California

  • August 20, 2026

    9th Circ. Revives Can-Am Fuel Claims Against Sinclair, Glovis

    A unanimous Ninth Circuit panel on Thursday revived Can-Am Fuel Distribution LLC's federal franchise claims against Sinclair Oil LLC and Glovis America Inc., holding the companies' licensing agreements are covered by the Petroleum Marketing Practices Act despite an "unusual variation" in the parties' relationship.

  • August 20, 2026

    Adviser, Startup To Pay SEC $266K For Taking Client Data

    The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission has secured a nearly $266,000 judgment against a California-based investment adviser and his firm, and banned him from practicing for three years after he allegedly emailed himself confidential client information from his former employer and used it to launch his own investment firm.

  • August 20, 2026

    Lenders Sue Over $1M Loan Tied To Cannabis Farm

    A group of California lenders is trying to claw back a $1 million loan that was supposed to launch a cannabis farm in Miranda, claiming they learned too late that the property had already lost its permits to grow and that the borrowers had misused most of the loan proceeds.

  • August 20, 2026

    Defunct Tax Startup CEO Barred From Deceiving Investors

    A California federal judge prohibited the CEO of a defunct tax compliance startup who was accused by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission of swindling $13 million from investors from deceiving anyone or disseminating false information regarding investments in violation of securities laws.

  • August 20, 2026

    Snap Must Face YouTube Creators' DMCA AI Scraping Suit

    A California federal judge has denied a bid from the company that owns video-messaging app Snapchat to escape allegations from a group of YouTube creators that their content was illegally ingested to train artificial intelligence, saying the YouTubers had sufficiently laid out how users encounter measures meant to protect videos.

  • August 20, 2026

    Judge Denies Bid To Move AT&T ERISA Case To State Court

    A California federal judge has denied a former AT&T employee's bid to move his class action suit alleging violations of state labor law over a tobacco surcharge on employee health plans from federal to state court.

  • August 20, 2026

    Estee Lauder's TM Suit 'Full Of Detail,' Judge Tells Walmart

    A California federal judge said Thursday he is skeptical of Walmart's motion to dismiss much of Estee Lauder's lawsuit accusing the retail giant of selling infringing beauty products online, saying he is unsure the pleadings are inadequate at this stage because he found them "chock full of detail."

  • August 20, 2026

    DOJ Pot Shift Changes LA Licensing Challenge, 9th Circ. Told

    A California attorney who has challenged state and local cannabis licensing policies across the country on the grounds that they discriminate against out-of-state entrants told the Ninth Circuit that recent federal shifts on medical marijuana mean the dormant commerce clause should apply to the once-federally illicit industry.

  • August 20, 2026

    Amgen Reaches Deal To End Ex-Worker's Tobacco Fee Fight

    Biotech giant Amgen Inc. struck a deal to end a proposed class action alleging a $150-a-month fee on the health plans of employees who used tobacco violated federal benefits law, according to a filing in California federal court Thursday.

  • August 20, 2026

    Trade Groups Back Apple In 9th Circ. Class Decert. Fight

    The U.S. Chamber of Commerce and other trade and advocacy groups backed Apple Wednesday with amicus briefs telling the Ninth Circuit to reject an appeal from consumers looking to undo the decertification of a class of roughly 200 million people in an antitrust case targeting App Store policies.

  • August 20, 2026

    Lakers Sale Fight Offers M&A Lessons For Family Businesses

    The agreement by former Walt Disney Co. CEO Bob Iger and venture capitalist Josh Kushner to acquire the Los Angeles Lakers at a record $12.5 billion valuation appeared, at first, to be another example of the seemingly endless rise in professional sports franchise values.

  • August 20, 2026

    Johns Hopkins Hit With Sex Discrimination, Retaliation Suit

    Johns Hopkins University was hit with a complaint in California federal court alleging it impaired a graduate student's educational access and retaliated against her after she returned from a pregnancy-related leave and accused her former adviser of sexual misconduct.

  • August 20, 2026

    Sangamo Ch. 11 Auction Nets $238M In Offers

    A Delaware bankruptcy judge Thursday agreed to approve a trio of sales that will bring in $52 million in cash for Sangamo Therapeutics, after attorneys representing the life sciences group told the court a competitive Chapter 11 auction ended with four winning bids worth over $238 million.

  • August 20, 2026

    UnitedHealthcare Beats User's Data Privacy Suit, For Good

    UnitedHealthcare Services Inc. permanently beat a proposed class action alleging that its website's third-party tracking pixels shared information about its visitors, after a California federal judge said Wednesday that "the mere collection of plaintiff's generic insurance browsing data is not enough to demonstrate" concrete injury.

  • August 20, 2026

    CREXi Drops 9th Circ. Challenge To Quinn Emanuel DQ

    Property listing company Commercial Real Estate Exchange Inc. has moved to dismiss its own Ninth Circuit mandamus petition, which challenged a lower court's disqualification of CREXi's counsel, Quinn Emanuel Urquhart & Sullivan LLP, from a legal battle against rival CoStar.

  • August 20, 2026

    Eastman Among 16 Calif. Attys Disbarred In Q2 2026

    The State Bar of California removed the licenses of 16 attorneys between April and June of this year over a broad spectrum of ethical breaches ranging from the high-profile case of John Eastman attempting to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential election, to a lawyer found to be in possession of child sex abuse images.

  • August 20, 2026

    9th Circ. Widens Arbitration Split, But Will High Court Step In?

    The Ninth Circuit issued a decision last week foreclosing the use of the legal concept that a dispute over the enforcement of an international arbitral award might be better heard elsewhere, contributing to a circuit split that could result in the U.S. Supreme Court finally addressing an issue it has previously eschewed.

  • August 19, 2026

    Firms Cut From $101M Anthropic Atty Fees Appeal To 9th Circ.

    Two law firms involved in securing artificial intelligence company Anthropic's $1.5 billion copyright settlement with a class of authors and publishers are appealing to the Ninth Circuit an order excluding them from attorney fees awarded to court-appointed class counsel.

  • August 19, 2026

    Social Media Use Has Addiction Hallmarks, Meta Jury Told

    A psychologist told a Tennessee jury considering claims against Meta on Wednesday that it's well accepted in his field that social media use can cause behavior that looks like addiction, and social media is a challenging presence in the lives of 15% to 20% of his patients.

  • August 19, 2026

    Davis Wright Vets Scolded: Don't Tell Foes 'How To Run Firm'

    Davis Wright Tremaine LLP veterans have failed to dodge six-figure sanctions in a prominent discovery donnybrook, and a California magistrate judge added invective to the financial injury, lambasting "troubling" omissions in case citations and heavy-handed "nitpicking" akin to commandeering an adversary's law firm.

  • August 19, 2026

    Amazon Wants Full 9th Circ. To Rethink Block On Perplexity AI

    Amazon is pressing the full Ninth Circuit to consider a lower court's injunction preventing Perplexity's "uniquely reckless" artificial intelligence tool from purchasing items for users on Amazon, arguing that a panel erred in lifting the block earlier this month.

  • August 19, 2026

    Zuckerberg Can't Be Trusted On Kids' Safety Online, Jury Told

    A Meta whistleblower testified Wednesday in a California federal jury trial over states' claims Meta hid social media's harms that Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg ignored calls for Meta to prioritize kids' safety while publicly touting Meta's safety practices, saying "I feel that you just cannot trust Mark Zuckerberg with kids."

  • August 19, 2026

    9th Circ. Sides With PennyMac In Fixed LIBOR Fallback

    The Ninth Circuit on Wednesday rejected a shareholder's claim that PennyMac Mortgage Investment Trust was required to replace discontinued LIBOR with a newer floating rate when calculating preferred-share dividends, holding that the federal LIBOR Act allowed for a contractual fixed fallback rate.

  • August 19, 2026

    Scribd To Pay $3M To End Wash. Wage Scale Class Action

    Document hosting service Scribd Inc. will pay $3 million to resolve a class action accusing the tech company of violating Washington state law by failing to include pay information on job postings, according to a settlement agreement given preliminary approval by a King County Superior Court judge.

  • August 19, 2026

    Baltimore Can't Send Payday Lender Suit Back To State Court

    A Maryland federal judge refused to remand a suit brought by the city of Baltimore against Los Angeles-based lender Dave Inc. to state court, ruling that the city failed to explain how federal courts' interpretation and application of the city's consumer protection ordinance would disrupt the state's efforts to establish a policy regulating consumer loans.

Expert Analysis

  • How A Founder's AI Pitch Deck Can Become A Crime Scene

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    As recent indictments and prosecutions against tech executives illustrate, AI washing is a criminal enforcement priority, not a regulatory formality, highlighting the importance of ensuring that founders don't overstate what their artificial intelligence does, particularly in the initial pitch deck to investors, says attorney Alan N. Walter.

  • SEC Disgorged Fund Distribution Is Next Query After Sripetch

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    Following the Supreme Court's Sripetch v. U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission decision, investor harm isn't required for the SEC to obtain a disgorgement award, but future cases must resolve whether the commission will be freed from a requirement to distribute disgorged funds to the victims of alleged misconduct, says Daniel Walfish at Katsky Korins.

  • New State AI Laws Create Dual Misrepresentation Risk

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    As artificial intelligence transparency laws are enacted across the country and the volume and specificity of compliance records increase, companies will be required to speak more often, more precisely and to more audiences about the same systems, compounding the risk of litigation, say attorneys at Cooley.

  • Trump Admin's Agency Records Purge Tests Judicial Notice

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    While courts commonly take judicial notice of data in government websites and reports, the Trump administration's recent modification or wholesale deletion of these sources means that litigants must look elsewhere to support trial admission of this information, says Jon Gryskiewicz at Lewis Baach.

  • Series

    Cow Horse Makes Me A Better Lawyer

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    Moving an unwilling 800-pound cow while riding a horse at high speed is exhilarating, a little unhinged and, at least for me, a surprisingly effective training ground for litigation — both demand focus, preparation over rigid planning and the willingness to act despite fear, says Ashley Zitrin at Glenn Agre.

  • Vax Ruling Offers Employer Tips For Handling Political Speech

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    A California appeals court's recent decision in Rademacher v. ABC, rejecting a "General Hospital" actor's suit alleging he was terminated for opposing a vaccine policy, demonstrates the importance of the employer's process, including neutral policies, documentation, and evidence of who knew what and when, say attorneys at Krevolin Horst.

  • PowerSchool Data Breach Ruling Underscores PE Liability

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    The recent California federal court decision in PowerSchool, where Bain Capital was unable to dismiss claims relating to a data breach based in part on Bain's preinvestment activities, is an important addition to the line of cases addressing investor liability for acts of a portfolio company, says Mark Kelley at MoloLamken.

  • What Prop 65 Listings For Welding Fumes, Drugs Mean For Cos.

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    With California poised to add welding chemicals and three medications to its list of known carcinogens under Proposition 65, businesses must assess risks from nontraditional pharmaceutical dispensing, occupational and environmental exposures to welding operations, and downstream exposures from the manufacture of both types of substances, says Gregory Berlin at Alston & Bird.

  • 3 Disgorgement Questions Linger After Justices' SEC Ruling

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    While the U.S. Supreme Court’s recent decision in Sripetch v. U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission avoided placing new limits on the SEC’s disgorgement powers, it passed over several questions, including whether the commission can seek disgorgement when returning the money to investors isn't possible, says David Slovick at Kopecky Schumacher.

  • Checking For AI Errors Is Now A Two-Way Street

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    A handful of recent federal and state cases demonstrate the importance of checking for errors generated by artificial intelligence not only in your own court submissions, but also your opponent's, as well as when catching opposing counsel's AI mistakes could result in an award for attorney fees, says Tamara Barago at Hollingsworth.

  • Green Card Memo Warps Long-Standing Adjustment Process

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    A recent policy memorandum that treats a nonimmigrant visa holder’s decision to seek adjustment of status in the U.S., rather than at a U.S. consulate, as an adverse factor reinterprets existing discretionary frameworks, compounds risks for applicants required to apply abroad and changes practitioner approaches to application preparation, says attorney Jack Jrada.

  • Celebs May Need Federal Protection To Fight Voice Deepfakes

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    Deepfakes and digital replicas are increasingly misappropriating celebrities' voices for commercial purposes, but unless federal right of publicity protections are developed, celebrities are left to rely on ill-equipped trademark and state law, say attorneys at Brown Rudnick.

  • Series

    The Biz Court Digest: Shoring Up Corporate Law In Maryland

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    Launched more than 20 years ago to improve complex corporate adjudication, Maryland's Business and Technology Case Management Program has been a solid success in some areas, but there always is room for improvement, says Bill Krulak at Miles & Stockbridge.

  • State Enviro Agencies Give Cosmetics Regulation A Makeover

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    As state oversight of cosmetics rapidly expands, the new statutes and regulations governing these products are being implemented by environmental agencies rather than consumer product regulators, requiring manufacturers, distributors and retailers to reevaluate their supply chains and procedures, say attorneys at Baker Botts.

  • How End Of SEC 'Gag Rule' Affects Free Speech Certiorari Bid

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    The Securities and Exchange Commission's recent rescission of the so-called gag rule, which forbade defendants in settlements from denying the SEC’s allegations, may sway the outcome of a petition to the Supreme Court in a case challenging the rule on First Amendment grounds, say attorneys at Troutman.

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