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WASHINGTON, D.C. — The International Centre for Settlement of Investment Disputes (ICSID) on Nov. 14 published a tribunal’s order denying the United Mexican States’ request to suspend an arbitration brought against it by British and Chinese lithium mining investors pending the potential consolidation of the arbitration with a recently filed claim brought by British parties who previously claimed an interest in the investors’ royalties, writing that suspension is not yet warranted.
CHICAGO — An Illinois federal magistrate judge who previously determined that a deponent’s “obstructive and combative behavior and dilatory tactics” warranted three extra hours of deposition and monetary sanctions awarded more than half of the $105,875.20 requested for related attorney fees in the Employee Retirement Income Security Act class action that challenges the expenses and allocations by trustees of a nationwide multiemployer health plan.
WASHINGTON, D.C. — U.S. Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor on Nov. 14 vacated her Nov. 5 stay of a Second Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals decision that cleared the way for the Republic of the Philippines to receive the millions of dollars in a U.S. bank account opened by former President Ferdinand E. Marcos and denied the application for stay filed by a class of individuals who were subject to Marcos’ human rights abuses.
WASHINGTON, D.C. — The U.S. Supreme Court on Nov. 17 granted a petition for a writ of certiorari filed by federal government officials after a divided Ninth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals partially upheld a permanent injunction in a class case over a now-rescinded border metering policy.
PHILADELPHIA — The Pennsylvania Superior Court granted a joint application to discontinue cross-appeals filed by Monsanto Co. and a glyphosate cancer plaintiff who won $404,308,904.11 against the company in trial court, according to a note on the docket.
WASHINGTON, D.C. — A District of Columbia federal judge on Nov. 14 entered a minute order granting a motion to stay a complaint filed by Jenner & Block LLP against the Republic of Sierra Leone for $8.1 million in attorney fees the firm incurred representing the country in two international arbitration disputes against a mining company, the day after the parties announced they had reached a settlement in principle.
CHARLOTTE, N.C. — A North Carolina federal judge denied a consolidated request by asbestos claimants in two bankruptcy cases of debtors created under Texas divisional merger law for leave to appeal the denial of their motions to dismiss the Chapter 11 cases, finding that the proposed interlocutory appeals lack a “controlling question of law.”
ST. LOUIS — The Eighth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals determined that a lower federal court did not abuse its discretion when it excluded the opinion of an insured’s expert in the insured’s breach of contract lawsuit alleging that its commercial building was damaged by water intrusion during a storm, affirming the lower court’s grant of summary judgment in favor of the insurer.
WILMINGTON, Del. — The federal judge in Delaware overseeing an auction of Venezuelan oil shares to satisfy confirmed international arbitration awards and civil judgments against Venezuela worth more than $22 billion on Nov. 13 denied motions to disqualify himself, a court-appointed special master who recently recommended the court favor a $5.8 billion bid for Venezuela’s oil shares or the special master’s advisers filed by Venezuela, its affiliates and a rejected bidder.
WASHINGTON, D.C. — A federal judge in Michigan wrongly construed the term “transparency” in an infringement dispute concerning patents related to a school bus sign, and it was unreasonable for a jury to find infringement under the doctrine of equivalents, a Federal Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals panel held Nov. 13; the panel reversed an infringement judgment as to one of the patents and vacated the infringement finding as to the other.
NEW YORK — A federal judge in Vermont properly reduced attorney fees for an employee’s counsel in a wrongful termination case after determining that the counsel’s billing was unreasonable; however, the judge’s additional reduction based on the worker’s degree of success was incorrect as it was based on the disproportionality of the requested amount to the monetary relief for the worker, a Second Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals panel ruled, vacating the attorney fee award and remanding for recalculation.