Commercial Contracts

  • December 16, 2024

    Blindsided Developer Says $112K Legal Bill Should Be $25K

    A real estate developer fighting a $112,000 legal bill from Conrad & Scherer LLP testified in a Florida state court Monday that he hired the firm for its banking regulation expertise but not for trial work in a lawsuit over a luxury house in Colorado.

  • December 13, 2024

    OpenAI Slams Musk's 'Evidence-Free' Bid To Block For-Profit

    OpenAI urged a California federal judge Friday to reject Elon Musk's bid to block the artificial intelligence research organization from transitioning into a for-profit enterprise, scoffing at Musk's assertions of anticompetitive practices and arguing that the injunctive motion is "just another evidence-free effort to harass a competitor."

  • December 13, 2024

    NCAA, Pac-12, USC Say Reggie Bush Filed NIL Suit Too Late

    The NCAA, the University of Southern California and the Pac-12 Conference urged a Los Angeles state court to toss former USC star running back Reggie Bush's lawsuit accusing them of profiting off his fame without compensating him, saying Bush waited "far too long" to sue.

  • December 13, 2024

    Prindle Goetz Says Attys Took Trade Secrets To Rival Firm

    Prindle Goetz Barnes & Reinholtz LLP sued two former nonequity partners in California state court Thursday, accusing them of taking its confidential billing, compensation and client listing information with them in late 2022 before jumping to a rival law firm launched by a former equity owner at the law firm.

  • December 13, 2024

    US Bank Fails To Beat RMBS Suit From Commerzbank

    A New York federal judge has ruled that Commerzbank AG's suit against U.S. Bank may proceed, rejecting U.S. Bank's argument that presuit notification to certain residential mortgage-backed securities trust parties was unnecessary due to their alleged involvement in the misconduct.

  • December 13, 2024

    NHTSA Publishes Whistleblower Program Final Rule

    The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration finalized its whistleblower program, which could award as much as 30% of monetary sanctions to a worker of an auto manufacturer who calls out bad behavior.

  • December 13, 2024

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

    This past week in London has seen a group of franchise operators hit Vodafone with a £120 million ($151 million) claim for allegedly imposing commission cuts, green energy tycoon Dale Vince pursue another libel action against the publisher of the Daily Mail, and parcel delivery giant Yodel face a claim by an investor that helped save it from collapse earlier in the year.

  • December 13, 2024

    ByteDance Ex-Coder Perjured Himself In Suit, Judge Finds

    A California federal judge imposed terminating sanctions against a former engineer at TikTok's parent company, finding he committed perjury in a suit alleging he was wrongly fired and ordered the dispute to arbitration.

  • December 13, 2024

    Mass. Law Wipes Out Pandemic Tuition Case Against Tufts

    Tufts University on Friday defeated a putative class action seeking tuition refunds for pandemic closures of the Boston-area school's campus, as a Massachusetts federal judge upheld a state law providing immunity to colleges that shut their doors during the worst of the COVID-19 pandemic.

  • December 13, 2024

    'Copycat' Nantucket Wine Event Ordered To Issue Retraction

    A Massachusetts liquor distributor was ordered Friday by a federal judge to post a bold-type correction and issue press releases retracting claims that it had acquired and "re-branded" a long-running Nantucket wine and food festival.

  • December 13, 2024

    Pa. Contractor Hit With $4.2M Verdict In Pot Software Row

    A Pennsylvania federal jury hit a cannabis software company with a $4.2 million judgment in a lawsuit from a subcontractor claiming it was brought on to help with a government project because of its Black-owned status, then pushed out of the $10 million deal.

  • December 13, 2024

    Mass. Cannabis Biz Gets Receiver Amid $10M In Debt

    A Massachusetts judge on Friday agreed to appoint a receiver to oversee either a sale or liquidation of cannabis grower and retailer Revolutionary Clinics, which owes nearly $10 million to its primary lender and thousands more to landlords and other creditors.

  • December 13, 2024

    Off The Bench: PE Buys In On NFL, WWE Abuse Suit Back On

    In this week's Off The Bench, two teams usher in a new era for the NFL by bringing in private equity investors, a suit accusing the WWE and Vince McMahon of sexual abuse and trafficking picks back up while a federal investigation continues, and a private equity giant and NHL owner passes away.

  • December 13, 2024

    Pot Tech Co. Says Its Countersuit In $24M Dispute Has Legs

    Exactly who breached a $24.7 million contract between e-commerce cannabis company Dutchie and a distributor of cash register monitors is still a question for a jury to decide, the cannabis company argued in a motion opposing summary judgment.

  • December 13, 2024

    Fight Over $40M Discount For Boston Casino Headed To Trial

    A Massachusetts judge declined to toss allegations that Wynn Resorts lied to a landowner to secure a $40 million discount on real estate where the company built the Encore Boston Harbor casino, teeing up a bench trial in the case.

  • December 13, 2024

    Mich. Cos. Accused Of $1.5M Dispensary Investment Scam

    An Illinois business is suing Great Lakes Holistics Muskegon and Redbud Roots Inc. in Michigan federal court, alleging the companies' officers induced it to invest $1.5 million into a dispensary that had previously failed, while those officers pocketed the investment.

  • December 12, 2024

    Align Tech's $27.5M Antitrust Deal Hits Nerve With Judge

    A California federal judge said Thursday that a proposed $27.5 million deal for teeth-aligner buyers to resolve antitrust claims alleging Align Technologies Inc. colluded with the now-bankrupt SmileDirectClub to illegally restrict competition might be "inherently improper" due to a coupon component that "would bring additional business to the monopolist."

  • December 12, 2024

    Boutique LA Firm Sues Rival Trying To Claim Fees In $10B Win

    Ross LLP, which helped its clients win $3.7 billion of a $10 billion verdict in a long-running dispute among five brothers over their real estate empire, sued another firm in California court Thursday alleging that it is wrongly trying to grab a portion of Ross' fees in the blockbuster case.

  • December 12, 2024

    Incora's Opt-Outs Not Like Class Actions, US Trustee Says

    The U.S. Trustee's Office on Thursday objected to the third-party releases in the Chapter 11 plan from aircraft parts supplier Incora, arguing in a Texas bankruptcy court that the opt-out mechanism for the releases is not comparable to class action procedures.

  • December 12, 2024

    Ballot Issue Group Can't Nose Into Ark. Casino Measure Suit

    The ballot issue committee backing an Arkansas amendment that revoked a Cherokee Nation business's casino license can't intervene in the tribal entity's challenge that looks to block the law, a federal district court judge said Thursday, arguing that it has not adequately refuted the presumption that the state can defend its rights.

  • December 12, 2024

    Keller Postman Sues Jenner & Block In Escalating Tubi Fight

    Keller Postman LLC added a new front Wednesday to its heated legal fight with Jenner & Block LLP, filing a California state court lawsuit accusing the BigLaw firm of employing a host of unethical tactics to gain leverage in mass arbitration against the streaming service Tubi.

  • December 12, 2024

    Fla. Judge Awards $114M To Crypto-Forex Exchange Investors

    A Florida judge issued a directed verdict Thursday against absent foreign exchange currency broker FxWinning Ltd. awarding investors more than $114 million after they told the court how they were swindled out of their investments when the company abruptly stopped honoring withdrawal requests.

  • December 12, 2024

    Texas AG Targets Instagram, Reddit Over Youth Data Security

    Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton announced Thursday that his office is looking into minors' privacy and safety policies of more than a dozen tech companies, including Character.AI, Reddit and Instagram, as part of his long-running campaign to stop companies from selling minors' personal information without permission from their parents.

  • December 12, 2024

    Chemical Co. Cuts $300K Deal To End Unpaid Wage Suit

    A Pennsylvania chemical company and a former worker who accused it of violating state and federal wage laws by requiring uncompensated preshift work of its employees came together and asked a Keystone State judge to approve a $300,000 settlement for the proposed class action.

  • December 12, 2024

    Utah State Drops Out Of Suit Over Trans Volleyball Player

    Utah State University has dropped its intervening complaint in a lawsuit against the Mountain West Conference that sought to stop a transgender athlete from participating in a now-finished volleyball tournament, days after the collegiate athletic conference asked the Tenth Circuit to toss an appeal in the case as moot.

Expert Analysis

  • 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.

  • NC Ruling Takes Practical Approach To Duty-To-Defend Costs

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    In Murphy-Brown v. Ace American Insurance, a case of first impression, the North Carolina Business Court adopted the commonsense rationale of many state courts in holding that policyholders' defense costs should be deemed presumtively reasonable when a insurer breaches its duty to defend, say attorneys at McGuireWoods.

  • How Attorneys Can Break Free From Career Enmeshment

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    Ambitious attorneys can sometimes experience career enmeshment — when your sense of self-worth becomes unhealthily tangled up in your legal vocation — but taking the time to discover and realign with your core personal values can help you recover your identity, says Janna Koretz at Azimuth Psychological.

  • Lawyers With Disabilities Are Seeking Equity, Not Pity

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    Attorneys living with disabilities face extra challenges — including the need for special accommodations, the fear of stigmatization and the risk of being tokenized — but if given equitable opportunities, they can still rise to the top of their field, says Kate Reder Sheikh, a former attorney and legal recruiter at Major Lindsey & Africa.

  • Testing The Waters As New Texas Biz Court Ends 2nd Month

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    Despite an uptick in filings in the Texas Business Court's initial months of operation, the docket remains fairly light amid an apparent wait-and-see approach from some potential litigants, say attorneys at Norton Rose.

  • How DOJ's Visa Debit Monopolization Suit May Unfold

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    The U.S. Department of Justice's recently filed Section 2 monopolization suit against Visa offers several scenarios for a vigorous case and is likely to reveal some of the challenges faced by antitrust plaintiffs following the U.S. Supreme Court's split 2018 American Express decision, say attorneys at Mintz.

  • Opinion

    Judicial Committee Best Venue For Litigation Funding Rules

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    The Advisory Committee on Civil Rules' recent decision to consider developing a rule for litigation funding disclosure is a welcome development, ensuring that the result will be the product of a thorough, inclusive and deliberative process that appropriately balances all interests, says Stewart Ackerly at Statera Capital.

  • The Strategic Advantages Of Appointing A Law Firm CEO

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    The impact on law firms of the recent CrowdStrike outage underscores that the business of law is no longer merely about providing supplemental support for legal practice — and helps explain why some law firms are appointing dedicated, full-time CEOs to navigate the challenges of the modern legal landscape, says Jennifer Johnson at Calibrate Strategies.

  • There's No Crying In Property Valuation Baseball Arbitration

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    The World Series is the perfect time to consider how the form of arbitration used for settling MLB salary disputes — in which each side offers competing valuations to an arbitrator, who must select one — is often ideal for resolving property valuation disputes, say Sean O’Donnell at Herrick Feinstein and Mark Dunec at FTI Consulting.

  • Navigating Fla.'s Shorter Construction Defect Claim Window

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    In light of recent legislation reducing the amount of time Florida homeowners have to bring construction defect claims, homeowners should be sure to understand their rights and responsibilities regarding maintenance, repairs and inspections set forth in developer-drafted documents, say Brian Tannenbaum and Nicholas Vargo at Ball Janik.

  • Why Diversity Jurisdiction Poses Investment Fund Hurdles

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    Federal courts' continued application of the exacting rules of diversity jurisdiction presents particular challenges for investment funds, and in the absence of any near-term reform, those who manage such funds should take action to avoid diversity jurisdiction pitfalls, say attorneys at Sher Tremonte.

  • Webuild Ruling Complicates Arb. Award Enforcement In US

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    A Delaware federal court's recent decision in Sociedad Concesionaria Metropolitana de Salud v. Webuild, if read literally, could undercut the United States' image as a proarbitration jurisdiction by complicating creditors' efforts to enforce awards against property in this country, says Jeff Newton at Omni Bridgeway.

  • Series

    Beekeeping Makes Me A Better Lawyer

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    The practice of patent law and beekeeping are not typically associated, but taking care of honeybees has enriched my legal practice by highlighting the importance of hands-on experience, continuous learning, mentorship and more, says David Longo at Oblon McClelland.

  • Opinion

    Legal Institutions Must Warn Against Phony Election Suits

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    With two weeks until the election, bar associations and courts have an urgent responsibility to warn lawyers about the consequences of filing unsubstantiated lawsuits claiming election fraud, says Elise Bean at the Carl Levin Center for Oversight and Democracy.

  • How Cos. Can Build A Strong In-House Pro Bono Program

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    During this year’s pro bono celebration week, companies should consider some key pointers to grow and maintain a vibrant in-house program for attorneys to provide free legal services for the public good, says Mary Benton at Alston & Bird.

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