California

  • May 15, 2025

    Coinbase May Avoid BiT Global's $1B Antitrust Suit, For Now

    A California federal judge indicated Thursday she'll likely toss a $1 billion antitrust case against Coinbase claiming the cryptocurrency exchange delisted BiT Global after launching a competing "wrapped" bitcoin product for trading on decentralized exchanges, saying the suit didn't plausibly allege that Coinbase gave false justifications for dropping the rival.

  • May 15, 2025

    LG Cheats Buyers By Starting Warranties Early, Suit Says

    LG Electronics is cheating consumers and breaking California's consumer warranty law by starting warranty periods at the dates consumers buy the appliance company's products and not when products are delivered, two California residents alleged in a putative class action filed Wednesday.

  • May 15, 2025

    Polar Air Vendor Gets 2 Years For $32M Kickback Scheme

    The owner of a California aviation company was sentenced Thursday in New York federal court to two years in prison for paying Polar Air Cargo executives $4.4 million in kickbacks in exchange for lucrative contracts, as part of a $32 million scheme to enrich the cargo airline's C-suite and others, at the company's expense.

  • May 15, 2025

    Anthropic's Atty Says Client's Own AI Created Error In Filing

    A Latham & Watkins LLP associate representing Anthropic in the artificial intelligence company's copyright fight with music publishers said Thursday that she used Anthropic's own Claude.ai tool to help draft an expert's declaration that included an erroneous citation, but she argued the error was "an honest citation mistake and not a fabrication of authority."

  • May 15, 2025

    Live Nation's Atty Fails To 'Move The Needle' In Discovery Bid

    A California federal judge appeared likely Thursday to stick with his tentative ruling that Live Nation's ticketing rivals can protect documents they say could facilitate the very conduct at issue in an antitrust case, telling an attorney for the company his arguments did not "move the needle."

  • May 15, 2025

    Consumer Bid To Block Capital One-Discover Deal Falters

    A California federal judge Wednesday rejected a group of consumers' last-minute bid to delay Capital One Financial Corp.'s impending purchase of Discover Financial Services, unpersuaded that the deal poses serious enough potential antitrust concerns to support a preliminary injunction.

  • May 15, 2025

    Unions, Groups Seek Injunction To Block Gov't Restructuring

    A California federal judge must greenlight a nationwide injunction to stop multiple federal agencies from moving ahead with implementing reorganization and mass termination plans linked to an executive order, a coalition of unions and groups argued, making their request on the heels of a temporary restraining order.

  • May 15, 2025

    Justices Wary Of Pausing Sweeping Injunctions In Birthright Case

    A majority of the U.S. Supreme Court seemed eager Thursday to limit lower courts' use of universal injunctions generally, but several justices voiced concerns about the effect such a ruling would have on lawsuits challenging the constitutionality of President Donald Trump's executive order that aims to limit birthright citizenship.

  • May 15, 2025

    9th Circ. Doubts Anti-Trans Orgs Can Nix Youth Runaway Law

    Ninth Circuit judges questioned Thursday if anti-transgender groups and parents had standing to challenge a Washington state law intended to ensure shelter for runaway teens seeking gender-affirming care, with one judge asking "where are the parents" who have been adversely affected.

  • May 15, 2025

    9th Circ. Questions University's Limits On Professor's Speech

    Two Ninth Circuit judges cast doubt on the University of Washington's defense in a First Amendment lawsuit on Thursday, questioning why the college would remove a professor's parody of a Native American land acknowledgment from his class syllabus while permitting him to broadcast the same opinions elsewhere in the academic setting.

  • May 15, 2025

    SEC Focused On 'Rooting Out' AI Abuse, Agency Atty Says

    The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission is focused on "rooting out" the misuse of artificial intelligence by brokerage firms and publicly traded companies, a California audience heard Thursday as agency attorneys tried to combat the perception that the SEC's enforcement arm has gone silent.

  • May 15, 2025

    Full 9th Circ. Affirms BNSF Railway's Win In Retaliation Suit

    The full Ninth Circuit upheld a win for BNSF Railway on Thursday in a now-deceased conductor's lawsuit alleging he was fired in retaliation for testing train cars' brakes, finding the railroad had met the high bar required for lawful firing under whistleblower protection law. 

  • May 15, 2025

    Apple Accused Of False IPhone AI Promises In 50-State Suit

    Apple pulled a bait-and-switch on phone buyers when it promised that new artificial intelligence features would be available on the iPhone 16, despite knowing it hadn't yet developed those features, according to a sprawling proposed class action that brings claims under consumer protection laws in all 50 states.

  • May 15, 2025

    Snap's Alice Win On Image Search Patents Gets Fed. Circ. OK

    The Federal Circuit on Thursday refused to revive a lawsuit accusing Snap of infringing a pair of patents related to image searches, affirming a lower court's decision that the claims were patent ineligible under the U.S. Supreme Court's Alice decision.

  • May 15, 2025

    Kelley Drye Brings On Data Privacy Pro From Calif. Agency

    Kelley Drye & Warren LLP is expanding its data privacy team, bringing in an attorney from the California Privacy Protection Agency's enforcement division as special counsel in its Los Angeles office.

  • May 15, 2025

    Ex-LA DA's Atty's AI Use 'Affirmatively Misled' Special Master

    The retired California federal judge serving as special master for former Los Angeles District Attorney Jackie Lacey's insurance coverage suit — stemming from her husband's holding a gun in their home's doorway in 2020 — has ordered litigation sanctions against Lacey's legal team, finding the lawyers submitted "bogus AI-generated research" that initially tricked the judge.

  • May 15, 2025

    Claims Judge Slams DOJ Plea For More Time To Answer Suit

    A Court of Federal Claims judge denied the U.S. Department of Justice's bid for more time to respond to a breach of contract suit, saying its "failure to adequately staff its cases" does not warrant any more extensions beyond the four already granted.

  • May 15, 2025

    Buchalter Names Sports Agent As Sacramento Office Co-Lead

    Buchalter PC has named Josh Escovedo, co-chair of its sports law industry group, as co-managing shareholder of the firm's Sacramento, California, office.

  • May 14, 2025

    Politico Beats Readers' Suit Over Online Trackers, For Now

    A California federal judge on Tuesday tossed a proposed class action against Politico claiming the online news outlet unlawfully installed third-party trackers on users' browsers to surreptitiously collect data and personally identifying information without their consent, saying the plaintiffs had not shown they'd suffered a sufficiently concrete injury to sue.

  • May 14, 2025

    J&J Unit's Catheter Policy Stopped Free-Riding, Jury Told

    A Johnson & Johnson unit sales director took the stand Wednesday in Innovative Health's antitrust case against its medical technology unit Biosense Webster, defending Biosense's policy cutting off clinical cardiac mapping support to hospitals using third-party reprocessed catheters and explaining that the policy prevented competitors from free-riding on its investments in clinical support training.

  • May 14, 2025

    Costco Fails To Wipe Away Kirkland Baby Wipes PFAS Suit

    A California federal judge Wednesday denied a bid by Costco Wholesale Corp. to toss a mother's putative class action accusing the warehouse club of falsely advertising Kirkland brand baby wipes as being natural despite allegedly having toxic levels of so-called forever chemicals, saying the mother sufficiently alleged three types of chemicals and their quantities.

  • May 14, 2025

    Google Co-Founder Sergey Brin Settles Fatal Plane Crash Suit

    Google co-founder Sergey Brin and others have settled at least one wrongful death lawsuit filed by family members of a pilot who died while ferrying Brin's private aircraft from California to Hawaii, according to a California state court filing.

  • May 14, 2025

    Girardi's Son-In-Law Should Face Ill. Theft Case, Feds Say

    Disbarred attorney Tom Girardi's son-in-law should be ordered to face Chicago charges that he helped the once-celebrated plaintiffs' lawyer steal client money because he "blew through" the deadline for dismissal motions and supported them with arguments that lack merit, federal prosecutors argued Wednesday.

  • May 14, 2025

    Wells Fargo, Others To Pay $19.5M For Recording Biz Calls

    Wells Fargo and two other companies agreed to pay $19.5 million to settle allegations they listened in on small businesses' calls in violation of the California Invasion of Privacy Act, according to a motion seeking final approval of the deal filed in federal court. 

  • May 14, 2025

    DOJ Tells Judge It's Reshaping, Not Killing, Detainee Legal Aid

    A D.C. federal judge suggested he might need more in an administrative record to decide whether to reinstate government-backed legal assistance programs for detained noncitizens after a late filing from the feds suggested congressionally appropriated funds would still go out but to different recipients.

Expert Analysis

  • 4 Property Insurance Action Steps For LA Policyholders

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    Property insurance will play a vital role in rebuilding the areas affected by the Los Angeles wildfires, and policyholders should be aware of key aspects of that coverage in order to maximize their insurance recovery, say attorneys at Cohen Ziffer.

  • Predicting Where State AGs Will Direct Their Attention In 2025

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    In 2025, we expect state attorneys general will navigate a new presidential administration while continuing to further regulate and police financial services, artificial intelligence, junk fees and antitrust, say attorneys at Troutman Pepper.

  • A Look At Sweepstakes Casinos' Legal Issues In Fla., Beyond

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    Scheduled for trial in Florida federal court this fall, the VGW sweepstakes case underscores the growing urgency for gambling states to clarify and enforce their laws in response to emerging online gaming models, as the expansion of sweepstakes casinos challenges traditional interpretations of gambling regulations, say attorneys at Holland & Knight.

  • FTC Privacy Enforcement Takeaways From 2024

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    In 2024, the Federal Trade Commission distinguished three prominent trends in its privacy-related enforcement actions: geolocation data protections, data minimization practices, and artificial intelligence use and marketing, say Cobun Zweifel-Keegan at IAPP and James Smith at Dechert.

  • The Fed. Circ. In 2024: 5 Major Rulings To Know

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    In 2024, the Federal Circuit provided a number of important clarifications to distinct areas of patent law – including design patent obviousness, expert testimony admissions and patent term adjustments – all of which are poised to have an influence going forward, say attorneys at Knobbe Martens.

  • Rethinking Litigation Risk And What It Really Means To Win

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    Attorneys have a tendency to overestimate litigation risk before summary judgment and underestimate risk after it, but an eight-stage litigation framework can clarify risk at different points and help litigators reassess what true success looks like in any particular case, says Joshua Libling at Arcadia Finance.

  • Mass Arbitration Procedures After Faulty Live Nation Ruling

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    Despite the Ninth Circuit's flawed reasoning in Heckman v. Live Nation, the exceptional allegations of collusive conduct shouldn't be read to restrict arbitration providers that have adopted good faith procedures to ensure that consumer mass arbitrations can be efficiently resolved on the merits, says Collin Vierra at Eimer Stahl.

  • Public Corruption Enforcement In 2024 Has Clues For 2025

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    If 2024 activity is any indication, the U.S. Supreme Court will likely continue to rein in expansive prosecutorial theories of fraud in the year to come, but it’s harder to predict what the new administration will mean for public corruption prosecutions in 2025, says Cathy Fleming at Offit Kurman.

  • Roundup

    Banking Brief: State Law Recaps From Each Quarter Of 2024

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    In this Expert Analysis series, throughout 2024 attorneys provided quarterly recaps discussing the biggest developments in banking regulation, litigation and policymaking in various states, including New York, California and Illinois.

  • Calif. Justices' Options In Insurance Exhaustion Case

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    Fox Paine v. Twin City Fire Insurance may serve as the California Supreme Court's opportunity to firmly establish precedent with respect to a strict adherence to excess insurance policies' exhaustion provisions when the language is clear and explicit, says Aiden Spencer at Langsam Stevens.

  • Considering The Status Of The US Doctrine Of Patent Misuse

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    A recent Ninth Circuit decision and a U.K. Court of Appeal decision demonstrate the impact that the U.S. Supreme Court's 2015 decision in Kimble v. Marvel Entertainment has had on the principle that post-patent-expiration royalty payments amount to patent misuse, not only in the U.S. but in English courts as well, say attorneys at Covington.

  • Series

    Playing Rugby Makes Me A Better Lawyer

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    My experience playing rugby, including a near-fatal accident, has influenced my legal practice on a professional, organizational and personal level by showing me the importance of maintaining empathy, fostering team empowerment and embracing the art of preparation, says James Gillenwater at Greenberg Traurig.

  • Looking Back At 2024's Noteworthy State AG Litigation

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    State attorneys general across the U.S. took bold steps in 2024 to address unlawful activities by corporations in several areas, including privacy and data security, financial transparency, children's internet safety, and other overall consumer protection claims, say attorneys at Troutman Pepper.

  • Opinion

    A Federal Insurance Mandate For Private Aviation Is Overdue

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    A recent private plane crash in California that killed two people and injured 19 others spotlights the dangers of such occurrences — and serves as a reminder that because there is no federal requirement for general aviation pilots to carry insurance, the victims of these accidents are often unable to obtain fair compensation, says Timothy Loranger at Wisner Baum.

  • Reviewing 2024's Evolving EdTech Privacy Regulations

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    Lawmakers are trying to keep up with the privacy and security risks of the increasingly prevalent education technology, with last year's developments including the Federal Trade Commission's proposed amendments to the Children's Online Privacy Protection Act, and the U.S. Senate passing two new children's privacy acts, say attorneys at McDermott.

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