Appellate

  • November 13, 2024

    Mich. Justice Jokes He's To Blame For PIP Assignment Fights

    A Michigan Supreme Court justice joked Wednesday that his 2017 footnote about patients assigning medical claims to healthcare providers was to blame for complicated recent insurance litigation surrounding plaintiffs who sign over their rights but nevertheless sue insurers. 

  • November 13, 2024

    LNG Co. Says Full DC Circ. Must Revive Texas Project

    The company behind a liquefied natural gas project on the Texas Gulf Coast urged the full D.C. Circuit on Wednesday to vacate a panel's ruling nixing its federal approval, citing another panel's decision finding the White House Council on Environmental Quality's National Environmental Policy Act regulations are unenforceable.

  • November 13, 2024

    6th Circ. Partially Vacates Insurer's ERISA Disability Suit Win

    The Sixth Circuit partially invalidated on Wednesday an insurance company's win in an ex-worker's suit seeking additional disability benefits, directing a lower court to reconsider arguments regarding when to apply a 24-month policy limitation on benefits for total disability caused by a mental health condition.

  • November 13, 2024

    Michael Jordan's NASCAR Team Appeals Antitrust Loss

    Two NASCAR teams, one co-owned by Michael Jordan, on Wednesday appealed a North Carolina federal judge's denial of their request to keep racing next season, taking part of their antitrust fight against the stock car league to the Fourth Circuit.

  • November 13, 2024

    Fed. Circ. Won't Send Microchip Patent Suit To NY

    The Federal Circuit on Wednesday denied a bid from a Chicago tech manufacturer to transfer a Texas case brought by an ex-Microsoft executive's private equity-funded patent litigation outfit, saying the manufacturer didn't show that the lower court erred in refusing to ship the case to New York.

  • November 13, 2024

    NC Wetlands Developer Wants 4th Circ. To Revive Projects

    A North Carolina landowner has urged the Fourth Circuit to block a new rule defining the scope of the Clean Water Act, arguing that the new rule saddles him with "extraordinary compliance costs" for wetland development projects and goes beyond the law's actual scope.

  • November 13, 2024

    4th Circ. Won't Rethink Ex-Development Director's Wage Case

    The Fourth Circuit declined Wednesday to reconsider its decision affirming a North Carolina city's win on a former development director's claims for unpaid overtime, turning down the former employee's argument that the record did not make clear that she was classified as exempt under federal law.

  • November 13, 2024

    Texas Fights Contractor Wage Hike After 9th Circ. Ruling

    The recent Ninth Circuit decision deeming President Joe Biden's increase of federal contractors' hourly minimum wage unlawful clarified that the government's position that it could mandate the hike is absurd, the state of Texas told the Fifth Circuit in its case also challenging the wage hike.

  • November 13, 2024

    FERC Tells 9th Circ. It Properly Rescinded PG&E Grid Perk

    The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission has told the Ninth Circuit it correctly yanked a grid incentive for Pacific Gas & Electric Co. for voluntarily belonging to a regional transmission organization, noting California now mandates the state's major utilities join an RTO.

  • November 13, 2024

    3rd Circ. Wary Of Easing Cheesesteak Shop Owner's Sentence

    Third Circuit judges seemed mostly skeptical of overturning an extension to the prison sentence of a Philadelphia cheesesteak shop owner who admitted to paying employees off the books, saying during oral arguments it was unclear whether the employees should be considered co-conspirators in the tax fraud.

  • November 13, 2024

    Former Fla. Law Prof Turns To 11th Circ. For Reinstatement

    A former tenured professor at Florida A&M University College of Law has asked the Eleventh Circuit to be reinstated, arguing that the university wrongly terminated her in retaliation for suing it under the federal Equal Pay Act.

  • November 13, 2024

    1st Circ. Punts Pandemic Retail Antitrust Case To Puerto Rico

    A divided First Circuit has ruled that local Puerto Rico courts, not federal courts, should hear an unfair-competition suit by local merchants accusing major big-box retailers Costco and Walmart of violating executive orders during the pandemic by continuing to sell "non-essential" goods.

  • November 13, 2024

    NJ AG Avoids Defense Of Prosecutor's Office In Civil Case

    The New Jersey Attorney General's Office is not required to represent the Monmouth County Prosecutor's Office in a suit from a local deputy police chief over an internal affairs investigation, a state appeals court ruled Wednesday in a published opinion. 

  • November 13, 2024

    What's Next For Court Reform In This New Political Climate?

    Advocates are not holding out hope for bills that would firm up a code of ethics for the U.S. Supreme Court, impose term limits on justices or give judiciary employees antidiscrimination job protections, saying Republican control of the federal government will likely stall any progress that's been made with court reform efforts.

  • November 13, 2024

    Trump Taps DOJ Critic Matt Gaetz For Attorney General

    President-elect Donald Trump on Wednesday nominated Rep. Matt Gaetz to be the next U.S. attorney general, seeking to elevate a close political ally to lead a Justice Department that the Florida lawmaker has sharply criticized and that last year declined to charge him in a sex-trafficking investigation.

  • November 13, 2024

    EPA Effluent Rule Is Fatally Flawed, 8th Circ. Told

    Republican-led states, utilities and industry groups called on the Eighth Circuit to vacate the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's rule setting new wastewater limitations for coal-fired power plants, saying it is based on economically unavailable technologies in an effort to further the Biden administration's goal of shuttering coal plants.

  • November 13, 2024

    Senate Fills Another Illinois Judge Seat

    The U.S. Senate voted 50-46 on Wednesday to confirm U.S. Magistrate Judge Jonathan Hawley for a district judgeship for the Central District of Illinois.

  • November 13, 2024

    MVP: Sullivan & Cromwell's Jeff Wall

    Jeff Wall, who heads Sullivan & Cromwell LLP's Supreme Court and appellate practice, won a unanimous high court ruling that insurers can enforce choice-of-law provisions in maritime policies, triumphed over a Delaware Supreme Court case for Bayer AG involving liability for billions of dollars in consumers' talc claims, and preserved the MLB's antitrust exemption, earning him a spot as one of the 2024 Law360 Appellate MVPs.

  • November 13, 2024

    Gibson Dunn 'Titan,' Ex-Solicitor General Theodore Olson Dies

    Theodore B. Olson, the founder of Gibson Dunn & Crutcher LLP's appellate and constitutional law practice group and a former U.S. solicitor general, died Wednesday, the law firm announced.

  • November 12, 2024

    DC Circ. Mulls Legality Of Gag Orders On X Corp. Subpoenas

    A D.C. Circuit panel grappled Tuesday with the federal government's authority to obtain sweeping nondisclosure orders preventing social media companies from notifying users when their accounts are targeted by subpoenas, with X Corp. arguing that such gag orders are illegal.

  • November 12, 2024

    5th Circ. Won't Reopen CFPB Payday Rule Fight

    The Fifth Circuit on Tuesday denied a bid from a lender to reopen an industry legal challenge to the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau's payday loan rule that previously foundered at the U.S. Supreme Court, clearing the way for the rule to take effect.

  • November 12, 2024

    Justices Told Fed. Circ. Overstep Claims Are 'Simply Incorrect'

    A unit of pharmaceutical company Alvogen on Tuesday urged the U.S. Supreme Court to reject a petition from the company whose blockbuster IBS drug it's hoping to copy, saying the "petition's fundamental premise" that the Federal Circuit went beyond its legal boundaries "is simply incorrect."

  • November 12, 2024

    Judge Notes 'Serious Issue' In Fired Firm Worker's Appeal

    The outcome of a fired Whitman Breed Abbott & Morgan LLC legal assistant's appeal of her loss in a disability discrimination suit may hinge on whether there is a genuine dispute about the demands of the job, a Connecticut judge signaled Tuesday. The judge noted a "substantial" disagreement about whether the position was supposed to be a hybrid of remote and in-person.

  • November 12, 2024

    NJ Doctor Can't Sue Hospital Over License Suspension

    A New Jersey appellate panel held Tuesday that a hospital administrator's clerical error in connection with reporting a doctor's patient safety issues to state health authorities and subsequent medical board suspension did not warrant a reinstatement of the doctor's breach of contract suit.

  • November 12, 2024

    'Heat Machine' Maker's Trade Dress Win Clears 8th Circ.

    The Eighth Circuit on Tuesday affirmed a finding from a bench trial that cleared the Costco supplier behind the "Heat Machine" involved in "a complex intellectual property dispute" with the maker of the "HeatDish," a different machine that Costco also sells.

Expert Analysis

  • Curious Case Of FTC's Amicus Brief In Teva Fed. Circ. Appeal

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    Attorneys at BCLP explore the Federal Trade Commission's backing of Amneal's Orange Book-delisting efforts on Teva ahead of a key Federal Circuit hearing in a case between the two pharmaceutical companies, and wonder if the FTC amicus brief indicates a future trend, especially in the next administration.

  • E-Discovery Quarterly: Recent Rulings On Metadata

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    Several recent rulings reflect the competing considerations that arise when parties dispute the form of production for electronically stored information, underscoring that counsel must carefully consider how to produce and request reasonably usable data, say attorneys at Sidley.

  • When 'Patented' Goes Beyond Inventorship In False Ad Cases

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    The Federal Circuit's recent false advertising holding in Crocs v. Effervescent is significant because it offers a nuanced yet realistic understanding of what false claims about a product's status as "patented" can mean, say attorneys at McDermott.

  • 2nd Circ. Hostile Workplace Ruling Widens Arbitration Pitfalls

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    The Second Circuit’s recent decision, affirming the Ending Forced Arbitration of Sexual Assault and Sexual Harassment Act applies to a worker whose workplace hostility claims arose before the law’s 2022 enactment, widens the scope of the law — and the risks of unenforceable arbitration agreements for employers, say attorneys at Hinshaw.

  • 2nd Circ. Maxwell Ruling Adds To Confusion Over NPA Reach

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    The Second Circuit’s recent decision upholding Ghislaine Maxwell’s conviction made an analytical leap in applying plea agreement precedent to a nonprosecution agreement, compounding a circuit split and providing lessons for defense counsel, say attorneys at Kropf Moseley.

  • The Fed. Circ. In October: Aetna And License-Term Review

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    The Federal Circuit's recent decision that Aetna's credit card licensing agreement with AlexSam did not give the insurer immunity from patent infringement claims serves to warn licensees to read their contracts carefully, say attorneys at Knobbe Martens.

  • Recent Developments In Insurance Coverage For FCA Claims

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    As the U.S. Department of Justice continues its vigorous False Claims Act enforcement, companies looking to their insurers to help defray the costs of an investigation or settlement should note recent decisions on which types of policies cover FCA claims, which policy periods apply and which portions of FCA-related losses are covered, say attorneys at Covington.

  • Striking A Balance Between AI Use And Attorney Well-Being

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    As the legal industry increasingly adopts generative artificial intelligence tools to boost efficiency, leaders must note the hidden costs of increased productivity, and work to protect attorneys’ well-being while unlocking AI’s full potential, says Ed Sohn at Factor.

  • Boosting Confidence In Pennsylvania's Election System

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    As Election Day nears, Pennsylvania is facing an intense flurry of litigation, including an appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court centered on mail-in and provisional ballots, but the state's election system is robust, and attorneys from all practice areas have an important role to play in ensuring confidence in and access to our election system, says Bucks County Commissioner Bob Harvie.

  • Takeaways From The IRS' Crypto Doc Summons Win

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    A recent First Circuit decision holding that taxpayers do not have a Fourth Amendment reasonable expectation of privacy in cryptocurrency transaction records should prompt both taxpayers and exchanges to take stock of past transactions and future plans, say attorneys at BakerHostetler.

  • A Novel Expansion Of Alien Tort Statute In 9th Circ.

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    The Ninth Circuit's Doe v. Cisco rehearing denial allows a new invocation of the Alien Tort Statute to proceed, which could capture the U.S. Supreme Court's attention, and has potentially dramatic consequences for U.S. companies doing business with foreign governments, say attorneys at Ropes & Gray.

  • Empathy In Mediation Offers A Soft Landing For Disputes

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    Experiencing a crash-landing on a recent flight underscored to me how much difference empathy makes in times of crisis or stress, including during mediation, says Eydith Kaufman at Alternative Resolution Centers.

  • Series

    Being An Artist Makes Me A Better Lawyer

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    My work as an artist has highlighted how using creativity and precision together — qualities that are equally essential in both art and law — not only improves outcomes, but also leads to more innovative and thoughtful work, says Sarah La Pearl at Segal McCambridge.

  • Reading Tea Leaves In Fed. Circ. Deep Dive On Review Scope

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    Roy Wepner at Kaplan Breyer investigates why a recent Federal Circuit opinion spent six pages explaining its unsurprising conclusion on proper scope of review — that no deference need be afforded to the trial court in a case dismissed for failure to state a claim.

  • How Judiciary Can Minimize AI Risks In Secondary Sources

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    Because courts’ standing orders on generative artificial intelligence and other safeguards do not address the risk of hallucinations in secondary source materials, the judiciary should consider enlisting legal publishers and database hosts to protect against AI-generated inaccuracies, say attorneys at Lankler Siffert & Wohl.

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