparation for appellate arguments in court — just as you must put your trust in the ocean when competing in a swim event, you must do the same with the judicial process, says John Kulewicz at Vorys.

  • Best Practices For Space Security In Our Connected World

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    NASA's recently published space security guide is another indication that cyber-resilience has become a global theme for the space and satellite sector, as well as a useful reference for companies and organizations reviewing their cybersecurity frameworks or looking to partner with the U.S. agency, says Hayley Blyth at Bird & Bird.

  • Manufacturers Should Pay Attention To 'Right-To-Repair' Laws

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    Oregon’s recently passed "right-to-repair" statute highlights that the R2R movement is not going away, and that manufacturers of all kinds need to be paying attention to the evolving list of R2R statutes in various states and consider participating in the process, says Courtney Sarnow at Culhane.

  • Don't Use The Same Template For Every Client Alert

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    As the old marketing adage goes, consistency is key, but law firm style guides need consistency that contemplates variety when it comes to client alert formats, allowing attorneys to tailor alerts to best fit the audience and subject matter, says Jessica Kaplan at Legally Penned.

  • Series

    Walking With My Dog Makes Me A Better Lawyer

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    Thanks to my dog Birdie, I've learned that carving out an activity different from the practice of law — like daily outdoor walks that allow you to interact with new people — can contribute to professional success by boosting creativity and mental acuity, as well as expanding your social network, says Sarah Petrie at the Massachusetts Attorney General’s Office.

  • Think Like A Lawyer: Follow The Iron Rule Of Trial Logic

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    Many diligent and eager attorneys include every good fact, point and rule in their trial narratives — spurred by the gnawing fear they’ll be second-guessed for leaving something out — but this approach ignores a fundamental principle of successful trial lawyering, says Luke Andrews at Poole Huffman.

  • Breaking Down EPA's Rule On PFAS In Drinking Water

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    Last week, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency finalized the first enforceable federal drinking water regulation for PFAS, which, along with reporting and compliance requirements for regulated entities, will have a number of indirect effects, including increased cleanup costs and the possible expansion of existing Superfund sites, say attorneys at Morgan Lewis.

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