Expert Analysis

Buried in the middle of U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services' recent 11-page memorandum is a single sentence that would put a whole new population of people in removal proceedings as the result of the denial of certain extension requests, say David Serwer and Matthew Gorman of Baker & McKenzie LLP.

The Delaware Chancery Court's opinion in Cirillo Family Trust v. Moezinia is a stark reminder of both the required contents of an appraisal notice as well as the appropriate approach to take when communicating with stockholders, say attorneys with Pepper Hamilton LLP.

The U.K. Financial Conduct Authority has acknowledged that Brexit will present challenges, and will set aside some resources in preparation, but its business plan for 2018-2019 sends a strong message that there will be no let-up when it comes to detecting and prosecuting market abuse, says Ben Ticehurst of Rahman Ravelli Solicitors.

The U.S. Supreme Court's ruling in South Dakota v. Wayfair Inc. will cause a massive shift of risk onto remote sellers in the form of state audits, litigation in hostile forums, and state False Claims Act and consumer fraud lawsuits, say attorneys at Jones Day.

As the EB-5 visa program becomes more cumbersome, many investors are requesting or demanding a return of their $500,000 capital contribution. There are several variations of such requests that will result in different consequences, says Ronald Fieldstone of Saul Ewing Arnstein & Lehr LLP.

A New Jersey state appellate court's decision in Jimenez v. Jimenez shows that when dealing with property owned by a husband and wife as tenants by the entirety, New Jersey law can impose very serious ramifications on a judgment creditor’s efforts to collect or levy on that property, says Bruce Buechler of Lowenstein Sandler LLP.

Millennials represent more than 25 percent of the U.S. population and grew up immersed in technology. Anyone preparing to face a patent jury should consider how this age group feels about the patent world. Our analysis of 5,000 mock jurors showed two important overall conclusions, say Johanna Carrane and Lynn Fahey of JuryScope Inc.

A few weeks ago, Georgia became the 16th state to ban the use of a handheld cellphone while driving. These laws bring considerations for employers, who can be held liable for accidents caused by employees acting within the scope of their employment when the accident occurred, say Alison Loy and Marilyn Fish of Bryan Cave Leighton Paisner LLP.

The misappropriation of funds charge can leave defense attorneys struggling throughout trial to distinguish personal expenses from legitimate business expenses. The Fifth Circuit's decision in U.S. v. Spalding sheds light on how to handle these situations, but also sets out the battles that attorneys won’t win, say Kip Mendrygal and Mario Nguyen of Locke Lord LLP.

In the first half of 2018, technology that determines where you are and who you are garnered significant attention. Less discussed are the legislative efforts underway in the federal government and in many states to regulate these emerging technologies, says Justin Kay of Drinker Biddle & Reath LLP.

Hardly a day goes by where we don’t hear about another lawsuit being filed accusing pharmaceutical companies, distributors, hospitals and pharmacies of fueling the country’s addiction to opioids. But without any of these cases reaching a jury to date, it can be difficult to predict how jurors will react to these claims, says Christina Marinakis of Litigation Insights.

Less than three weeks after the U.S. Supreme Court decided Lucia v. Securities and Exchange Commission, President Donald Trump signed an executive order applying the court’s rationale in Lucia to the hiring — and firing — of all administrative law judges in the federal government, making them entirely beholden to the heads of their agencies or the president for their jobs, says Brian Casey of Barnes & Thornburg LLP.

As a result of a tax tribunal decision, Beshear v. Bevin, the landmark tax reform legislation in Kentucky now faces a possible constitutional attack just two months after passage, says Mark Sommer of Frost Brown Todd LLC.

Genetic data and techniques are becoming ever more powerful tools for explaining when and how diseases arise. They can also have very strong evidentiary value, and in some toxic tort cases, genetic findings can provide conclusive answers for a judge or jury, say Kirk Hartley and David Schwartz of ToxicoGenomica.

On July 6, the D.C. Circuit torpedoed a hydroelectric license renewal issued in 2013 because the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service did not consider environmental damage already caused by the project. In doing so, the court rejected FERC’s long-standing practice of using existing conditions and operations as an environmental baseline, say attorneys at Davis Wright Tremaine LLP.

Next term, the U.S. Supreme Court will hear six cases that might impact insurers, reinsurers and other financial services institutions. These cases will address asbestos, immunity and exemption, class action and arbitration issues, say Mark Bradford and Damon Vocke of Duane Morris LLP.

Most lawyers are understandably unable to advise a first-time federal inmate as to what it will be like in prison. In their final installment of this series, criminal defense attorney Alan Ellis and federal prison consultant J. Michael Henderson address questions about mental health care and substance abuse treatment in the Bureau of Prisons.

Last month, the U.S. Department of Justice released the results of its ninth annual health care fraud takedown, an aggregation of criminal, civil and administrative health care-related actions. It appears that the DOJ and its law enforcement partners are sticking to many of the same enforcement areas that were central to last year's takedown, say Melissa Jampol and George Breen of Epstein Becker Green.

Crypto markets experienced a sharp downturn in the first half of 2018. But strategically positioned blockchain-related patent and trademark rights can help keep a company financially and technologically relevant through even turbulent times, say attorneys with Finnegan Henderson Farabow Garrett & Dunner LLP.