Appellate

  • May 13, 2025

    Colo. Justice Iffy On Tossing Rulings In Securities Fraud Case

    A Colorado Supreme Court justice said he was a bit troubled that three decisions might be overturned if he accepts the state's argument that attorney advice isn't relevant to a securities fraud defendant's state of mind, musing that perhaps those previous courts "got it right."

  • May 13, 2025

    Ski Resort Owner Offers Alternative Fixes After Antitrust Loss

    A New York ski resort operator is offering alternative remedies for a state court to consider after it found the owner violated antitrust law by acquiring a rival ski operation and shutting it down, despite a call from enforcers for a sale of the property to another operator.

  • May 13, 2025

    Pa. Court Debates RGGI Membership Without Lawmakers' Nod

    The Pennsylvania Supreme Court on Tuesday weighed if a law empowering the state's environmental regulator equated to securing legislative approval to join a multistate Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative, with the state justices noting Pennsylvania is the only member to join without lawmakers' blessing.

  • May 13, 2025

    Pa. Justices Question Ruling Over Verizon's Utility Pole Rents

    Some justices on Pennsylvania's Supreme Court questioned Tuesday whether the state's Public Utility Commission skipped steps in declaring that electrical utility FirstEnergy was charging Verizon "unjust and unreasonable" rates to rent space on utility poles, since the decision appeared to rest mainly on federal price limits the state had adopted.

  • May 13, 2025

    10th Circ. Wary Of Nixing $20M Fraud Award For Colo. Town

    The Tenth Circuit seemed poised Tuesday to affirm a $19.8 million verdict in favor of a Colorado city battling a software developer accused of misrepresenting the readiness of its integrated billing platform for fiberoptic broadband services, even as the contractor insisted the language in the agreement was transparent.

  • May 13, 2025

    The Man Who Ended Affirmative Action Is Just Getting Started

    Nearly two years after the U.S. Supreme Court struck down affirmative action in college admissions, the legal strategist who brought the landmark case is using the ruling in a bid to end race-based programs in the public and private sectors, bolstered by allies in the executive branch.

  • May 13, 2025

    Fox Nabs Smartmatic Bribery Probe Docs In Defamation Case

    A New York state appeals court on Tuesday ordered Smartmatic to give Fox News documents related to a federal investigation into allegations that executives of the election systems company bribed officials in the Philippines, ruling the materials are "plainly relevant" to the network's defense against defamation claims.

  • May 13, 2025

    3rd Circ. Upholds Most Of Boy Scouts' Ch. 11 Plan

    The Third Circuit upheld the bulk of the Boy Scouts of America's Chapter 11 plan to deal with thousands of childhood sex abuse claims, but agreed Tuesday with one objecting insurer that its rights were impermissibly altered under the plan.

  • May 13, 2025

    Cancer Centers Want Fed. Circ. To Rehear Antibody IP Fight

    The Dana-Farber Cancer Institute and Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center say the full Federal Circuit should review a decision rejecting Xencor's application for an antibody patent, arguing that the decision wrongly created a new precedent that could be harmful to other patents.

  • May 13, 2025

    1st Circ. Urged To Rule In Appeal Over Canceled HUD Grants

    Groups challenging Trump administration cuts to $30 million in housing grants asked the First Circuit to rule that a Massachusetts federal judge, in fact, has the power to order federal officials to fund the grants, even after the judge dissolved such a ruling in reaction to a recent U.S. Supreme Court finding.

  • May 13, 2025

    6th Circ. Clears Teacher To Fight Exclusion From Rehire List

    The Sixth Circuit breathed new life into a teacher's lawsuit claiming a Tennessee school district unlawfully failed to place her on a reemployment candidate list after it eliminated her position, saying a trial court took too narrow a view of whether omission from the list caused harm.

  • May 13, 2025

    11th Circ. Looks Open To Reviving Ga. Voter Intimidation Suit

    Eleventh Circuit judges scrutinizing a ruling that a conservative election monitoring group didn't intimidate Georgians when it challenged the voter registration of hundreds of thousands of citizens said Tuesday the district judge may have gotten it wrong, suggesting during oral arguments the group may have at least tried it.

  • May 13, 2025

    Climate NGOs Attack EPA Appeal In Funding Clawback Fight

    Climate investment groups asked the D.C. Circuit to affirm a district court ruling blocking the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency from clawing back billions of dollars disbursed to them under the Inflation Reduction Act, characterizing its actions as "textbook arbitrariness."

  • May 13, 2025

    3rd Circ. Says Worker's Pre-Suit EEOC Filings Are Inadequate

    The Third Circuit refused to revive an age bias suit from a former community college employee who claimed she was mistreated by a younger supervisor, rejecting her argument that a U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission intake form and other documents qualified as her required pre-suit discrimination charge.

  • May 13, 2025

    10th Circ. Pushes Vail On Safety Claim Behind Truck Limits

    A Tenth Circuit panel on Tuesday pressed the ski town of Vail, Colorado, on whether it has enough evidence that an ordinance limiting commercial truck deliveries in pedestrian-only zones would improve public safety, with one judge saying the town's rationale "almost sounds like a pretext."

  • May 13, 2025

    Albright Scraps $26M Video Patent Verdict Against Google

    U.S. District Judge Alan Albright has overruled a jury's $26 million verdict against Google LLC and its YouTube LLC subsidiary for infringing VideoShare LLC's video sharing patent, finding that as a matter of law "the only reasonable interpretation of the claim language" shows no infringement.

  • May 13, 2025

    Trump Nudges Justices To Lift Ban On Venezuelan Removals

    The Trump administration has asked the U.S. Supreme Court to lift a 3-week-old order temporarily prohibiting the government from removing a group of almost 200 alleged Venezuelan gang members currently detained in northern Texas to an El Salvador prison, citing new lower court rulings and a detention center protest.

  • May 13, 2025

    Ga. Justices Nix Atty Immunity Doctrine, Uphold Tossing Case

    The Georgia Supreme Court on Tuesday overturned a long-standing attorney immunity doctrine that a lower court found shielded Barnes & Thornburg LLP from a legal malpractice suit, but the justices concluded that a onetime client's claims still fell short.

  • May 13, 2025

    Ex-Defender Can't Block Mystery Info In Sex Bias Case Appeal

    The federal government can submit additional documents from a district court case record in an appeal by a former assistant public defender in North Carolina who accused the federal judiciary of sex bias, the Fourth Circuit ruled Tuesday over the assistant public defender's objections.

  • May 13, 2025

    Pot Dispensary Asks Mo. High Court To Block County Taxes

    In incorporated areas of Missouri counties, a municipality's imposition of a 3% sales tax on adult-use cannabis supersedes a county's ability to impose its own additional tax, a dispensary told the Missouri Supreme Court during oral arguments Tuesday.

  • May 13, 2025

    NJ AG, Data Co. Defend Judicial Privacy Law At 3rd Circ.

    Data protection company Atlas Data Corp. and New Jersey's attorney general are urging the Third Circuit to uphold a decision declaring the state's judicial privacy measure known as Daniel's Law as constitutional.

  • May 13, 2025

    11th Circ. Eyes Restarting Seafood Workers' ESOP Suit

    The Eleventh Circuit seemed Tuesday to lean toward reviving a lawsuit from former workers of a seafood company who allege that their employee stock ownership plan was overcharged in a $92 million deal, as judges questioned a lower court's decision to toss the case with prejudice.

  • May 13, 2025

    Attys Push 11th Circ. To Weigh Judge Shopping Sanctions

    The Eleventh Circuit can hear three attorneys' appeal of sanctions against them for judge shopping during their legal challenge to an Alabama law criminalizing gender-affirming care, because the underlying case was dismissed, making the jurisdictional question moot, two of those lawyers told the appellate court.

  • May 13, 2025

    1st Circ. Vacates $10M Severance Win Over Drafting Error

    The First Circuit threw out a judgment that valued a departing technology executive's severance payout at $10.2 million due to a mistake in the contract, ruling that the company's intended offer of $680,000 in total value could also be reasonably construed from the text of the deal.  

  • May 13, 2025

    NLRB Urges 5th Circ. To Stand By Its OK Of Exxon Vacatur

    The Fifth Circuit should stand by its decision that the National Labor Relations Board correctly vacated Exxon Mobil's win in an agency case after learning that a board member who presided over the litigation had a stake in the company, the agency told the appellate court.

Expert Analysis

  • AI Will Soon Transform The E-Discovery Industrial Complex

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    Todd Itami at Covington discusses how generative artificial intelligence will reshape the current e-discovery paradigm, replacing the blunt instrument of data handling with a laser scalpel of fully integrated enterprise solutions — after first making e-discovery processes technically and legally harder.

  • When Innovation Overwhelms The Rule Of Law

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    In an era where technology is rapidly evolving and artificial intelligence is seemingly everywhere, it’s worth asking if the law — both substantive precedent and procedural rules — can keep up with the light speed of innovation, says Reuben Guttman at Guttman Buschner.

  • The Future Of ALJs At NLRB And DOL Post-Jarkesy

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    In the wake of the U.S. Supreme Court’s 2024 Jarkesy ruling, several ongoing challenges to the constitutionality of the U.S. Department of Labor's and the National Labor Relations Board's administrative law judges have the potential to significantly shape the future of administrative tribunals, say attorneys at Wiley Rein.

  • The Tides Are Changing For Fair Access Banking Laws

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    The landscape of fair access banking laws, which seek to prevent banks from denying services based on individuals' ideological beliefs, has shifted in the last few years, but a new presidential administration provides renewed momentum for advancing such legislation against the backdrop of state efforts, say attorneys at Latham.

  • Imagine The Possibilities Of Openly Autistic Lawyering

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    Andi Mazingo at Lumen Law, who was diagnosed with autism about midway through her career, discusses how the legal profession can create inclusive workplaces that empower openly autistic lawyers and enhance innovation, and how neurodivergent attorneys can navigate the challenges and opportunities that come with disclosing one’s diagnosis.

  • Top 10 Healthcare And Life Sciences Issues To Watch In 2025

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    Under the new Trump administration, this coming year may benefit some healthcare and life sciences stakeholders, while creating new challenges for others amid an increasingly complex regulatory environment, say attorneys at Debevoise.

  • Disciplinary Rule Updates Every Texas Lawyer Needs To Know

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    Sweeping amendments to the Texas Disciplinary Rules of Professional Conduct that recently went into effect provide essential clarity and modernity to rules governing conflicts of interest, client confidentiality and duties to prospective clients, says Robert Tobey at Johnston Tobey.

  • Parsing 3rd Circ. Ruling On Cannabis, Employee Private Suits

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    The Third Circuit recently upheld a decision that individuals don't have a private right of action for alleged violations of New Jersey's Cannabis Regulatory, Enforcement Assistance and Marketplace Modernization Act, but employers should stay informed as the court encouraged the state Legislature to amend the law, say attorneys at Mandelbaum Barrett.

  • Perspectives

    How High Court May Rule In First Step Act Resentencing Case

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    U.S. Supreme Court justices grappled with verb tenses and statutory intent in recent oral arguments in Hewitt v. U.S., a case involving an anomalous resentencing issue under the First Step Act, and though they may hold that the statute is unambiguous, they could also decide the case on narrow, practical grounds, say attorneys at Bracewell.

  • Series

    Documentary Filmmaking Makes Me A Better Lawyer

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    Becoming a documentary filmmaker has allowed me to merge my legal expertise with my passion for storytelling, and has helped me to hone negotiation, critical thinking and problem-solving skills that are important to both endeavors, says Robert Darwell at Sheppard Mullin.

  • Litigation Funding Disclosure Debate: Strategy Considerations

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    In the ongoing debate over whether courts should require disclosure of litigation funding, funders and plaintiffs tend to argue against such mandates, but voluntarily disclosing limited details about a funding arrangement can actually confer certain benefits to plaintiffs in some scenarios, say Andrew Stulce and Marc Cavan at Longford Capital.

  • Discretionary Compensation Lessons From 7th Circ. Ruling

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    The Seventh Circuit’s recent ruling in Das v. Tata established that contract disclaimers don't automatically bar claims under the Illinois Wage Payment and Collection Act, underscoring the limits of compensation systems that purport to grant employers unilateral discretion, say attorneys at Schoenberg Finkel.

  • Gas Contract Fight Holds Lessons On Force Majeure Clauses

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    Ongoing litigation over gas deliveries during Winter Storm Uri underscores the need for precision and foresight when negotiating force majeure clauses in contracts — particularly in the energy sector, where climate-related disruptions and market volatility are inevitable, but often unpredictable, say attorneys at Spencer Fane.

  • Justices Likely To Stay In ERISA's Bounds On Pleadings

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    The arguments in Cunningham v. Cornell showed the U.S. Supreme Court's willingness to resolve a circuit split regarding Employee Retirement Income Security Act pleading standards by staying within ERISA's confines, while instructing courts regarding what must be pled to survive a motion to dismiss, says Ryan Curtis at Fennemore Craig.

  • Scope And Nature Of Judicial Relief Will Affect Loper's Impact

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    The practical result of post-Loper Bright rulings against regulatory actions will depend on the relief courts grant — and there has been controversy in these types of cases over whether the ruling is applied just to the parties or nationwide, and whether the action can be left in place while it's corrected, says Steven Gordon at Holland & Knight.

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