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Top News
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January 23, 2013
DOJ Criminal Division Chief Lanny Breuer To Leave Post
Lanny Breuer — whose role as head of the U.S. Department of Justice's Criminal Division pitted him against white collar fraud and corruption in the aftermath of the 2008 financial crisis, as he prosecuted banks involved in the Libor scandal and others — plans to step down, according to Wednesday reports.
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December 7, 2012
High Court Enters Same-Sex Marriage Debate
The U.S. Supreme Court on Friday agreed to jump into the same-sex marriage debate, accepting a suit over California’s same-sex marriage ban that was struck down earlier this year as well as a challenge to the Defense of Marriage Act.
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September 20, 2012
Health Law’s Employer Mandate Draws Challenge From Okla.
The state of Oklahoma on Wednesday filed a new legal challenge related to the health care overhaul's employer mandate, accusing the Obama administration of overstepping the law by making insurance premium subsidies available on both federal and state-based exchanges.
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September 20, 2012
Regulators OK Shell Preparatory Drilling In Beaufort Sea
Offshore regulators told Royal Dutch Shell PLC on Thursday that it could begin the first stages of drilling for oil in Alaska's Beaufort Sea, allowing the company to prepare wells that could begin producing next year.
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September 20, 2012
Sen. Committee Approves Decades-Old Int'l Patent Treaties
The Senate Judiciary Committee approved legislation Thursday that would implement two long-stalled treaties designed to help American inventors secure patent protection overseas, sending the Clinton-era pacts to the full Senate.
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September 20, 2012
Fast And Furious Report Lands DOJ's Breuer In Hot Seat
House Republicans pushed Lanny Breuer, the head of the U.S. Department of Justice's Criminal Division, to resign on Thursday, claiming he failed to properly supervise prosecutors and federal agents who botched the gun-trafficking investigation known as Operation Fast and Furious.
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September 20, 2012
House Approves Ban On Contaminated Chinese Drywall
The U.S. House of Representatives on Wednesday passed a bill banning the sale of contaminated drywall imported from China and urging Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton to work with the Chinese government to help gain restitution for people who already have used the product.
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September 20, 2012
House Bypasses SEC To Define Muni Bond Advisers
Frustrated with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission's delays in defining who qualifies as a municipal bond adviser and proposals that experts have called overbroad and onerous, House lawmakers moved Wednesday to sidestep the agency by passing their own, narrower definition.
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September 19, 2012
Politics Delay Senate Vote On 6-Month Stopgap Budget
Back in Washington, D.C., after summer recess, the U.S. Senate delayed votes on a six-month continuing resolution which would fund the federal government for the short term, after the bill was held up by partisan arguments on Wednesday.
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September 19, 2012
High Court Won't Block Texas Interim Redistricting Plan
The U.S. Supreme Court on Wednesday ended a bid by the League of United Latin American Citizens to block the implementation of a court-ordered interim congressional redistricting plan in Texas, which will remain in effect through the November general election.
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September 19, 2012
GOP 'War On Coal' Bill Will Get Vetoed, White House Says
The White House said Wednesday it would veto Republican legislation that would weaken or block a host of environmental regulations affecting the coal industry, arguing the legislation would harm public health, the environment and the economy.
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September 19, 2012
IG's Fast And Furious Report Rips DOJ, ATF For Failures
The U.S. Department of Justice's inspector general on Wednesday blamed 14 federal officials for botching the gun-trafficking investigation known as Operation Fast and Furious and recommended that they face disciplinary reviews.
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September 18, 2012
Judge Rules Ariz. Can Enforce Immigration Law
An Arizona federal judge on Tuesday lifted a block against enforcement of the sole provision of Arizona's controversial immigration law that the U.S. Supreme Court upheld, setting into motion a section of the law that calls on police to check the immigration status of people they detain.
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September 18, 2012
Pa. High Court Orders Review Of Voter ID Restrictions
The Pennsylvania Supreme Court on Tuesday vacated a lower court’s ruling upholding the state’s contentious voter identification law, asking the lower court to first review the state’s efforts to provide identification cards with easier access.
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September 18, 2012
Greenberg's $25B Suit Over AIG Bailout Allowed To Proceed
A federal judge on Monday refused to reconsider an order allowing a $25 billion suit brought by an insurance company run by former American International Group Inc. CEO Maurice "Hank" Greenberg against the U.S. government over AIG's bailout.
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September 18, 2012
DC Circ. Backs Political Ad Rule In Donor Disclosure Fight
The D.C. Circuit on Tuesday restored a Federal Election Commission rule that allowed nonprofit organizations to run political issue advertisements without disclosing their donors, reversing a lower court’s ruling on the statute.
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September 18, 2012
Fannie Mae Taps Ex-Pfizer Litigation Chief For GC Role
Fannie Mae on Tuesday tapped former Pfizer Inc. chief litigation counsel Bradley Lerman to take over the general counsel role left vacant earlier this year when Timothy J. Mayopoulos moved up to become CEO of the mortgage giant.
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September 17, 2012
Sen. Unveils Anti-Discrimination Bill For Pregnant Workers
A proposal that would provide pregnant employees with protections similar to those extended to disabled workers picked up steam Friday when a U.S. senator unveiled a companion to a bill previously introduced in the House of Representatives.
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September 17, 2012
Wis. Bargaining Law's Fate May Bode Ill For Copycats
A Wisconsin judge's ruling nullifying key parts of a controversial state law curbing public employees' collective bargaining rights on the grounds that the law was unconstitutional could stymie efforts to enact similar limitations on bargaining in other parts of the country, attorneys said Monday.
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September 14, 2012
Top NLRB Lawyer Breached Rules In Wal-Mart Probe: Report
The acting general counsel of the National Labor Relations Board violated government ethics rules by taking part in an investigation of Wal-Mart Stores Inc.'s social media policy while holding stock in the retail giant, the agency’s inspector general reported Thursday.
Expert Analysis
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Takeaways From United Technologies' $75M Settlement
United Technologies Corporation's global settlement with the U.S. Departments of State and Justice underscores the importance of a robust compliance program to prevent, detect and remediate any violations of export control laws or regulations — especially if products and services are destined for China, say Jeffrey Gerrish and Soo-Mi Rhee of Skadden Arps Slate Meagher & Flom LLP.
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Understanding Mayo V. Prometheus
Following the U.S. Supreme Court's treatment of the machine-or-transformation test in Mayo Collaborative Services Inc. v. Prometheus Laboratories Inc., the test — previously thought to be the governing test for patent eligibility under § 101 — no longer appears to occupy such a prominent role in patent-eligibility jurisprudence, says William Merkel of Marshall Gerstein & Borun LLP.
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Radlax — 'An Easy Case'
“This is an easy case,” Justice Antonin Scalia wrote in his opinion in Radlax Gateway Hotel LLC v. Amalgamated Bank, settling the issue of whether the Bankruptcy Code grants the secured creditor a right to credit bid in an auction sale under a plan. But interestingly, the opinion barely mentions the infamous Philadelphia News decision from the Third Circuit which was effectively overruled by the U.S. Supreme Court, say attorneys with Foley & Lardner LLP.
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The Latest Attempt At Criminalizing 'Robo-Signing'
While the New York state Senate did not act on the Foreclosure Fraud Prevention Act of 2012 before adjourning its regular session — and as a result there is little chance the bill will be enacted this year — the bill represents the latest attempt by state governments to impose criminal liability on fraudulent foreclosure practices by mortgage servicers or their employees, say attorneys with Dechert LLP.
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How The 2nd Circ. Aleynikov Opinion Went Awry
In United States v. Aleynikov, the Second Circuit recently created an unfortunate cloud over the scope of the federal trade secret statute. The decision detracts from the primary legislative objectives to promote and protect national economic security and punish individuals who misappropriate intellectual property in the form of trade secrets, say Mark Krotoski and Richard Scott of the U.S. Department of Justice.
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PPACA Victory Sets Stage For New Wave Of Litigation
Although the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act and its coverage mandates have been upheld, the lack of regulatory guidance for many key areas of the statute creates uncertainty regarding implementation and enforcement. No matter how employers and plan fiduciaries approach the various coverage mandates, it is clear that the future is not without risk of litigation, say attorneys with Proskauer Rose LLP.
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Did The Court Get The Oracle Analysis Right?
The Northern District of California's opinion in Oracle America Inc. v. Google Inc. is suprising given that there was direct copying and that the threshold of originality required for a work to qualify as copyrightable has traditionally been so low that the application programming interfaces almost certainly qualified as sufficiently original to be protected by copyright, says David Makman of the Law Offices of David A. Makman.
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Facing CFIUS: Better Safe Than Sorry
The Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States recently blocked yet another acquisition involving Chinese investors. Any foreign companies looking to invest in the U.S. should be wary of the scrutiny they may confront, and determine whether CFIUS review is likely, say George Wang and Yelena Kotlarsky of Haynes and Boone LLP.
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A Closer Look At ING's $619M Settlement
ING Bank NV's $619 million fine to settle criminal charges is the largest ever against a financial institution in connection with an investigation into U.S. sanctions violations and related offenses. The enforcement action is also notable in several other respects, say attorneys with Steptoe & Johnson LLP.
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Apple V. Motorola: Implications For Patent Damages
Unfortunately, the level of economic coherence in patent law with respect to damages today is roughly comparable to what existed in antitrust law in 1955. However, Judge Richard Posner’s recent opinions in Apple Inc. v. Motorola Inc. help clarify legal and economic standards for measuring patent damages, says Gregory Sidak of Criterion Economics LLC.