Practice Areas
Employment
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February 22, 2012
8th Circ. Mostly OKs Toss Of EEOC’s Trucker Sex Bias Suit
The Eighth Circuit on Wednesday upheld the dismissal of almost all of the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission's lawsuit on behalf female drivers at CRST Van Expedited Inc. but vacated a $4.5 million attorneys' fee award to the trucking company.
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February 22, 2012
Mining Co. Indicted Over Coal Mine Roof Collapse
A federal grand jury in Kentucky on Wednesday indicted Manalapan Mining Co. for allegedly failing to maintain safety standards in a coal mine whose roof collapsed and killed a miner last year.
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February 22, 2012
Union Sues Indiana Gov. Daniels Over Right-To-Work Law
Indiana union members on Wednesday sought to invalidate the state’s new right-work-law with a suit against Indiana Gov. Mitch Daniels, claiming the bill is unconstitutional for interfering with union security and that it treats different groups of workers differently.
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February 22, 2012
AMR Says Retiree Committee Would Slow Down Labor Talks
AMR Corp. on Wednesday told the Delaware judge overseeing its bankruptcy that nonunion retirees should not form a committee to represent the interests of all retired company workers because a committee was not needed and would hold up labor negotiations.
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February 22, 2012
Sheen, Asner Among SAG Members Fighting AFTRA Merger
Actors Martin Sheen, Ed Asner and other members of the Screen Actors Guild filed a lawsuit Wednesday in California federal court seeking to block a vote on a proposed merger with the American Federation of Television and Radio Artists.
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February 22, 2012
9th Circ. Chucks $1M Verdict Against FedEx In Bias Case
The Ninth Circuit on Tuesday affirmed a decision to throw out a nearly $1 million jury verdict against Federal Express Corp. in a former manager's race discrimination and retaliation suit, saying a review of the record showed no factual basis for the verdict.
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February 22, 2012
Former WaMu Execs Balk At Plan For D&O Claims
A number of former Washington Mutual Inc. executives objected Wednesday to the bankrupt bank's refusal to set aside cash reserves to cover their existing and potential indemnification claims.
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February 22, 2012
6th Circ. Revives GM Workers' ERISA Suit Against State Street
The Sixth Circuit on Wednesday reversed a lower court's dismissal of a putative class action alleging State Street Bank & Trust Co. violated federal employment law by allowing General Motors employees to invest in the company's stock even after GM's impending bankruptcy became public knowledge.
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February 22, 2012
Fed. Circ. Nixes Judicial Pay Raise Again
The Federal Circuit again denied federal judges a cost-of-living pay raise Friday but held that the judges' class action was not barred by a previous ruling, clearing the way for the suit to possibly return to the U.S. Supreme Court.
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February 22, 2012
Burr & Forman Adds Lowndes Drosdick Labor Pro In Fla.
Burr & Forman LLP said this month that it had lured over a veteran labor and employment attorney from Lowndes Drosdick Doster Kantor and Reed PA to bolster its ranks in Orlando, Fla.
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February 22, 2012
Ariz. Law Firm Can't Be Dragged Into Ill. Court: Judge
An Illinois federal judge on Friday dismissed an Arizona-based law firm from a suit accusing it and two former Macey Bankruptcy Law PC attorneys of stealing clients from Macey's Phoenix office, ruling the court did not have personal jurisdiction over the firm.
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February 22, 2012
NYPD Faces Setback In Suit Over Pensions For Veteran Cops
A federal judge on Wednesday tossed counterclaims brought by New York City in a federal challenge to how the city pays pensions to police officers who served in the military, saying the countersuit was unrelated to the government’s claims.
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February 22, 2012
EEOC To Attack Systemic Bias Under New Plan
The U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission will ramp up its enforcement of laws against systemic bias starting next month, after approving on Wednesday a strategic plan for the next four years that forecasts a tight budget.
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February 22, 2012
Insurer Aims To Duck Coverage Of Omeros FCA Suit
Carolina Casualty Insurance Co. sued biopharmaceutical company Omeros Corp. on Tuesday, seeking to avoid covering claims from an underlying False Claims Act action brought by the company's former chief financial officer concerning allegedly fraudulent National Institute of Health grants.
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February 22, 2012
2nd Massey Boss Charged In Fatal Mine Explosion
Federal prosecutors charged a second Massey Energy Co. mine boss Wednesday with obstructing an investigation into poor safety conditions at the infamous Upper Big Branch mine in West Virginia, where an explosion in 2010 killed 29 miners.
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February 21, 2012
Fla. Catholic University Sues Over Contraception Rule
A Catholic university in Florida on Tuesday sued the Obama administration, claiming the new rule requiring employers to include free contraceptive care in their health plans is unconstitutional, the latest such suit challenging the provision.
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February 21, 2012
Ex-Freed & Weiss Atty Says Former Partner Betrayed Firm
A former Freed & Weiss LLC attorney sued one of the firm's former name partners for breach of contract in Illinois court Tuesday, claiming Paul Weiss tried to take over the firm and fired the plaintiff after he “refused to help [Weiss] accomplish his schemes.”
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February 21, 2012
Dukes Dooms Class Claims In Race Bias Suit, Walgreen Says
Ex-Walgreen Co. workers who allege the company discriminated against Latinos are not only short on facts, but their putative class claims are at odds with the U.S. Supreme Court's ruling in Dukes, the drugstore giant told an Illinois federal court Tuesday.
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February 21, 2012
SNR Denton Defamation Claims Revived In Secrets Row
An Illinois appeals court last week revived SNR Denton’s defamation and tortious interference counterclaims in a consulting company’s trade secrets suit that claims a former executive violated her noncompete agreement by joining the law firm and helping it poach employees for the firm's health care group.
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February 21, 2012
Ex-BGC Financial Employee Says Firm Lets Sex Bias Slide
A former BGC Financial LP employee slapped the brokerage with a lawsuit in New York federal court Friday, accusing the firm of fostering a “blatantly sexualized and misogynistic atmosphere” in which sexual harassment is rampant and accepted.
Expert Analysis
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Workers' Comp Insurance: The Most Important Tool
Unless a contractor is exempt from having workers' compensation insurance, its failure to maintain such coverage results in an automatic suspension of its license in California. Two key cases — Wright v. Isaak and Loranger v. Jones — illustrate this point, says Matthew Hicks of Sedgwick LLP.
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Accidentally Misleading Employers With The 'Facts'
The U.S. Office of Special Counsel for Immigration-Related Unfair Employment Practices has published examples of what constitutes unlawful discrimination in its "Fact Pattern Flyer," but employers need to avoid becoming confused by the possible implication that certain actions are appropriate as long as all workers are treated the same, says Robert Divine of Baker Donelson Bearman Caldwell & Berkowitz PC.
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A Troublesome Twist In Texas Workers' Comp Decision
Due to the Supreme Court of Texas' decision in Port Elevator-Brownsville v. Casados, insurance companies providing workers' compensation coverage to staffing customers in Texas now must worry about how much uncompensated exposure they may have for injuries to temporary agency workers, says George Reardon of Littler Mendelson PC.
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Law School, Meet Litigation PR ...
The single most important thing law schools can do to manage their reputations in the face of litigation is apply the lessons learned from Wall Street during the recent financial crisis and strive for transparency in all communications. One need only look to Goldman Sachs’ woes or the struggles of Jon Corzine’s MF Global as examples of the catastrophic results of a campaign based on anything but complete honesty, says Spencer Baretz of Hellerman Baretz Communications.
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Avoiding Union Ire With Consistent Policy Enforcement
The National Labor Relations Board has affirmed that consistent enforcement of clearly articulated uniform and off-duty access policies in a health care facility is paramount, particularly when possible union activity is involved. Unions trying to attack such policies will be aware of any exceptions and use them aggressively to challenge an otherwise lawful policy, say Eric Stevens and Jennifer Mora of Littler Mendelson PC.
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Deposition Is Not The Best Solution To Denial
Since Metropolitan Life Insurance Co. v. Glenn, a substantial body of case law has developed addressing when plaintiffs in Employee Retirement Income Security Act benefit claim litigation should be permitted to explore insurer conflict considerations — with some courts taking the problematic step of granting requests to depose those responsible for the benefit denial, says Deidre Grossman of Littler Mendelson PC.
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Termination Or Retirement: Just Semantics?
Several employment cases from 2011, and others preceding those decisions, have made the quagmire of "retirement or termination?" a little less murky, but employers should still tread carefully where the end of an employment relationship closely precedes or follows a retirement, says Frances Rogers of Liebert Cassidy Whitmore.
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Tracking The Implications Of US V. Jones
The U.S. Supreme Court's ruling in U.S. v. Jones that the government’s attachment of a GPS device to a vehicle without a warrant violated the Fourth Amendment likely will not — at least in California — impact an employer’s ability to place devices on its own vehicles to track employee movement when there is a legitimate business reason to do so, says Elizabeth Arce of Liebert Cassidy Whitmore.
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The Rise Of '2nd Generation' Dukes Issues
2012 looks to be the year that litigants and courts alike increasingly confront “second generation” issues left open by the U.S. Supreme Court's ruling in Wal-Mart v. Dukes. One of the prime areas of development is the use of Dukes to attack the architecture of the class theories in a complaint, say Gerald Maatman and David Ross of Seyfarth Shaw LLP.
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A Green Light For Repetitive Class Action Litigation
Most employers assume that if they successfully defeat a plaintiff’s motion for class certification in a wage and hour class action, the same class claims cannot be raised again in another case. However, the California Court of Appeal has dashed that commonly held assumption in Bridgeford v. Pacific Health Corp., says Remy Kessler of Reed Smith LLP.