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Massachusetts
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February 26, 2024
Liberty Cuts Off Drivers' Rentals Too Soon, Suit Claims
Liberty Mutual systematically and arbitrarily ends replacement transportation coverage after seven days for policyholders whose vehicles are totaled in collisions, in violation of its own policy language, a proposed class action alleges.
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February 26, 2024
Mass. Casino Gets 2nd Fine For Taking Illegal College Bets
The Massachusetts Gaming Commission on Monday fined Encore Boston Harbor $40,000 for improperly taking bets on games involving in-state colleges, the second such punishment doled out to the casino in the past seven months.
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February 26, 2024
Murder, Robbery Exoneree Seeks $1M For Lost Years
A Massachusetts man who spent more than half his life in prison before being exonerated for a 1994 murder and robbery has filed a lawsuit seeking $1 million in compensation under a 20-year-old state law.
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February 26, 2024
Ropes & Gray-Led THL Taking Agiliti Private In $2.5B Deal
Medical equipment management company Agiliti is going private in a deal with private equity firm Thomas H. Lee Partners, Agiliti announced Monday.
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February 26, 2024
Jury Awards Woodworking Co. $158K Over 'Lemon' Machine
A Georgia federal jury has found that the manufacturer of a high-tech woodworking machine breached warranty duties to the device's buyer, awarding nearly $160,000 to a Massachusetts business that alleged it was sold a "lemon" of a machine.
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February 26, 2024
1st Circ. Rejects Crypto Founder's Hollow Fraud Appeal
A cryptocurrency founder convicted of fraud hitched his appeal to "inapplicable precedent" and failed to muster an argument why a judge's blocking of testimony from government witnesses deprived his defense of material and favorable evidence, the First Circuit said in upholding the guilty verdict.
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February 24, 2024
Up Next At High Court: Social Media Laws & Bump Stocks
The U.S. Supreme Court will hear oral arguments related to three big-ticket cases this week in a pair of First Amendment challenges to Florida and Texas laws prohibiting social media platforms from removing content or users based on their viewpoints and a dispute over the federal government's authority to ban bump stocks.
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February 23, 2024
No Lie In Calling A Lemon A Lemon, Jury Told At Trial's End
At the close of a trial nearly eight years in the making, counsel for a Massachusetts woodworking shop facing claims that it bad-mouthed its machinery suppliers to others in the industry denied claims Friday that the shop's owner-operator leveled death threats during a heated dispute over a malfunctioning piece of equipment.
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February 23, 2024
Gov.'s Romantic Ties To Top Court Pick May Spark Recusals
Massachusetts Gov. Maura Healey's selection of a former romantic partner to serve on the state's Supreme Judicial Court could be grounds for the justice to recuse herself from certain cases, though those scenarios would be relatively rare, legal ethics experts told Law360.
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February 23, 2024
Mass. Ruling Seen As 'Sea Change' In Young Adult Sentencing
A first-of-its-kind ruling by Massachusetts’ top appeals court recently declared sentences of life without parole for anyone under 21 to be unconstitutional, and advocates say the decision and the science backing it up could provide a road map for young adult sentencing reform nationwide.
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February 23, 2024
Tobacco Cos. Look To Nix COPD Suit Decades After Diagnosis
Tobacco companies R.J. Reynolds and Philip Morris asked a Massachusetts state judge on Friday to end a wrongful death lawsuit brought decades after a woman's COPD diagnosis and nearly three years after her death, pointing to a state high court ruling last summer that affirmed strict time limits for such claims.
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February 23, 2024
WilmerHale Scores Win For Hearing Impaired Mass. Prisoners
After an eight-year legal fight, WilmerHale and several nonprofit legal advocacy organizations recently won a major ruling from a federal judge to help change how deaf and hard-of-hearing Massachusetts prisoners receive emergency notifications and other announcements.
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February 23, 2024
J&J Unit Assails Knee Replacement IP Verdict At Fed. Circ.
Johnson & Johnson subsidiary DePuy Synthes wants the Federal Circuit to undo a $20 million jury verdict against it for infringing an orthopedic surgeon's knee replacement patent.
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February 23, 2024
Balloon Co. Blew Up Appeal Of Fraud Verdict, 1st Circ. Says
A bid from the owner of a defunct balloon company to set aside an already-reduced jury award won't fly, the First Circuit has concluded, finding that the company's own acknowledgment about transferred funds "dooms their appeal."
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February 23, 2024
1st Circ. Told Wind Farm's Approval Should've Been A Breeze
A wind farm developer has asked the First Circuit to reject fishing groups' challenge to the U.S. Department of the Interior's approval of a proposed project off the coast of Martha's Vineyard, saying the effort to sink the plan can't survive because the agency did things by the book.
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February 23, 2024
New 'Varsity Blues' Judge Should Hear Plea Redo, Parent Says
A former television executive looking to have her guilty plea wiped out in the "Varsity Blues" college admissions case asked Friday for a different judge, arguing that U.S. District Judge Nathaniel M. Gorton's "incorrect" ruling is the basis for her motion to vacate her conviction.
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February 23, 2024
US Gun Cos. Seek Time For Justices' Input On Mexico's Suit
Gunmakers facing a recently revived lawsuit looking to hold them liable for firearms trafficking and cartel violence in Mexico on Friday asked a Boston federal judge to stand down and halt proceedings so the U.S. Supreme Court can have a chance to review the case.
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February 23, 2024
Mass. Tax Panel Grants Part Of Homeowner's Value Appeal
The Massachusetts Appellate Tax Board said that the valuation of a single-family home should be slightly increased from the previous tax year because of rising home values in the neighborhood, but it determined that the local assessor's valuation was too high.
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February 23, 2024
Motorola, Mass. Police Sued For Using Intercepting Devices
Motorola sold technology that let the Massachusetts State Police make illegal, warrantless recordings during investigations, according to a federal class action filed by four men claiming to be subjects of the secret recordings.
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February 23, 2024
Red Sox Network Exec Says 18 Mos. Enough For Billing Fraud
A former vice president with the network that broadcasts Boston Red Sox and Boston Bruins games argued Thursday that he should spend no more than 18 months in federal prison after a jury convicted him of bilking his former employer through a phony invoice scheme.
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February 22, 2024
Mastercard Faces Monopolization Claims Over Digital Tokens
Mastercard has been stonewalling digital wallet startup OV Loop, refusing to provide needed tokens and thereby excluding OV Loop from the mobile payment services market, all part of Mastercard's effort to maintain its chokehold on payment processing and continue to charge supracompetitive fees on transactions, according to a suit filed Wednesday.
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February 22, 2024
CVS Says Redbox Won't Remove Kiosks Despite Expired Deal
Pharmacy chain CVS filed a lawsuit against Redbox in Illinois state court Wednesday alleging the DVD rental company has refused to remove its kiosks from 10 CVS stores across the country after their deal expired, and is seeking over $424,000 in unpaid commissions and the removal of the kiosks.
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February 22, 2024
YouTube Privacy Judge 'Flummoxed' By Kids' Liability Theory
A California federal judge indicated Thursday that she's open to trimming a revived proposed class action alleging Google and companies that host child-friendly YouTube channels illegally collected children's data from targeted ads, expressing concerns about the requested relief and saying she's "flummoxed" by the consumers' belated liability theory against the channels' owners.
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February 22, 2024
Mass. Medical Regulator Seeks Pregnancy Center Records
A group of pregnancy crisis centers in Massachusetts and their medical director have been hit with a civil investigative demand by the state's medical board, which says it is looking into allegations the clinics "may be engaging in deceptive practices" and allowing unlicensed employees to perform ultrasounds and other procedures.
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February 22, 2024
Feds Can't Offset Nuclear Cleanup Bill With Trusts' Earnings
The U.S. Department of Energy wasn't able to convince the U.S. Court of Federal Claims that nuclear utilities' high earnings on nuclear decommissioning funds should erase their $149 million damages claim against the department for delayed nuclear waste cleanup, according to an opinion made public this week.
Expert Analysis
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Tales From The Trenches Of Remote Depositions
As practitioners continue to conduct depositions remotely in the post-pandemic world, these virtual environments are rife with opportunities for improper behavior such as witness coaching, scripted testimony and a general lack of civility — but there are methods to prevent and combat these behaviors, say Jennifer Gibbs and Bennett Moss at Zelle.
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Minn. Noncompete Ban May Add To Nat'l Venue Choice Tangle
With federal courts already split on which laws govern choice-of-venue clauses in noncompete agreements, the new Minnesota statute that bans noncompetes and empowers workers to void any employment contract that requires out-of-state adjudication will complicate compliance for multistate employers, says Sarah Tishler at Beck Reed.
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3 Ways Courts Approach Patent Eligibility At Trial And After
Sorin Zaharia and Mark Liang at O’Melveny analyze all 36 district court cases where patent eligibility under Section 101 was decided at trial or post-trial after Alice, specifically focusing on how different districts address step two of the Alice inquiry, as well as the impact of each approach on the outcome.
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Employer Drug-Testing Policies Must Evolve With State Law
As multistate employers face ongoing challenges in drafting consistent marijuana testing policies due to the evolving patchwork of state laws, they should note some emerging patterns among local and state statutes to ensure compliance in different jurisdictions, say attorneys at Troutman Pepper.
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Level Up Lawyers' Business Development With Gamification
With employee engagement at a 10-year low in the U.S., there are several gamification techniques marketing and business development teams at law firms can use to make generating new clients and matters more appealing to lawyers, says Heather McCullough at Society 54.
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Mallory Ruling Leaves Personal Jurisdiction Deeply Unsettled
In Mallory v. Norfolk Southern Railway, a closely divided U.S. Supreme Court recently rolled back key aspects of its 2017 opinion in Daimler AG v. Bauman that limited personal jurisdiction, leaving as many questions for businesses as it answers, say John Cerreta and James Rotondo at Day Pitney.
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Challenging Gov't Use Of Nontraditional White Collar Tools
As the government prosecutes white collar cases with an ever-increasing reliance on nontraditional tools — including wiretaps, cooperating witnesses and racketeering charges — defense attorneys must understand how to mount effective defenses against such tools, say Glenn MacKinlay and Dean Elwell at McCarter & English.
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5 Ways Firms Can Rethink Office Design In A Hybrid World
As workplaces across the country adapt to flexible work, law firms must prioritize individuality, amenities and technology in office design, says Kristin Cerutti at Nelson Worldwide.
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Opinion
Bar Score Is Best Hiring Metric Post-Affirmative Action
After the U.S. Supreme Court's ruling striking down affirmative action admissions policies, law firms looking to foster diversity in hiring should view an applicant's Multistate Bar Examination score as the best metric of legal ability — over law school name or GPA, says attorney Alice Griffin.
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Ghosting In BigLaw: How To Come Back From Lack Of Feedback
Junior associates can feel powerless when senior colleagues cut off contact instead of providing useful feedback, but young attorneys can get back on track by focusing on practical professional development and reexamining their career priorities, says Rachel Patterson at Orrick.
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Opinion
States Must Fight Predatory Real Estate Listing Agreements
As momentum against long-term real estate listing agreements continues to grow, states should take action to render existing agreements unenforceable and discourage future unfair and deceptive trade practices in real estate, says Elizabeth Blosser at the American Land Title Association.
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Steps To Success For Senior Associates
Excerpt from Practical Guidance
Adriana Paris at Rissman Barrett discusses the increased responsibilities and opportunities that becoming a senior associate brings and what attorneys in this role should prioritize to flourish in this stressful but rewarding next level in their careers.
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How To Avoid A Zombie Office Building Apocalypse
With national office vacancy rates approaching 20%, policymakers, investors and developers will need to come together in order to prevent this troubling trend from sucking the life out of business districts or contaminating the broader real estate market, say Ryan Sommers and Robyn Minter Smyers at Thompson Hine.
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Legal Profession Must Do More For Lawyers With Disabilities
At the start of Disability Pride month, Rosalyn Richter at Arnold & Porter looks at why lawyers with disabilities are significantly underrepresented in private practice, asserting that law firms and other employers must do more to conquer the implicit bias that deters attorneys from seeking accommodations.
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What Affirmative Action Ruling Means For Higher Ed And Cos.
The U.S. Supreme Court's holding that race-conscious admissions programs at two educational institutions violate the Constitution's equal protection clause applied the "strict scrutiny" standard that governs race-conscious programs in a way that will be very difficult for educational institutions and other entities to satisfy, say attorneys at Jenner & Block.