Appellate

  • October 08, 2024

    Fed. Circ. Mulls Trade Dress Fight Over Pink Hip Devices

    A Federal Circuit panel wrestled Tuesday with arguments from a German medical supplier that "late-breaking research" shows why the appearance of the color pink in a part of hip joint implants is not as functional as the company used to claim in the marketplace.

  • October 08, 2024

    Justices Cast Favorable Eye On ATF's Ghost Gun Rule

    The U.S. Supreme Court on Tuesday appeared to side with the federal government's position that a Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives rule regulating so-called ghost gun kits was wrongly invalidated by a lower appeals court, with several justices responding favorably to the feds' arguments.

  • October 08, 2024

    Enviro Groups Seek To Overturn Nuclear Plant Renewal Rules

    Anti-nuclear power groups are challenging new nuclear power plant license renewal rules from the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, telling the D.C. Circuit on Monday that the changes violate federal environmental protection law.

  • October 08, 2024

    2nd Circ. Won't Revive 1-800 Contacts, Warby Parker Row

    A Second Circuit panel affirmed a ruling Tuesday that found eyewear retailer Warby Parker did not infringe 1-800 Contacts Inc.'s trademarks by purchasing ads on search engines using its competitor's keywords.

  • October 08, 2024

    Coolant Cos. Challenging HFC Rules Meet Skeptical DC Circ.

    A D.C. Circuit panel Tuesday seemed dubious of coolant industry challenges to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's omission of 2020 market data in calculating the agency's framework for phasing down climate-harming hydrofluorocarbons.

  • October 08, 2024

    1st Circ. Says 'Nothing We Can Do' To Help Salvadoran Family

    The First Circuit on Monday rejected a petition for asylum from a Salvadoran family fleeing MS-13 gang violence, acknowledging that the issue is "rampant" in the Central American country but saying their hands are tied from helping the petitioners.

  • October 08, 2024

    New Testimony Can't Revive Seattle Police Pursuit Crash Suit

    A Washington state appeals court won't upend a verdict clearing the city of Seattle from liability in a suit by a woman injured in a car accident after the man driving her vehicle fled the police, finding that testimony taken after one of the officers involved died by suicide would not have altered the case's outcome.

  • October 08, 2024

    Solo Cup Maker Must Face Suit Over Worker's Shooting Death

    Solo Cup Operating Corp. can't escape a wrongful death lawsuit accusing it of negligently hiring a worker who killed a fellow employee in a dispute over $400, a Georgia appeals court ruled, saying the incident is clearly not covered by the state's workers compensation law.

  • October 08, 2024

    Yellow Tells 10th Circ. To Revive Claims Against Teamsters

    Yellow Corp. called on the Tenth Circuit to reverse a lower court's dismissal of the company's $137 million lawsuit against the Teamsters that claimed the union led the nearly 100-year-old company to shutter, saying the business wasn't required to exhaust the grievance process under a contract.

  • October 08, 2024

    9th Circ. Says Mexican Family Was Persecuted By Cartel Violence

    A Mexican mother and daughter will get another shot at asylum after the Ninth Circuit ruled on Tuesday that the Board of Immigration Appeals wrongly determined that cartel violence, including kidnapping, physical assault and murder, isn't persecution.

  • October 08, 2024

    Marathon Co. Wants 'Both Bites' In Pipeline Row, 8th Circ. Told

    A group of tribal landowners looking to intervene in the federal government's appeal related to a Marathon Petroleum Corp. subsidiary's pipeline that crosses part of reservation lands told the Eighth Circuit that the company can't have "both bites of the apple" in fighting their bid to dismiss the case.

  • October 08, 2024

    Hawaii Justices Hand AIG Win In Novel Climate Coverage Suit

    AIG isn't obligated to cover a lawsuit accusing a Honolulu-based Sunoco subsidiary of contributing to climate change, the Hawaii Supreme Court ruled, saying a pollution exclusion in the oil giant's policy encompasses greenhouse gas emissions.

  • October 08, 2024

    3rd Circ. Directs Court To Explain If Natera Ads 'Literally False'

    A Third Circuit panel on Tuesday sent allegations of false advertising against medical test maker Natera back to district court, directing the judge to determine whether a jury had sufficient evidence last year to find that eight of the company's advertisements were "literally false."

  • October 08, 2024

    Avian Orgs Say FWS Unlawfully Tossed Bid To Import Parrots

    Two exotic bird nonprofits told the Eleventh Circuit Tuesday that they should have the chance to make their case for importing two parrot species to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, which the nonprofits say unlawfully refused to even consider the petitions.

  • October 08, 2024

    1st Circ. Warned Not To 'Speculate' In Union Debt Ceiling Suit

    A lawyer for a governmental workers' union challenging the constitutionality of the federal debt limit told a First Circuit panel on Tuesday that a January default is a virtual certainty under existing law, and urged the judges to avoid trying to predict whether President Joe Biden and a lame-duck Congress might extend the ceiling.

  • October 08, 2024

    Pa. Developers Defend Efforts To Remediate Landslide Damage

    A Western Pennsylvania property development company asked the Pennsylvania Commonwealth Court on Tuesday to throw out a contempt order in connection with an agreement to provide remediation to a community it built that was devastated by a landslide, arguing it poured its personal and business funds into the project.

  • October 08, 2024

    Texas Tribune Can Attend Bail Hearings, 5th Circ. Told

    A Fifth Circuit panel pushed back on a Texas county's argument that the Texas Tribune and other news organizations do not have the right to enter magistration proceedings, asking why the process of setting bail would count as an informal procedure during oral arguments Tuesday.

  • October 08, 2024

    Fed. Circ. Restores Debit Card Patent Suit Against Aetna

    The Federal Circuit on Tuesday revived patent litigation targeting Aetna's Visa- and Mastercard-branded debit cards, while holding that certain aspects of dismissal decisions should be reviewed from scratch on appeal.

  • October 08, 2024

    Colo. Supreme Court Punts On Transgender Cake Case

    The Colorado Supreme Court said Tuesday it couldn't consider the merits of a discrimination case alleging a bakery refused to make a cake to celebrate a customer's gender transition, finding a trial court didn't have jurisdiction to hear the case in the first place.

  • October 08, 2024

    Industry, Utilities Take Aim At EPA's Drinking Water PFAS Rule

    Water utility associations and chemical industry players asked the D.C. Circuit to strike down the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's rule setting the first-ever limits for forever chemicals in the nation's drinking water.

  • October 08, 2024

    Student Loan Cos. Settle Ex-Exec's Severance Dispute

    Student loan companies Navient Corp. and Earnest LLC told the Ninth Circuit they had reached a settlement to end a former executive's lawsuit alleging he was wrongly denied severance benefits, just days before a dual-sided appeal in the case was set for panel arguments on Thursday.

  • October 08, 2024

    Fla. Riot Law Targets Only Violent Protesters, 11th Circ. Says

    The Eleventh Circuit reversed a lower court's preliminary injunction putting a halt to a recent Florida riot law put in place in the wake of the George Floyd protests, saying the law only targets violent agitators after the state's high court clarified that it doesn't apply to peaceful demonstrations.

  • October 08, 2024

    Exporting Chips To China Doesn't Merit 7 Years, 9th Circ. Told

    Counsel for a former UCLA electrical engineering professor urged the Ninth Circuit on Tuesday to reduce his seven-year prison sentence for illegally exporting high-powered semiconductor chips to China, saying the conduct did not amount to an evasion of national security controls.

  • October 08, 2024

    11th Circ. Revives Slip-And-Fall Suit Against Sam's Club

    The Eleventh Circuit has reinstated a woman's suit against retailer Sam's Club alleging she slipped and fell on water in one of its stores, saying there's evidence creating a dispute about whether the store had constructive notice of the spill.

  • October 08, 2024

    3rd Circ. Won't Rehear Pa., NJ Businesses' Virus Loss Suits

    The Third Circuit declined to rehear consolidated pandemic-related loss coverage disputes brought by New Jersey and Pennsylvania businesses, according to an order issued Tuesday, upholding its decision that the businesses' insurers didn't owe coverage for the claimed losses.

Expert Analysis

  • Fed. Circ. Ruling Creates New Rule For Certification Marks

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    The Federal Circuit's decision last month in Bureau National Interprofessionnel du Cognac v. Cologne & Cognac Entertainment is significant in that it establishes a new standard for assessing evidence of third-party uses of a certification mark in deciding whether the mark is famous, say Samantha Katze and Lisa Rosaya at Manatt.

  • Series

    After Chevron: Conservation Rule Already Faces Challenges

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    The Bureau of Land Management's interpretation of land "use" in its Conservation and Landscape Health Rule is contrary to the agency's past practice and other Federal Land Policy and Management Act provisions, leaving the rule exposed in four legal challenges that may carry greater force in the wake of Loper Bright, say Stacey Bosshardt and Stephanie Regenold at Perkins Coie.

  • 11 Patent Cases To Watch At Fed. Circ. And High Court

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    As we head into fall, there are 11 patent cases to monitor, touching on a range of issues that could affect patent strategy, such as biotech innovation, administrative rulemaking and patent eligibility, say Edward Lanquist and Wesley Barbee at Baker Donelson.

  • Opinion

    3rd. Circ. Got It Right On Cancer Warning Claims Preemption

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    The Third Circuit's recent, eminently sensible ruling in a failure-to-warn case against Roundup manufacturer Monsanto, holding that the Federal Insecticide, Fungicide and Rodenticide Act preempts state law claims, provides a road map that other courts should adopt, says Lawrence Ebner at the Atlantic Legal Foundation.

  • How Methods Are Evolving In Textualist Interpretations

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    Textualists at the U.S. Supreme Court are increasingly considering new methods such as corpus linguistics and surveys to evaluate what a statute's text communicates to an ordinary reader, while lower courts even mull large language models like ChatGPT as supplements, says Kevin Tobia at Georgetown Law.

  • 7th Circ. Rulings Offer Employee Vaccine Exemption Guidance

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    Dawn Solowey and Samantha Brooks at Seyfarth explain how two recent Seventh Circuit rulings in Passarella v. Aspirus and Bube v. Aspirus could affect litigation involving employee vaccine exemptions, and discuss employer best practices for handling accommodation requests that include both religious and secular concerns.

  • The Fed. Circ. In August: Secret Sales And Public Disclosures

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    Two recent Federal Circuit rulings — Sanho v. Kaijet and Celanese International v. ITC — highlight that inventors should publicly and promptly disclose their inventions, as a secret sale will not suffice as a disclosure, and file their patent applications within a year of public disclosure, say Sean Murray and Jeremiah Helm at Knobbe Martens.

  • The State Law Landscape After Justices' Social Media Ruling

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    Following the U.S. Supreme Court’s recent NetChoice ruling on social media platforms’ First Amendment rights, it’s still unclear if state content moderation laws are constitutional, leaving online operators to face a patchwork of regulation, and the potential for the issue to return to the high court, say attorneys at Crowell & Moring.

  • Employers Should Not Neglect Paid Military Leave Compliance

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    An August decision from the Ninth Circuit and the settlement of a long-running class action, both examining paid leave requirements under the Uniformed Services Employment and Reemployment Rights Act, are part of a nationwide trend that should prompt employers to review their military leave policies to avoid potential litigation and reputational damage, says Bradford Kelley at Littler.

  • Unpacking Jurisdiction Issues In 3rd Circ. Arbitration Ruling

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    The Third Circuit's recent ruling in George v. Rushmore Service Center could be interpreted to establish three principles regarding district courts' jurisdiction to enter arbitration-related orders under the Federal Arbitration Act, two of which may lead to confusion, says David Cinotti at Pashman Stein.

  • Why Attorneys Should Consider Community Leadership Roles

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    Volunteering and nonprofit board service are complementary to, but distinct from, traditional pro bono work, and taking on these community leadership roles can produce dividends for lawyers, their firms and the nonprofit causes they support, says Katie Beacham at Kilpatrick.

  • How NJ Temp Equal Pay Survived A Constitutional Challenge

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    The Third Circuit recently gave the New Jersey Temporary Workers' Bill of Rights a new lease on life by systematically dismantling multiple theories of the act's unconstitutionality brought by staffing agencies hoping to delay their new equal pay and benefits obligations, say attorneys at Duane Morris.

  • Firms Must Offer A Trifecta Of Services In Post-Chevron World

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    After the U.S. Supreme Court’s Loper Bright Enterprises v. Raimondo decision overturning Chevron deference, law firms will need to integrate litigation, lobbying and communications functions to keep up with the ramifications of the ruling and provide adequate counsel quickly, says Neil Hare at Dentons.

  • What We Know From Early Cyberinsurance Rulings

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    Recent cyber disruption incidents, like the Crowdstrike outage and the CDK Global cyberattack this summer, highlight the necessity of understanding legal interpretations of cyberinsurance coverage — an area in which there has been little litigation thus far, say Peter Halprin and Rebecca Schwarz at Haynes Boone.

  • 6th Circ. Ruling Highlights Complexity Of ERISA Preemption

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    The Sixth Circuit’s recent ruling in Standard Insurance v. Guy — that the defendant couldn't collect his mother’s life insurance after being convicted of murdering his parents — illustrates how courts must engage in mental gymnastics to avoid the broad reach of Employee Retirement Income Security Act preemption, says Mark DeBofsky at DeBofsky Law.

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