Justices Revive Mississippi Death Row Inmate's Batson Claim

By Marco Poggio

The U.S. Supreme Court ruled Thursday that a Black Mississippi death row prisoner who argued racial discrimination tainted his jury selection is entitled to habeas corpus relief, finding that Mississippi's courts improperly rejected his challenge to the prosecutor's juror strikes.

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High Court Says First Step Act Can't Inform Early Releases

By Matthew Santoni

The U.S. Supreme Court ruled Thursday that changes in mandatory minimum sentences cannot be considered retroactively when weighing if a federal prisoner should be granted early release.

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Justices Say First Step Act Not 'Vehicle' For Innocence Claim

By Phillip Bantz

The U.S. Supreme Court held Thursday that judges lack wide discretion to pare down sentences for criminal defendants under the First Step Act based on questions about the validity of a conviction, shutting the door on a potential wave of postconviction relief petitions, experts said.

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Goldstein Says Bad Jury Instructions Warrant New Trial

By Jared Foretek

SCOTUSblog founder Tom Goldstein said that the prosecutors who convicted him on 12 tax and mortgage fraud charges in February are now contradicting arguments they made at the end of his trial in their attempt to deny him a bench acquittal or new trial.

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Pa. Panel Orders Judge Replaced In Sex Abuse Retrial

By Elizabeth Daley

A county judge must step aside for the retrial of an accused child sex offender, a Pennsylvania appeals court said Thursday, finding that, because the judge repeatedly declared that the man was innocent of the crimes in a prior proceeding, his impartiality was questionable.

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'Socioeconomic' Remark At Atty's Homicide Trial Vexes Judge

By Brian Steele

A prosecutor's "socioeconomic" description of the man shot to death by a former Cramer & Anderson LLP partner may have been improper, a Connecticut appellate judge said Thursday, casting some doubt on the integrity of Robert L. Fisher Jr.'s manslaughter conviction.

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Trans Patients Say Stanford Can't Give DOJ Medical Records

By Gianna Ferrarin

A group of transgender adolescents who received gender-related care at a Stanford Medicine hospital urged a California federal court to order the hospital not to turn over any of their medical records in response to a criminal subpoena issued by a grand jury in Texas.

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Pa. Justices Order Return Of Gun After Charges Dismissed

By Elizabeth Daley

A Philadelphia woman who has been trying to get her gun back from the state for years is entitled to it, the Pennsylvania Supreme Court ruled, finding that since the complaint against her was dismissed and prosecutors couldn't show why they needed to keep her property, it should be returned.

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4th Circ. Wipes Out NC Man's Sentence For Gun Possession

By Parker Quinlan

The Fourth Circuit vacated a North Carolina man's seven-year prison sentence for a firearm conviction, finding there was not an adequate factual connection between his gun possession and an underlying state homicide charge.

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Colo. Panel Says Insanity Verdict Supports Sealed Records

By Parker Quinlan

A Colorado state appeals court on Thursday ruled that a man declared not guilty by reason of insanity in three cases over 20 years ago should have his records sealed because the criminal insanity finding is functionally an acquittal under state law.

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4th Circ. Rules IRS 'Cooperation' Doesn't Sink Tax Convictions

By Hayley Fowler

The Fourth Circuit on Thursday affirmed the convictions of two software executives found guilty at trial of failing to pay employment taxes to the Internal Revenue Service, rejecting the notion that their alleged cooperation with the IRS somehow undermined the charges.

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Man Who Used 'God And Ga. Football' For Fraud Gets 4 Years

By Kelcey Caulder

A federal judge in Atlanta sentenced a man who defrauded would-be investors and college football fans out of more than $940,000 to four years in prison on Thursday, saying he "took advantage of God and Georgia football" to carry out the schemes. 

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Ex-TD Bank Worker Admits Role In $3M Customer Fraud Scam

By Dorothy Atkins

A former TD Bank NA financial service representative entered a plea deal in New Jersey federal court Wednesday, admitting to defrauding bank customers and bribing an employee at another financial institution to falsify bank records to facilitate a $3.4 million fraud scheme.

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Financial Adviser Gets 2 Years For $3.7M Investment Fraud

By Gina Kim

A Pennsylvania financial adviser was sentenced to more than two years in prison in federal court Thursday after copping to wire fraud stemming from a scheme where he transferred over $3.7 million from the bank account of a fund he managed to another client's account, to recoup investment losses.

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Series

Studying Foreign Languages Makes Me A Better Lawyer

Studying Italian and Japanese has shown me that learning a new language can benefit a legal career in several ways, including by demonstrating the importance of approaching problems from a fresh perspective and the value of practicing patience with colleagues and clients, says Anna King at Genworth Financial.

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Brief

Davis Polk Adds A&O Shearman Antitrust Partner In NY

By Andrea Keckley

Davis Polk & Wardwell LLP has hired a former A&O Shearman partner, who joined its antitrust and competition practice in New York.

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Bonus Spotlight

Selendy Gay Doles Out Spring Associate Bonuses

By Aebra Coe

New York litigation boutique Selendy Gay PLLC paid its associates spring bonuses of as much as $25,000 this week, according to the firm.

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Ex-Calif. Appellate Judge To Take Over As Law School Dean

By Rose Krebs

A former California appellate justice, who was the first Muslim to serve as a Court of Appeal justice in the U.S., has been named Western State College of Law at Westcliff University's next dean.

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Dems Say DOJ Blocked Bondi On Trump Questions

By Courtney Bublé

Democrats were incensed on Friday that the U.S. Department of Justice attorneys who accompanied former Attorney General Pam Bondi to her committee interview stopped her from answering questions about President Donald Trump.

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Civil Rights Icon Clarence B. Jones Dies At 95

By Andrea Keckley

Civil rights icon Clarence B. Jones, a speechwriter and personal attorney to Martin Luther King Jr., died May 22 at an assisted living facility in the Santa Clara County city of Cupertino, California, his family confirmed earlier this week. He was 95.

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Roundup

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

By Megan Norcott

The past week in London has seen the billionaire who donated £5 million ($6.7 million) to Nigel Farage sue Ben Habib, the leader of far-right party Advance UK, for defamation; Mashreqbank bring claims against three subsidiaries of dissolved private equity giant Abraaj Group for commercial fraud; and the property and investment vehicle of the State of Kuwait be targeted by four real estate figures who filed a miscellaneous claim. Here, Law360 looks at these and other new claims in the U.K.

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Titan Of The Plaintiffs Bar: Boies Schiller's Matthew Schwartz

By Sarah Jarvis

Matthew L. Schwartz oscillated among many career aspirations as a kid, from astronaut to mayor of New York. When it was time to head off to college, the man who would go on to handle the prosecution of employees tied to Bernie Madoff and become chair of Boies Schiller Flexner LLP set his sights on science, earning an undergraduate degree in physics.

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Law360's Legal Lions Of The Week

By Kevin Penton

Phillips Black Inc., Hogan Lovells and Watkins & Eager PLLC lead this week's edition of Law360 Legal Lions, after the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that a Black Mississippi death row prisoner who argued racial discrimination tainted his jury selection is entitled to habeas corpus relief.

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DLA Piper Hires Real Estate, Construction Partner In Seattle

By Nate Beck

DLA Piper said it has added a Seattle-based real estate partner with experience advising a range of construction projects including data centers, mixed-use projects, schools and renewable energy facilities.

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GC Cheat Sheet: The Hottest Corporate News Of The Week

By Sue Reisinger

Kirkland & Ellis says it's investing a half billion dollars into developing its own artificial intelligence platform to better serve clients. And Law360 looks at the general counsel who is guiding BP through its latest leadership crisis after the company abruptly dismissed its board chair.

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Baker McKenzie Asks Judge Not To Toss Suit Against Ex-Atty

By Alison Knezevich

A lawyer for Baker McKenzie on Friday urged a Washington, D.C., judge not to dismiss the BigLaw firm's defamation suit against a former tax associate who accused a firm office leader of sexual assault, telling the court the accusations were false and made with "malice."

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Fla. Panel Revives Firm's Suit Over Tobacco Case Referrals

By David Minsky

A Florida state appellate court revived a law firm's complaint alleging tortious interference against a widow over a contingency fee agreement involving tobacco injury case referrals, finding that the lower court wrongly tossed the lawsuit based on extraneous information even though there was sufficient evidence to support a claim.

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NY Judge Doubts Nussbaum-Linked Firms Belong In Ch. 11

By Emily Lever

A New York bankruptcy judge on Friday questioned whether his court was the proper venue to wind down two commercial real estate law firms headed by Mark J. Nussbaum as the debtors sought to ditch an assignment for the benefit of creditors process in New York state court.

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Trump Urges 3rd Circ. To Reverse 'Bizarre' Anti-SLAPP Loss

By Dorothy Atkins

President Donald Trump urged the Third Circuit on Thursday to find a Pennsylvania anti-SLAPP statute shields him from the Central Park Five's defamation claims, slamming the lower court's "truly bizarre" ruling in an opening brief filed the same day a DLA Piper partner and others joined Trump's defense team.

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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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Akin Gump Owes Fees For Winebow's 'Self-Indulgent' Appeal

By Dorothy Atkins

The Ninth Circuit on Thursday ordered an importer's Akin Gump Strauss Hauer & Feld LLP attorneys to pay a European winemaker fees for having to defend against the importer's "spurious objections" to the winemaker's valid arbitral award, ruling that the importer's "self-indulgent" appeal warrants sanctions in the form of fees.

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Colo. Appeals Court Bars One-Way Fees In Eviction Cures

By Zach Dupont

A Colorado Court of Appeals panel on Thursday reversed the dismissal of a proposed class action against a group of landlords, Tschetter Sulzer PC and the Colorado Apartment Association accusing the collective of illegally extracting attorney fees from tenants during eviction proceedings.

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Double Shooting Renews Courthouse Safety Fears In NC

By Hayley Fowler

The shooting of two Fox Rothschild LLP attorneys outside a courthouse in Raleigh, North Carolina, ahead of Memorial Day weekend has renewed calls to protect the safety of judges and lawyers in an increasingly volatile justice system.

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Calif. Panel Reverses Order For Citing Atty's Bogus Case Law

By Dorothy Atkins

A California appellate panel on Thursday reversed a judgment in favor of a man accused of abusing his son, finding that "without doubt" the trial judge abused her discretion by incorporating the man's bogus legal citations into her ruling, despite being alerted to the mistakes in advance.

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