California

  • October 20, 2026

    Meta To Rereview MDL Privilege Claims Under Special Master

    Meta Platforms Inc. has agreed to have an independent special master rereview potentially thousands of documents the company withheld as privileged in social media addiction multidistrict litigation, after a California federal judge criticized Meta's privilege claims and refused to let Meta use an AI tool to rereview 170,000 documents at issue.

  • October 20, 2026

    Squires Grants 10 Patent Review Bids, Rejects 2 Others

    In his latest round of decisions, U.S. Patent and Trademark Office Director John Squires has granted 10 petitions seeking review of patents and denied two others, both on discretionary grounds.

  • October 20, 2026

    Baby Food Makers Beat Autism Claims In MDL

    A mother who claims her child's autism was caused by heavy metal exposure from baby foods made by major companies, including Gerber, Beech-Nut and Walmart, saw her core claims ended when a California federal judge ruled that parents in the broader multidistrict litigation couldn't prove the products caused the disorder.

  • October 20, 2026

    Medtronic Sued Over Insulin Pump Failures

    Two women with diabetes on Monday accused Medtronic of knowingly selling insulin pumps with a known defect that can deliver the wrong amount of insulin that were recalled by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration in 2020.

  • October 20, 2026

    AI Plate Readers Don't Violate Driver Privacy, Tech Co. Argues

    Fleet management company Motive Technologies Inc. has asked a California federal court to end a proposed class action alleging it violated state privacy laws by secretly running a nationwide license plate surveillance network through its artificial intelligence-powered software, arguing there is no expectation of privacy on public roads.

  • October 20, 2026

    Zymergen Investors Win Final OK Of $125M IPO Deal

    Investors in the now-defunct biotechnology company Zymergen received final approval of their $125 million deal ending claims that the company misled shareholders ahead of its initial public offering, while plaintiffs' attorneys also had their fee request approved. 

  • October 20, 2026

    California Moves To Protect 15,000 Acres Of Coastal Waters

    California has begun the process of designating its first new marine protected areas in over a decade — and the first in which Native American tribes played a leadership role.

  • October 20, 2026

    Authors Bring Copyright Suits Targeting Meta's AI Training

    Hundreds of authors have sued Meta Platforms Inc. claiming their works were used improperly to train the artificial intelligence models Llama and Muse, adding to a pile of federal court cases accusing the tech giant of subverting copyright protections to build AI.

  • October 20, 2026

    DOL Recovers $800K For 339 Employees Denied OT Pay

    A home appliance company has agreed to pay $800,000 to 339 workers to resolve U.S. Department of Labor claims that it did not pay them overtime for all their worked hours.

  • October 20, 2026

    LA Tells 9th Circ. DOJ Pot Shift Can't Revive License Appeal

    The city of Los Angeles is urging the Ninth Circuit to throw out a challenge to its social equity cannabis licensure program, saying the Constitution's dormant commerce clause doesn't apply to marijuana regardless of recent changes to federal cannabis policy.

  • October 20, 2026

    Ex-PetSmart GC Brings M&A Experience To Crowell & Moring

    A former general counsel for PetSmart and a corporate attorney with more than 30 years of experience advising clients on mergers and acquisitions has moved his practice to Crowell & Moring LLP's Los Angeles office.

  • October 20, 2026

    Calif. Eyes Updating Pregnancy Leave, Workplace Protections

    Pregnant workers in California could gain expanded protections for taking leave and receiving workplace accommodations, including remote work, under proposed regulations announced by the state's Civil Rights Council.

  • October 20, 2026

    Womble Bond Corporate Partner Named Bay Area Office Head

    Womble Bond Dickinson announced Monday that an experienced corporate attorney who joined the firm through its 2022 merger with San Francisco-based Cooper White & Cooper LLP was named managing partner of its two Bay Area offices.

  • October 20, 2026

    Albertsons Says It Offered $800M To Save Kroger Deal

    Albertsons Cos. Inc.'s general counsel testified Tuesday that The Kroger Co. passed on proposed store divestitures that could have helped save their $24.6 billion merger, while Kroger's lawyers pointed to information shared with Albertsons and challenged its complaints about the process.

  • October 20, 2026

    Staffing App Will Pay $2.3M, Treat Drivers As Employees

    A gig staffing company has agreed to pay $2.3 million and treat all its California workers as employees to end San Francisco's lawsuit in state court claiming it wrongly labeled delivery drivers as independent contractors, the city's top lawyer announced Tuesday.

  • October 20, 2026

    Investor Says Pot Co. Took $1.15M, Left Him Defunct Business

    A Los Angeles man is suing a management company and its owner, alleging they duped him into investing $1.15 million into a cannabis venture, but he never saw repayment, and the owner eventually left him as the sole owner of the defunct business without consulting him.

  • October 20, 2026

    AI.Law Fights To Keep Patent Suit Alive Against Eve Legal

    Legal tech company AI.Law urged a San Francisco federal judge to deny a bid by its rival Eve Legal to throw out its patent suit, arguing that its claims are patent-eligible because they're more technical than the abstract idea of "using AI to draft legal documents."

  • October 20, 2026

    Wachtell Lipton, Covington Aid Salesforce's $5.66B Braze Buy

    Salesforce said Tuesday it has agreed to acquire Braze for a roughly $5.66 billion enterprise value, part of a broader effort to bolster its customer engagement platform, with Wachtell Lipton and Covington advising Salesforce and Davis Polk representing Braze.

  • October 19, 2026

    Ex-OpenAI Engineer Must Stay In Custody In Recording Case

    The former OpenAI product team engineer accused of hiding a secret recording device in an executive conference room has been ordered to stay behind bars after prosecutors argued he has "considerable resources and ties to Saudi Arabia," according to news reports and the government's motion for detention.

  • October 19, 2026

    Amazon Noncompetes Run Afoul Of California Law, Suit Says

    Two former Amazon employees have accused the company of wrongfully forcing its California workers to sign agreements containing a noninterference provision, contending the provision amounts to a noncompetition clause that's forbidden by state law.

  • October 19, 2026

    Drake Ripped Off Chorus 'Word-For-Word,' Songwriter Alleges

    Drake has been hit with a copyright infringement lawsuit in California federal court by a songwriter who alleges the catchy chorus in the rapper and singer's Billboard-topping song "Janice STFU" ripped off a hook the songwriter wrote, "word-for-word, note-for-note."

  • October 19, 2026

    Cannabis Partners Urge Contempt Finding Over Tax Returns

    Two cannabis entrepreneurs have asked a California state court to hold their former business partner in contempt after he failed to hand over eight years of tax returns, evidence they need to help support claims he schemed to steal majority ownership in their dispensary by creating $3.4 million in "phantom debt."

  • October 19, 2026

    Rogoff Tells 9th Circ. Firing Furthers 'Evil' Framers Opposed

    Roger Rogoff urged the Ninth Circuit to affirm a lower judge's order reinstating him as Seattle's top federal prosecutor, asserting in a filing Friday that he's entitled to keep the court-appointed U.S. attorney position until President Donald Trump fills the role with a Senate-confirmed nominee.

  • October 19, 2026

    95K Contact Lens Buyers Nab Cert. In Hubble Substitution Suit

    A California federal judge has certified a class of roughly 95,500 California contact lens purchasers who subscribed to Hubble Contacts, an online service accused of deceiving its customers by secretly substituting every customer order with its own Hubble-brand lenses.

  • October 19, 2026

    9th Circ. Open To Reviving P&G Shampoo 'Natural' Ad Fight

    A Ninth Circuit panel appeared open Monday to reviving a putative class action alleging The Procter & Gamble Co.'s Herbal Essences and Pantene shampoo labels dupe consumers by claiming 90% or 97% of ingredients are of "Natural Origin" or "Naturally-Derived," with two judges suggesting the case was prematurely tossed.

Expert Analysis

  • Meta Smart Glasses Suit Will Test Privacy Law For Bystanders

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    In a consolidated suit over how Ray-Ban Meta AI smart glasses handle personal video footage, a recently proposed class of unwittingly recorded bystanders highlights questions over whether privacy laws and product disclosures adequately address the risks wearable recording devices pose to nonusers, say attorneys at Barnes & Thornburg.

  • DOJ-Agri Stats Settlement Offers Key Benchmarking Lessons

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    A Minnesota federal court's recent approval of the Agri Stats settlement marks a significant milestone as it's the most granular U.S. Justice Department guidance on permissible competitor benchmarking since the 2023 withdrawal of the safety zone, lending predictability for companies in data-pooling arrangements, say attorneys at Arnold & Porter.

  • Calif. AV Notices Reshape Crash Data Preservation, Discovery

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    California's new autonomous vehicle noncompliance notice process does not decide fault or establish that an AV is unsafe, but it can create a contemporaneous regulatory record and accelerate decisions about what crash-related data must be preserved, reviewed and potentially disclosed in litigation, says attorney Lem Garcia.

  • Testing AI's Promise For Large-Scale Document Review

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    Our document-review comparison of attorneys' responsiveness and issue coding decisions versus predictions generated by artificial intelligence across 1,600 documents suggests that these tools can offer a reasonable and reliable basis for improved discovery workflows, provided lawyers understand where guardrails are needed, say attorneys at Redgrave.

  • How ChatGPT Teen Version Raises Product Liability Questions

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    OpenAI's recent rollout of ChatGPT for Teens offers younger users a purportedly safer version of the software — but it could also help plaintiffs who are questioning whether earlier versions were safe for minors, when the company identified risks and when safeguards became technically viable, says Michael McCready at McCready Law.

  • What's Next For Prediction Markets If States Win At High Court

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    While the Supreme Court hasn't taken up a prediction market case yet, a high court win for the states in their quest to regulate the exchanges would likely mean a wave of state legislature bills and regulatory guidance arriving on different timelines, rather than a single uniform transition, says Howard Herndon at Bradley Arant.

  • AI Meeting Recaps Pose New Discovery And Privilege Risks

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    The New York City Bar Association’s recent ethics opinion, cautioning attorneys not to record nonclient conversations with artificial intelligence tools, reflects an emerging view that AI meeting recaps are now a distinct business record category, meaning counsel should set meeting-level controls and apply framework-level updates, says William Wright at Faegre Drinker.

  • Preparing For Broader Calif. Rules On PE Healthcare Deals

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    California's recent emergency regulations implementing expanded healthcare transaction review requirements, such as for private equity and hedge funds, represent a notable expansion of state oversight, including enhanced disclosures, wider definitions and new advance notice requirements, say attorneys at Simpson Thacher.

  • Species 'Harm' Definition Rollback Brings Risk For Developers

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    A rule recently adopted by federal agencies rescinds the definition of "harm" in Endangered Species Act regulations to exclude habitat destruction — but while the move is aimed at reducing regulatory burdens, it creates new uncertainty for developers, and may trigger increased environmental protections in California, say attorneys at Cox Castle.

  • HPE-Juniper Settlement Teaches Key Tunney Act Lessons

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    A California federal court's recent approval of the U.S. Department of Justice's settlement with Hewlett Packard over its Juniper Networks acquisition offers legal practitioners some crucial lessons, including on unique tech-sector remedies for mergers and acquisitions and the continued viability of the Tunney Act, says Shubha Ghosh at Syracuse University College of Law.

  • Elder Fraud Risk And Pleading Lessons From Meta Cases

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    Michael Gilfix and Benjamin Gicqueau at Gilfix & La Poll discuss how a recent Meta youth settlement and an April decision involving social media harms to children may point to a broader pleading framework in cases of elder fraud, and offer practical measures for platforms and consumers seeking to reduce elder fraud risk.

  • Hugging Face Attack Is A Warning To The Securities Markets

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    The recent Hugging Face cyberattack, in which OpenAI's artificial intelligence agents hacked a third party without human instruction, raises questions about how regulators could respond to a similar incident in the securities markets and whether there's a substitute for scienter if no person is behind a financial crime, says Joseph A. Hall at Davis Polk.

  • Series

    Playing Bid Whist Makes Me A Better Lawyer

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    As a child, I viewed bid whist as a family tradition and a source of friendly card game competition, but as a lawyer, I see it as a tool that has helped me cultivate skills like communication, teamwork, risk assessment and composure, says Keyonn Pope at Riley Safer.

  • Tracking Trends In State-Level Regulatory Enforcement

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    State-level enforcement now increasingly involves antitrust, artificial intelligence and data privacy issues, and the key for organizations to reducing risk is having the ability to respond across governance, public affairs, discovery and remediation in multiple states simultaneously, say consultants at FTI Consulting.

  • Md. Digital Tax Ruling Is A Road Map For Future Challenges

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    Three Maryland Tax Court rulings that recently struck down the state's digital advertising tax suggest constitutional and statutory vulnerabilities that could be used to challenge newly enacted digital services laws or legislation being considered by other states, say attorneys at Holland & Knight.

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