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Product Liability
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June 04, 2024
FDA Advisers Rebuff Bid To Treat PTSD With MDMA
A panel of public health experts on Tuesday dealt a blow to a historic effort to regulate MDMA therapy for post-traumatic stress disorder, saying although the positive effects shown in clinical trials are promising, the proposal was hindered by too many confounding factors.
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June 04, 2024
'Ghost Gun' Makers Ask 2nd Circ. To Weigh In On NY AG Case
A group of companies being sued by the New York attorney general over their distribution of so-called ghost gun kits is asking the Second Circuit to weigh in on the case and decide whether the parts kits can be considered "firearms" and if they are entitled to immunity under federal firearms law.
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June 04, 2024
Zantac Suits Belong In Conn. State Court, Cancer Patients Say
Lawsuits claiming Zantac and its generic equivalents caused cancer belong in Connecticut state court, two groups of Constitution State cancer patients and their estates say, arguing against several drugmakers' assertions that they can't be sued in the state on innovator and warning label liability claims.
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June 04, 2024
Chancery Pauses Meta Suit While Calif., Texas Cases Continue
Delaware's Chancery Court on Tuesday paused a derivative suit seeking potentially massive damages from Meta Platforms Inc.'s leaders for failing to eliminate pedophilia, human trafficking and child exploitation content from its social media sites, pending resolution of direct damages suits in Texas and California.
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June 04, 2024
J&J Owes $260M To Ore. Talc Mesothelioma Patient, Jury Says
An Oregon state jury has ruled that Johnson & Johnson owes $260 million to a woman who said she developed mesothelioma from breathing in asbestos during daily talcum powder use.
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June 04, 2024
10th Circ. Backs CPSC In Baby Lounger Injunction Dispute
The Tenth Circuit on Tuesday sided with the Consumer Product Safety Commission in an appeal by a pillow company aiming to block a CPSC proceeding against it over one of its infant products, saying even if the company can show that removal protections for CPSC's commissioners and a judge are unconstitutional, the company hasn't shown how that affects its case.
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June 04, 2024
Wildfire Attys Descend On Colo. As Xcel Litigation Ramps Up
Hundreds of lawsuits seeking to hold Xcel Energy responsible for a devastating 2021 Colorado wildfire are just the latest battleground for a relatively small community of lawyers who have been involved in some of the biggest catastrophic fire suits in the western U.S.
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June 04, 2024
GM Ends Ga. Crash Suit That Nearly Forced CEO To Testify
General Motors and the widower of a woman whose death was alleged to have been caused by one of its vehicles have reached an agreement to end long-running wrongful death litigation that at one point threatened to force the company's CEO to testify, the parties said.
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June 04, 2024
Champion Sports Settles Hurdle Injury Suit With Athlete
Champion Sports has settled claims that it sold a gym a defective hurdle that impaled a gym-goer after he failed to jump over it, according to documents filed recently in South Carolina federal court.
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June 04, 2024
Vape Distributors Push To Exit NYC E-Cigarette Suit
Two groups of e-cigarette distributors are urging a New York state court to toss claims from New York City alleging they're violating city laws by selling flavored e-cigarettes, saying that the law in question only applies to retail sales, not distributor-to-distributor sales.
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June 04, 2024
Alaska Airlines Passengers Drop Boeing 737 Blowout Suit
A group of passengers has agreed to drop claims against The Boeing Co., supplier Spirit AeroSystems and Alaska Airlines over the Jan. 5 mid-flight door plug blowout on a Boeing 737, according to a stipulated dismissal notice filed in Washington state court.
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June 04, 2024
GRSM50 Gains Liability Partner In San Diego
Gordon Rees Scully Mansukhani LLP, the firm now known as GRSM50, has hired an attorney from Murchison & Cumming LLP, who joins the firm in California to continue her general liability practice, the firm announced Monday.
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June 03, 2024
Voir Dire With No Judge Present Persists In State Courts
Data released Friday by the National Center for State Courts revealed that voir dire conducted by lawyers with no judge present in the room persists in 7% of state court trials, but has been virtually eliminated in federal courts.
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June 03, 2024
TikTok Profits Off Of Child Sex Trafficking, Utah Alleges
Utah's Division of Consumer Protection hit TikTok Inc. with a lawsuit in state court Monday, accusing the social media giant of intentionally profiting off of child sex trafficking by implementing an unregulated virtual currency system in its live-streaming feature that allows children to be sexually exploited by adult viewers.
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June 03, 2024
PacifiCorp To Pay $178M To 400 Oregonians Over Fires
PacifiCorp has agreed to pay $178 million to more than 400 Oregon residents affected by a cluster of wildfires that burned more than a million acres of land on Labor Day 2020 amid dangerously dry and windy weather conditions, the utility announced Monday.
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June 03, 2024
Justices Won't Review Contempt Sanctions Against Drug Co.
The U.S. Supreme Court won't hear Hi-Tech Pharmaceuticals' challenge to the Federal Trade Commission's $40 million judgment against it for misrepresenting weight-loss drugs and violating an injunction.
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June 03, 2024
Navy Federal Lets AI Co. Monitor Calls, Suit Says
Navy Federal Credit Union has been letting an artificial intelligence software company intercept, analyze and record all its customer calls, according to a new lawsuit accusing the nation's largest credit union of putting its members' confidential, personal and financial information at risk.
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June 03, 2024
No Sanctions For 'Fraudulent' Signatures In 3M Earplug MDL
A Florida federal judge has decided against sanctioning two law firms that signed documents in place of their clients but chastised their lawyers' "obviously improper" act, which could have cut their clients out of their share of the $6 billion settlement in the 3M combat earplugs multidistrict litigation.
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June 03, 2024
Royal Caribbean Sued Over Ship's Wave Simulation Attraction
Royal Caribbean was hit Monday with a lawsuit in Florida federal court alleging its FlowRider wave simulation attraction on one of its cruise ships was "unreasonably dangerous" and led to a passenger being injured.
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June 03, 2024
Mich. Asks 6th Circ. To Keep Airport PFAS Suit In State Court
Michigan's Department of Environment, Great Lakes and Energy and the state attorney general are asking the Sixth Circuit to keep the department's suit against Gerald R. Ford International Airport Authority over so-called forever chemicals in state court, saying the Airport Authority is not entitled to removal as a "federal officer."
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June 03, 2024
GAO Urges DEA To Streamline Religious Drug Use Requests
The U.S. Government Accountability Office said in a new report that the nation's drug enforcement agency needs to be more transparent about its process for reviewing religious exemption requests from churches that use controlled substances as sacraments.
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June 03, 2024
New Mexico AG Beats Meta's Bid To Toss Child Abuse Suit
Social media company Meta can't escape a lawsuit claiming sexual predators were allowed to abuse children on Facebook and Instagram, after a New Mexico state judge rejected Meta's claims for immunity under Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act.
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June 03, 2024
Jeep Driver Files Proposed Class Suit Over Battery Defect
Stellantis North America has been slapped with a proposed class action in California federal court alleging that although the carmaker's 2021 Jeep Wrangler Unlimited 4XE suffers from a serious battery system defect, the company has refused to issue a recall or fix the vehicles.
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June 03, 2024
Printing Co. Loses Bid To Revive Tesla Screen Defect Suit
The Fourth Circuit has thrown out a printing company's lawsuit alleging Tesla refused to permanently fix a defective touch screen, with a panel ruling the defect wasn't present when the vehicle was sold, as required by the standards of a breach of warranty lawsuit.
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June 03, 2024
Jury Trials Dwindle In State Courts; Fall Started Before COVID
Jury trials have continued to "vanish" from state courts, despite seeing a slight bump following the pandemic shutdowns, with 2021 seeing fewer than half the number of jury trials as 2019 and one-third the number held in 2007, according to a new report from the National Center for State Courts.
Expert Analysis
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Legal Considerations For Circular Economy Strategies
As circular economy goals — generating revenue at multiple points in a product's life cycle — become nearly ubiquitous in corporate sustainability practices, companies should reassess existing strategies by focusing on government incentives, regulations, and reporting and disclosure requirements, say Rachel Saltzman and Erin Grisby at Hunton.
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Opinion
Insurance Industry Asbestos Reserve Estimates Are Unreliable
Insurance regulators rely on industry self-reporting in approving insurance company reorganizations, but AM Best data reveals that actuarial and audit estimates have been setting perniciously low levels of loss reserves for asbestos liabilities and thus should be treated with deep skepticism, says Jonathan Terrell at KCIC.
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Preempting Bottled Water Microplastics Fraud Claims
Food products like bottled water are increasingly likely to be targets of consumer fraud complaints due to alleged microplastics contamination — but depending on the labeling or advertising at issue, the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act can provide a powerful preemption defense, say Tariq Naeem and Brenda Sweet at Tucker Ellis.
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Litigation Inspiration: A Source Of Untapped Fulfillment
As increasing numbers of attorneys struggle with stress and mental health issues, business litigators can find protection against burnout by remembering their important role in society — because fulfillment in one’s work isn’t just reserved for public interest lawyers, say Bennett Rawicki and Peter Bigelow at Hilgers Graben.
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5 Ways To Hone Deposition Skills And Improve Results
Excerpt from Practical Guidance
Depositions must never be taken for granted in the preparations needed to win a dispositive motion or a trial, and five best practices, including knowing when to hire a videographer, can significantly improve outcomes, says James Argionis at Cozen O'Connor.
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The Challenges Of Measuring Harm In Slack-Fill Cases
A recent California federal court partial class certification ruling was a rare victory for plaintiffs in a case over slack-fill empty space in packaged products, indicating that damages arguments may be important at the certification stage, say Sushrut Jain and Valentina Bernasconi at Edgeworth Economics.
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Series
Skiing Makes Me A Better Lawyer
A lifetime of skiing has helped me develop important professional skills, and taught me that embracing challenges with a spirit of adventure can allow lawyers to push boundaries, expand their capabilities and ultimately excel in their careers, says Andrea Przybysz at Tucker Ellis.
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Opinion
High Court Should Endorse Insurer Standing In Bankruptcy
In Truck Insurance Exchange v. Kaiser Gypsum, the U.S. Supreme Court will examine bankruptcy standing doctrine as applied to insurers in mass tort cases, and should use the opportunity to eliminate spurious standing roadblocks to resolving insurer objections on their merits, says Frank Perch at White and Williams.
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Think Like A Lawyer: Forget Everything You Know About IRAC
The mode of legal reasoning most students learn in law school, often called “Issue, Rule, Application, Conclusion,” or IRAC, erroneously frames analysis as a separate, discrete step, resulting in disorganized briefs and untold obfuscation — but the fix is pretty simple, says Luke Andrews at Poole Huffman.
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How Firms Can Ensure Associate Gender Parity Lasts
Among associates, women now outnumber men for the first time, but progress toward gender equality at the top of the legal profession remains glacially slow, and firms must implement time-tested solutions to ensure associates’ gender parity lasts throughout their careers, say Kelly Culhane and Nicole Joseph at Culhane Meadows.
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How Echoing Techniques Can Derail Witnesses At Deposition
Before depositions, defense attorneys must prepare witnesses to recognize covert echoing techniques that may be used by opposing counsel to lower their defenses and elicit sensitive information — potentially leading to nuclear settlements and verdicts, say Bill Kanasky and Steve Wood at Courtroom Sciences.
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Proposed RCRA Regs For PFAS: What Cos. Must Know
Two rules recently proposed by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency would lead to more per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances being regulated under the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act, and would increase the frequency and scope of corrective action — so affected industries should prepare for more significant cleanup efforts, say attorneys at Alston & Bird.
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7 Common Myths About Lateral Partner Moves
As lateral recruiting remains a key factor for law firm growth, partners considering a lateral move should be aware of a few commonly held myths — some of which contain a kernel of truth, and some of which are flat out wrong, says Dave Maurer at Major Lindsey.
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Series
Cheering In The NFL Makes Me A Better Lawyer
Balancing my time between a BigLaw career and my role as an NFL cheerleader has taught me that pursuing your passions outside of work is not a distraction, but rather an opportunity to harness important skills that can positively affect how you approach work and view success in your career, says Rachel Schuster at Sheppard Mullin.
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Using Arbitration And Class Waivers As Privacy Suit Tools
Amid a surge in data breach class actions over the last few years, several federal court decisions indicate that arbitration clauses and class action waiver provisions can be possible alternatives to public court battles and potentially reduce the costs of privacy litigation, say Mark Olthoff and Courtney Klaus at Polsinelli.