Harvard University has agreed to pay $53 million to settle more than a dozen consolidated lawsuits over the theft of body parts from its medical school morgue by a former manager, lawyers for the plaintiffs said Tuesday.
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WEDNESDAY, AUGUST 19, 2026 Law360 iOS App Law360 Android App Follow Law360 on Facebook Follow Law360 on LinkedIn Follow Law360 on Twitter

TOP NEWS

Harvard To Pay $53M Over Medical School Morgue Thefts

By Julie Manganis

Harvard University has agreed to pay $53 million to settle more than a dozen consolidated lawsuits over the theft of body parts from its medical school morgue by a former manager, lawyers for the plaintiffs said Tuesday.

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Ex-DOJ Atty Says Trump's University Probes Were Political

By Hailey Konnath

Trump administration officials forged ahead with investigations into Harvard, Columbia and other universities despite its own lawyers raising legal concerns and, in some cases, finding "little to no factual predicate justifying opening them," according to a whistleblower disclosure from a former U.S. Department of Justice lawyer made public Tuesday.

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Attys In Ebay Harassment Suit Seek Lion's Share Of $15M Fee

By Julie Manganis

Counsel for a Massachusetts couple who recently reached a $55.7 million settlement over a harassment campaign by former eBay employees have asked a state court judge to find the couple's original attorney is entitled to no more than 5% of the fees in the case.

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Medical Device Exec Cashed In On Bad Quarter, Feds Charge

By Pete Brush

A former Treace Medical Concepts executive was arrested on insider trading charges Tuesday, after New York federal prosecutors said he exploited secret warnings about the Florida medical device company's sales and turned a $37,000 profit betting its stock would fall.

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Equity To Sell Boston Towers To Satisfy Antitrust Concerns

By Julie Manganis

Equity Residential has agreed to sell off two high-rise apartment buildings in Boston to avoid state and federal antitrust claims following its $69 billion merger with AvalonBay Communities, according to an agreement with the Massachusetts attorney general.

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ENFORCEMENT

Texas AG Asks 1st Circ. To Revive ActBlue Suit

By Spencer Brewer

The Texas attorney general has asked the First Circuit to revive his Texas-based lawsuit against Democratic fundraising platform ActBlue after a Massachusetts federal court blocked it, saying the federal judge improperly stymied his state-based fraud claims.

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ITC Probing Transformers Over Trade Secrets Theft Claim

By Jack McLoone

The U.S. International Trade Commission has opened an investigation into a California transformer manufacturer's claims that an Indian competitor stole its trade secrets in order to accelerate its entrance into the U.S. market, along with false advertising and trademark infringement claims.

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LITIGATION

Flawed Demand Letter Sinks Mass. Sewer Damage Suit

By Chris Villani

Massachusetts' intermediate-level appellate court on Tuesday affirmed a pretrial win for the city of Chelsea in a suit by a building owner whose property was damaged by sewer water, pointing to an insufficient demand letter sent before the case was filed.

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Tax Court's Petition Deadline Isn't Flexible, 1st Circ. Rules

By Zak Kostro

The deadline for filing a petition in the U.S. Tax Court isn't a jurisdictional bar that prevents the court from hearing a Maine company's late-filed challenge of a transferee liability notice for unpaid taxes, but the deadline can't be extended to create fairness, the First Circuit said.

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Aetna Says It Doesn't Use Repricing Tools In Antitrust Case

By Matthew Perlman

Aetna Inc. urged a Massachusetts federal court to toss it from an antitrust case accusing insurance companies of using repricing tools to reduce reimbursements paid to healthcare providers, arguing that a subsidiary, not Aetna, used the tools at issue.

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LEGAL INDUSTRY

How Does In-House Pay Compare? Take The Law360 Survey

How do in-house salaries vary across industries, roles, and organizational revenue? What compensation tools are companies using to lure top talent? Help Law360 Pulse answer these questions and more in this year's In-House Compensation Survey.

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White House Aims To Shield Advisers Behind Law Firm EOs

By Emily Sawicki

The Trump administration and Justice Department "strongly object" to an Aug. 3 discovery order requiring them to name individuals involved in drafting and approving executive orders targeting law firms, amid their repeated refusal to hand over certain communications in a suit brought by the American Bar Association.

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Troutman Sidelined Associate After Heart Attack, Suit Says

By Patrick Hoff

Troutman Pepper Locke LLP derailed an associate's career because he took medical leave to recover from a heart attack and spoke up about senior attorneys' fraudulent billing practices, according to a lawsuit filed Tuesday in New Jersey federal court.

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Trump Names 9 Judicial Picks Across 6 States

By Courtney Bublé

President Donald Trump announced nine nominees Tuesday for judicial spots in Florida, Texas, Louisiana, Kentucky, Oklahoma and Alaska. 

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Bot Errors Doom Expert's Credibility In Tainted-Supplement Suit

By Rachel Riley

A Washington federal judge Tuesday disposed of a U.S. Army nurse's lawsuit claiming supplement maker Thesis Nootropics sold products tainted with amphetamines, concluding that a key expert destroyed his credibility by submitting a report containing bot-generated false citations — much like errors for which the plaintiffs' counsel was recently sanctioned.

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Big Tech, PTAB Attys Urge Justices To Fix USPTO Power Grab

By Dani Kass

The Federal Circuit's refusal to curb the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office director's power over instituting Patent Trial and Appeal Board challenges has allowed leaders to "wreak havoc" without accountability, top tech companies have warned the U.S. Supreme Court.

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Quill & Arrow Says Ford Can't Rehash Lemon Law Fee Fights

By Linda Chiem

Quill & Arrow LLP has asked a California federal judge to dump a "retaliatory" lawsuit alleging the personal injury firm saddled Ford Motor Co. with high-priced legal bills for work purportedly handled by virtual assistants overseas or nonlawyers, saying the automaker is trying to chill product liability litigation.

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​​​​​​​Catching Up With Delaware's Chancery Court

By Jarek Rutz

The Delaware Chancery Court last week tackled disputes involving multibillion-dollar mergers, corporate oversight, founder control, SPAC litigation, commercial contracts and attorney fees.

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LAW FIRMS IN TODAY'S NEWS

Altman Nussbaum

Arete Law Group

Ashurst Perkins

Bochetto & Lentz

Cera LLP

Cleary Gottlieb

Cloherty & Steinberg

Cotchett Pitre

Cuneo Gilbert

Diller Law

Eimer Stahl

Finkelstein & Partners

Finkelstein Blankinship

Frederico Law

Gibson Dunn

Goodwin Procter

Gustafson Gluek

Hartley LLP

Haynes Boone

Hogan Lovells

Kasowitz LLP

Keches Law Group

Kilpatrick Townsend

Knight Law Group

Littler Mendelson

Lowell & Associates

Manning Gross

Mateus Law

Mazow McCullough PC

McDermott Will & Schulte

Milbank LLP

Monahan & Associates PC

Morgan & Morgan PA

Murphy Ball Stratton

Norman Hanson DeTroy

O'Melveny & Myers

Paul LLP

Pierce Davis

Quill & Arrow

Ropes & Gray

Sauder Schelkopf

Scalli Murphy Law

Scott&Scott

Shapiro Haber

Sidley Austin

Steptoe LLP

Sterlington PLLC

Susman Godfrey

Troutman

Wachtell Lipton

Wigdor LLP

Williams & Connolly

WilmerHale

Wilson Sonsini

Winston Taylor

Zimmerman Reed

COMPANIES IN TODAY'S NEWS

ActBlue LLC

Acushnet Holdings Corp.

Aetna Inc.

Agri Stats Inc.

Alliance for Automotive Innovation

American Bar Association

Amicus

Apple Inc.

Archer Aviation Inc.

AvalonBay Communities Inc.

BDO LLP

BDO USA LLP

Cisco Systems Inc.

Claritev

Clearing House Payments Co. LLC

Cloudflare Inc.

Computer & Communications Industry Association

EchoStar Corp.

Elevance Health Inc.

Enbridge Energy Partners LP

Equity Residential

Ford Motor Co.

Foundation Medicine Inc.

Google LLC

Government Accountability Project

H.I.G. Capital LLC

Harvard University

Humana Inc.

Intel Corp.

Kentucky Downs LLC

LinkedIn Corp.

Meritain Health Inc.

Microsoft Corp.

NHK Spring

National Retail Federation Inc.

New York Post

Outliers Inc.

RealPage Inc.

SAP AG

SAS Institute Inc.

Samsung Electronics Co. Ltd.

ServiceTitan Inc.

Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. Ltd.

Tesla Inc.

The Boeing Co.

The Cigna Group

The Software & Information Industry Association

Treace Medical Concepts Inc.

UnitedHealth Group Inc.

Verisk Analytics Inc.

Zelis Healthcare LLC

eBay Inc.

GOVERNMENT AGENCIES IN TODAY'S NEWS

California Supreme Court

City and County of San Francisco, California

Commonwealth of Massachusetts

Delaware Court of Chancery

Equal Employment Opportunity Commission

Executive Office of the President

Federal Trade Commission

Food and Drug Administration

Internal Revenue Service

International Trade Commission

National Labor Relations Board

Patent Trial and Appeal Board

Texas Attorney General's Office

U.S. Army

U.S. Attorney's Office for the District of Massachusetts

U.S. Attorney's Office for the Southern District of New York

U.S. Court of Appeals for the First Circuit

U.S. Department of Health and Human Services

U.S. Department of Justice

U.S. Department of Labor

U.S. District & Bankruptcy Courts of Southern District of Texas

U.S. District Court for the Central District of California

U.S. District Court for the District of Alaska

U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia

U.S. District Court for the District of Massachusetts

U.S. District Court for the District of New Jersey

U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Kentucky

U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Louisiana

U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Texas

U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Florida

U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Texas

U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York

U.S. District Court for the Western District of Washington

U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement

U.S. Patent and Trademark Office

U.S. Postal Service

U.S. Senate

U.S. Supreme Court

U.S. Tax Court

United States District Court for the Northern District of Oklahoma