Justices Say Trump Admin Can Implement Trans Passport Ban

By Katie Buehler

The U.S. Supreme Court on Thursday ruled that the U.S. Department of State can stop issuing passports to transgender and nonbinary individuals that reflect their gender identity, lifting a nationwide order that required the Trump administration to continue the longtime policy pending litigation.

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5th Circ. Revives Texas' Prohibition Of 'Erotic' Drag Shows

By Hailey Konnath

The Fifth Circuit on Thursday vacated a lower court's injunction blocking a Texas law that banned drag shows in front of children, ruling that most of the LGBTQ pride festivals, production companies and performers don't have standing to challenge enforcement of the law.

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6th Circ. Becomes Latest To Reject NLRB's Thryv Remedy

By Emily Brill

The Sixth Circuit is the latest court to weigh in on the National Labor Relations Board's 2022 decision that employers must cover any financial hits that workers take due to company misconduct, joining the Third and Fifth circuits and opposing the Ninth Circuit in ruling that the board overstepped.

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Goldstein Loses Bid To Trim Tax Charges Before Trial

By Jared Foretek

A Maryland federal judge Thursday handed SCOTUSblog co-founder Tom Goldstein a series of losses on pre-trial motions aimed at trimming the 22 federal tax charges he'll face at trial next year, ruling that many of the motions involved factual disputes fit for trial and keeping the government's case intact.

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2nd Circ. Orders New Look At Trump's Hush Money Case

By Aaron Keller

In a published opinion, the Second Circuit on Thursday ordered a federal district judge to take a fresh look at President Donald Trump's attempt to move his New York hush money conviction to federal court, citing the U.S. Supreme Court's 2024 presidential immunity ruling as grounds for reconsidering the case.

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Google-Epic Judge Raises Doubts About App Antitrust Deal

By Bonnie Eslinger

The California federal judge overseeing Epic Games' antitrust suit against Google expressed serious doubts Thursday about their recent deal to end their fight over Android app distribution, ordering an evidentiary hearing and warning he's not sure the proposed deal will correct Google's illegal conduct.

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Lawmakers Rip Judges Over Anonymous High Court Criticism

By Ryan Boysen

Two Republican lawmakers have asked Chief Justice John Roberts to rein in judges who've anonymously criticized the U.S. Supreme Court's flurry of "shadow docket" rulings, but a full-on investigation appears unlikely.

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Nuclear Waste Storage Site Opponents Appeal To High Court

By Juan-Carlos Rodriguez

Opponents of the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission's approval of a temporary nuclear waste storage site in New Mexico have asked the U.S. Supreme Court to review the D.C. Circuit's decision to toss their challenge.

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SD Tribe Says Time Is Right To Fight Dakota Access Pipeline

By Crystal Owens

The Standing Rock Sioux Tribe is asking the D.C. Circuit to reverse a lower court's order dismissing its challenge that looked to shut down the Dakota Access Pipeline, telling the court it is presenting a live, justiciable controversy regarding the federal government's failure to fulfill mandatory statutory obligations.

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Fed. Circ. Won't Overrule Stewart's Institution Practices

By Dani Kass and Theresa Schliep

The Federal Circuit on Thursday rejected petitions filed by Motorola, Google, Samsung and SAP America arguing that the deputy director of the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office violated their due process rights by changing institution practices at the Patent Trial and Appeal Board. 

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Verizon Gets Backup In Fight Against Stewart Terminating IPR

By Adam Lidgett

Patent quality advocacy group Askeladden LLC has backed Verizon's appeal of former acting U.S. Patent and Trademark Office Director Coke Morgan Stewart's decision to wipe out a Patent Trial and Appeal Board decision in the telecom company's favor invalidating an Omega Patents patent.

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Crocs Urges Fed. Circ. To Reverse ITC Clog Import Ruling

By Ivan Moreno

Clogs maker Crocs urged the Federal Circuit on Thursday to reverse a decision from the U.S. International Trade Commission not to impose a ban on imports that the Colorado-based company says are confusingly similar to its own footwear, arguing that the ITC erred in how it considered Crocs' fame and its competitors' intent to confuse consumers.

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3rd Circ. Rules Carjacker's Autism Didn't Affect Rights Waiver

By P.J. D'Annunzio

The Third Circuit Thursday ruled that a convicted carjacker's autism and learning disabilities did not affect his waiver of Miranda rights when talking to police, despite police falsely telling him that an alleged coconspirator confessed and implicated him in the crime.

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3rd Circ. Won't Revive Investors' Suit Over Viatris Sale

By Jessica Corso

The Third Circuit on Thursday upheld the dismissal of a proposed shareholder class action against pharmaceutical company Viatris, saying that investors hadn't plausibly alleged that they were misled about the future of the company's sold-off biosimilars business.

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6th Circ. Won't Rethink FirstEnergy Bribe Probe Docs Ruling

By Jessica Corso

The Sixth Circuit said Thursday it would not reconsider a ruling blocking FirstEnergy investors from accessing documents prepared by BigLaw firms investigating the company's $1 billion bribery scandal, and clarified that the decision also applies to depositions taken in the proposed class action.

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8th Circ. OKs Home Depot Barring Worker's Display Of 'BLM'

By Braden Campbell

An Eighth Circuit panel vacated a National Labor Relations Board ruling that Home Depot illegally forced out a worker who insisted on showing Black Lives Matter support at work, holding Thursday that social unrest at the time of their February 2021 display justified the company's caution.

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8th Circ. Won't Rehear EEOC Harassment Case Against BNSF

By Patrick Hoff

The Eighth Circuit said it won't rethink its decision to restore classwide claims in a U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission lawsuit claiming BNSF Railway Co. failed to protect female workers from verbal abuse and unwanted sexual advances.

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9th Circ. Backs NLRB Ruling On Nurses' Pandemic Pay Fight

By Gina Kim

The Ninth Circuit has affirmed the National Labor Relations Board's order finding a trio of Southern California hospitals violated federal labor law by unilaterally implementing a COVID-19 pandemic pay program without first bargaining with a Service Employees International Union affiliate representing registered nurses and professional workers. 

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T-Mobile Fairly Canceled $27M In Phone Orders, 9th Circ. Says

By Nadia Dreid

The Ninth Circuit isn't going to disturb a ruling tossing out a cellphone manufacturer's $27 million lawsuit against T-Mobile accusing it of reneging on purchase orders, after finding that the mobile behemoth had the right to unilaterally end their agreement.

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Sutter Health Patients' Attys To Get Over $100M Fees, Costs

By Craig Clough

A California U.S. magistrate judge said Thursday that she is ready to grant final approval of a $228.5 million deal settling a 13-year case over claims that Sutter Health boosted costs by pushing all-or-nothing networks on insurers, which includes $75.4 million in attorney fees and over $28 million in litigation expenses.

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11th Circ. Backs Trash Co.'s Defeat Of Age Bias, Reprisal Suit

By Chart Riggall

The Eleventh Circuit on Thursday upheld a Georgia garbage collection company's win in a bias and retaliation suit from a former employee who said she was forced out for her role in a criminal sexual assault probe of a coworker, with the court saying that getting subpoenaed didn't qualify as protected activity.

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Florida AG Tells 11th Circ. Contempt Order Was 'Dangerous'

By David Minsky

Florida Attorney General James Uthmeier told the Eleventh Circuit that a lower court order holding him in civil contempt for defying an injunction blocking a state immigration law was "dangerous," saying it erodes the U.S. Constitution's separation-of-powers doctrine and diminishes his authority over law enforcement.

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Seafood Co. Workers Urge 11th Circ. To Rehear ESOP Fight

By Kellie Mejdrich

Workers for a seafood company urged the Eleventh Circuit to rethink a panel's decision in October that upheld dismissal of their suit accusing the company of employee stock ownership plan mismanagement, arguing the full court should overturn appellate precedent that led to the three-judge panel's decision.

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Towing Co. Appeals Motorcyclist's $45M Crash Verdict

By Brian Steele

A Connecticut towing company has challenged a judge's decision to leave intact a $45 million award to a Marine Corps reservist who was paralyzed in a motorcycle crash, elevating the case to the state's intermediate-level appeals court.

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Larry Klayman Gets 2-Year License Suspension In Florida

By Carolina Bolado

The Florida Supreme Court on Thursday suspended conservative activist attorney Larry Klayman's law license for two years in a reciprocal disciplinary proceeding that arose from claims of ethical violations in the District of Columbia.

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Pa. High Court Revives Death Row Inmate's Jury Bias Claim

By Elizabeth Daley

A man on death row for stabbing a woman and decapitating a child in front of police may argue he was denied a fair trial, after allegedly discovering that a juror in his case hid an attempted infanticide in his family, the Pennsylvania Supreme Court ruled in a reversal.

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Roundup

Pa. Statehouse Catchup: Cannabis Quality, 'Deepfake' Fines

By Matthew Santoni

Even as the Pennsylvania General Assembly has struggled to agree to a state budget since the summer deadline passed, legislators have introduced and advanced bills dealing with perennial topics like cannabis legalization or responding to newer concerns like AI-fueled fraud.

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NJ Panel Says Med Mal Death Suit Wrongly Tossed

By Mike Curley

A New Jersey state appeals court on Thursday reinstated a woman's wrongful death suit against a Wayne hospital, finding the trial court misapplied precedent when it found her affidavit of merit was insufficient for not naming the specific employees she claims were negligent.

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Del. Justices Uphold Toss Of Trade Desk CEO's $5.2B Pay Suit

By Jarek Rutz

The Delaware Supreme Court Thursday affirmed a Chancery Court ruling that threw out a stockholder derivative challenge to an advertising technology company's multiyear compensation package for its co-founder, CEO and controlling stockholder, rejecting claims that the award, worth up to $5.2 billion, was a product of bad faith board conduct.

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NC Panel Vacates Protester's Conviction Over Vulgar Banner

By Elizabeth Daley

A man who wore a T-shirt that said "Eat Pussy and Protest" while unfurling a sexist banner calling a female North Carolina county commissioner "unprofessional" and a "cunt" had his free speech rights violated when he was arrested at a public meeting, a state appeals court has ruled, reversing his convictions.

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NC Panel Says Juror's Date Request Didn't Prejudice Case

By Abigail Harrison

An incident in which a juror asked a witness out on a date mere minutes after she left the stand didn't prejudice a woman who was later granted a new trial, a split North Carolina state appeals panel said as it vacated a lower court's decision.

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Ex-Deputy Sheriff Fights To Keep Political Firing Suit Alive

By Kelcey Caulder

A former Metro Atlanta deputy sheriff alleging he was forced to resign due to his age and support for the sheriff's 2024 election opponent pushed back Wednesday against a bid to dismiss his lawsuit, arguing his claims against the sheriff as an individual are not barred by qualified immunity.

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Wash. Justices Spurn Alaska Airlines' Worker Illness Stance

By Rachel Riley

The Washington Supreme Court on Thursday sided with an Alaska Airlines employee who caught COVID-19 while traveling on the job, rejecting the employer's attempt to distinguish an occupational disease covered by state workers' compensation law from any sickness that develops during a work trip.

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Trump Taps Ex-Kansas AG Deputy For DOJ Legal Policy Role

By Courtney Bublé

President Donald Trump has nominated Dan Burrows, a White House official and former chief deputy attorney general of Kansas, to be assistant attorney general for the U.S. Department of Justice's Office of Legal Policy.

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What's At Stake In High Court Compassionate Release Case

The U.S. Supreme Court will hear arguments in Fernandez v. U.S. next week about the overlap between motions to vacate and compassionate release, and its ultimate decision could ultimately limit or expand judicial discretion in sentencing, says Zachary Newland at Evergreen Attorneys.

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2nd Circ. Peloton Ruling Emphasizes Disclosure Context

The Second Circuit’s recent decision to revive shareholders’ suit alleging that Peloton made materially misleading statements makes clear that public companies must continually review risk disclosures to determine if previous hypotheticals have materialized, say attorneys at Baker Botts.

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Series

Mindfulness Meditation Makes Me A Better Lawyer

Mindful meditation enables me to drop the ego, and in helping me to keep sight of what’s important, permits me to learn from the other side and become a reliable counselor, says Roy Wyman at Bass Berry.

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Strategic Use Of Motions In Limine In Employment Cases

Because motions in limine can shape the course of employment litigation and ensure that juries decide cases on admissible, relevant evidence, understanding their strategic use is essential to effective advocacy and case management at trial, says Sara Lewenstein at Nilan Johnson.

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Delaware Fee Inflation Worries Overblown, Study Says

By Jeff Montgomery

A newly published report by two Stanford University researchers asserts that high-dollar attorney fee awards in Delaware courts make up "a very small minority of cases" and are "no basis for concern," throwing cold water on growing worries about so-called fee inflation in the First State.

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'It's A War, Man': Trump's Deputy AG Unloads On Judges, Bars

By Jeff Overley

The U.S. Department of Justice is in "a war" with federal judges who are "not following the law," and it is separately formulating plans to block "activist, obnoxious" bar associations from assessing ethics complaints against government lawyers, a top DOJ official said Friday.

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Jeffer Mangels Hit With Pregnancy Bias Suit By Ex-Associate

By Hailey Konnath

A former Jeffer Mangels Butler & Mitchell LLP associate has accused the firm of discriminating against women, especially pregnant women, claiming that she was harassed throughout her pregnancy and eventually fired after she advocated for herself and pointed out the disparate treatment.

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In Case You Missed It: Hottest Firms And Stories On Law360

For those who missed out, here's a look back at the law firms, stories and expert analyses that generated the most buzz on Law360 last week.

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Ex-Calif. Judge Seeks To Toss Sex Assault, Coverup Charges

By Craig Clough

A former California state judge on Friday moved to toss federal criminal charges alleging that he sexually assaulted a court employee and lied to investigators, saying the employee was not under his direct supervision so he could not have been acting under the "color of law" when the alleged assault occurred.

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Ex-Polsinelli Atty Agrees To Dismiss Sexual Harassment Case

By Hailey Konnath

A former Polsinelli PC equity shareholder agreed to drop her suit alleging two former partners sexually harassed her, and she was fired after reporting it, according to a notice filed Friday in Washington, D.C., federal court.

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Mass. Federal Judge Mark Wolf Retires After 40 Years

By Chris Villani

Senior U.S. District Judge Mark L. Wolf on Friday announced that he is retiring after more than 40 years on the federal bench, having presided over some of the most notable cases in Massachusetts federal court over the past four decades.

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Hearing Officer Clears Mass. Judge Of Aiding ICE Escape

By Julie Manganis

A hearing officer has concluded that Massachusetts state court Justice Shelley Richmond Joseph was not aware of a plan to allow a defendant to evade an ICE agent waiting at a suburban Boston court in 2018, but is recommending a public reprimand for other actions the judge took that day.

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Roundup

UK Litigation Roundup: Here's What You Missed In London

By Max Austin

This past week in London has seen Big Technologies file fresh claims against its ousted chief executive, West Ham United FC sue Arthur J. Gallagher Insurance for breach of duty, and RSM UK face a new claim over a company's administration. Here, Law360 looks at these and other new claims in the U.K. 

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Del. Federal Court Won't Keep Trump's Interim US Atty In Role

By Jack Karp

Delaware's federal court will not appoint the district's current interim U.S. attorney and President Donald Trump's choice for that position to remain in the role, according to a notice from the district's chief judge.

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DOJ Backs Trump In NY False-Records Conviction Appeal

By Emily Sawicki

The U.S. Department of Justice is throwing its support behind President Donald Trump's effort to overturn his New York criminal conviction for falsifying business records, filing a proposed amicus brief on Friday citing the U.S. Supreme Court's landmark 2024 decision "defining the contours of a president's federal constitutional immunity from criminal prosecution."

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Brief

Pension Corp. Installs EEOC Ex-Chair Dhillon As Director

By Kellie Mejdrich

The Pension Benefit Guaranty Corp. swore in former U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission chair and commissioner Janet Dhillon as the 17th director of the federal agency, which runs two insurance programs backstopping the nation's single and multiemployer defined-benefit pension plans.

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GC Cheat Sheet: The Hottest Corporate News Of The Week

By Sue Reisinger

The federal judge overseeing Epic Games' antitrust suit against Google Inc. has doubts about their settlement deal and is asking for more evidence. And a Black McDonald's executive, who claimed he was fired for confronting his CEO over a racial comment, has lost his bias suit. These are some of the stories in corporate legal news you may have missed in the past week.

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Law360's Legal Lions Of The Week

By Kevin Penton

Latham & Watkins LLP and Ogletree Deakins Nash Smoak & Stewart PC lead this week's edition of Law360 Legal Lions, after the Eighth Circuit vacated a National Labor Relations Board ruling that Home Depot illegally forced out a worker who showed support for Black Lives Matter.

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Shutdown, Funding Crisis Leave Federal Defenders Unpaid

By Courtney Bublé

The record-long government shutdown has hindered an already dire funding situation for the federal defense community, but now the judiciary is working on requests to Congress to alleviate that.

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Analysis

How One Law Firm Got Two Big White-Collar Wins In 48 Hours

By Phillip Bantz

The white-collar team at Dykema Gossett PLLC secured back-to-back dismissals of two criminal cases in as many days last month by challenging the government's experts, flagging discovery issues and hammering on other perceived weaknesses in the prosecutions.

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