Bankers Petroleum Vows To Pay Albania $236M Award

By Joyce Hanson

An Albanian oil extraction company has agreed to comply with an International Court of Arbitration decision in a long-running case brought by the country over petroleum cost audits, saying it will pay $236 million.

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DC Circ. Remands Yukos' $50B Award Suit Against Russia

By Caroline Simson

The D.C. Circuit on Tuesday ordered a lower court to reconsider Russia's bid to escape a long-running case to enforce $50 billion in arbitral awards issued to former shareholders of Yukos Oil Co., ruling the court must independently determine whether an underlying arbitration agreement exists.

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States Win Ruling To Shield FEMA Disaster Prevention Funds

By Julie Manganis

A Massachusetts federal judge on Tuesday temporarily barred the Trump administration from redirecting more than $4 billion in funds allocated by Congress for natural disaster mitigation efforts toward other Federal Emergency Management Agency programs.

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Brookfield Nabs $6B Minority Stake In Duke Energy Florida

By Jade Martinez-Pogue

Skadden Arps Slate Meagher & Flom LLP-advised Duke Energy on Tuesday unveiled plans for infrastructure investor Brookfield, advised by Kirkland & Ellis LLP, to take an indirect minority equity stake in its electric company Duke Energy Florida in a $6 billion all-cash deal.

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NY Loses Bid To Move Climate Superfund Suit Upstate

By Juan-Carlos Rodriguez

The federal government's lawsuit challenging New York's climate change Superfund law will proceed in the New York City court where it was filed, rather than in a judicial district closer to the state capitol as the state had requested, a judge said.

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Challenge To GOP Enviro Grant Cutoff Can Proceed, Judge Told

By Jared Foretek

Attorneys for environmental infrastructure grant recipients told a D.C. federal judge Tuesday that the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's own emails show that a proposed class action challenging the blanket termination of a climate justice and resilience grant program can move forward despite Congress' recent recission of "unobligated" funds.

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Feds Aim To Shut Off Kids' Challenge To Trump Energy Orders

By Juan-Carlos Rodriguez

A lawsuit filed by youths alleging that President Donald Trump's energy policy directives harm their future by exacerbating climate change should be dismissed because their claims can't be addressed by courts, the federal government said Monday.

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Fed. Hazmat Law Doesn't Bar Negligence Suit, 2nd Circ. Says

By Brian Steele

A Connecticut federal judge was wrong to find that the Hazardous Materials Transportation Act preempted a propane company's common-law negligence and recklessness claims over damage it suffered from a heating oil spill, the Second Circuit ruled Tuesday in restoring a lawsuit seeking more than $500,000 to cover remediation costs.

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Gas Breaks Can't Justify Russian Fertilizer Duties, Fed. Circ. Told

By Dylan Moroses

The federal government improperly concluded that EuroChem's Russian imports to the U.S. were subject to countervailing duties because of natural gas subsidies those products benefited from, counsel representing the company told the Federal Circuit during oral arguments Tuesday.

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Naftogaz Secures Vienna Court's OK To Seize Russian Assets

By Joyce Hanson

An Austrian court has granted Naftogaz permission to seize approximately €120 million ($139 million) of Russian assets as Ukraine's state-owned oil and gas company pursues an international campaign to enforce a $5 billion arbitral award it won against Russia.

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Ex-ComEd Lobbyist Gets 1 Year For Masking Madigan Bribes

By Celeste Bott

A former lobbyist for Commonwealth Edison was sentenced to a year and a day in prison Tuesday for allowing his lobbying firm to serve as a pass-through for the utility to pay associates of ex-Illinois House Speaker Michael Madigan for little to no work, as it sought his support for favorable energy legislation.

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Fed. Circ. Partly Revives Solar Panel Safety Patent Challenge

By Adam Lidgett

The Federal Circuit on Tuesday said the Patent Trial and Appeal Board has to take another look at one of renewable energy industry trade group SunSpec Alliance's arguments in its challenge to claims of a patent on safeguards for solar panels.

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Chancery Sends Steel Co.'s Fraudulent Transfer Suit To Trial

By Jeff Montgomery

A steel product company's claims that a bankrupt former customer, for which it was also serving as a creditor, fraudulently transferred away millions that could have covered its debts must go to trial, a Delaware vice chancellor ruled on Tuesday.

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Willkie Adds Int'l Arbitration Pro From Boies Schiller In DC

By Christine DeRosa

Willkie Farr & Gallagher LLP has strengthened its international arbitration offerings in the nation's capital with an attorney from Boies Schiller Flexner LLP.

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Opinion

The Legal Education Status Quo Is No Longer Tenable

As underscored by the fallout from California’s February bar exam, legal education and licensure are tethered to outdated systems, and the industry must implement several key reforms to remain relevant and responsive to 21st century legal needs, says Matthew Nehmer at The Colleges of Law.

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Law, Medical School Orgs Face Application Fee Antitrust Suits

By Gina Kim

The Law School Admission Council and the Association of American Medical Colleges have each been hit with a proposed class action in Pennsylvania and D.C. federal courts, respectively, by candidates who said the nonprofits conspired with their member schools to charge excessive application fees that have been fixed at the same price regardless of the school.

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Judge Mulls Sanctioning Hagens Berman In Thalidomide Suits

By Lauren Berg

The Pennsylvania federal judge presiding over dozens of product liability actions against manufacturers of the morning sickness drug thalidomide Tuesday ordered Hagens Berman Sobol Shapiro LLP to explain why it shouldn't be sanctioned for allegedly conducting "grossly inadequate" pre-suit inquiries, obstructing discovery and doctoring evidence.

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Analysis

Tesla Verdict Could Embolden Plaintiffs With Similar Claims

By Carolina Bolado

The $329 million verdict handed down by jurors in Miami on Friday over a fatal Florida Keys crash is the first to find Tesla's autopilot defective and will likely embolden other plaintiffs with similar claims to take them to trial, personal injury attorneys told Law360.

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Analysis

A Free Exercise 'Blueprint' In Colo. Abortion Reversal Order

By Mark Payne

A Colorado federal judge's decision to allow medication abortion "reversals" on free exercise grounds could serve as a model for other lawsuits meant to legitimize a practice that is outside the standard practice of medicine.

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Law Profs Urge 11th Circ. To Toss Judge-Shopping Sanctions

By Madison Arnold

A group of seven law school professors is urging the Eleventh Circuit to toss a sanctions ruling against three attorneys for judge shopping, arguing that federal law does not forbid the practice and citing the "potentially chilling effect the order will have on counsel, especially those involved in pro bono representation."

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OptumRx Urges Panel To DQ Motley Rice In LA Opioid Suit

By Craig Clough

OptumRx told a California appellate panel Tuesday that Motley Rice should be disqualified from representing Los Angeles County in a lawsuit alleging it colluded with drugmakers to fuel the opioid crisis, saying the firm violated state law by using confidential information obtained in the case in other lawsuits it's handling against Optum.

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Feature

Meet FDA Chief Counsel Sean Keveney

By Dan McKay

The new top attorney at the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, described as a "tremendous technical lawyer," rose through the ranks as a federal prosecutor before helping lead President Donald Trump's confrontation with elite universities this year.

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5th Circ. Says Texas Voter ID Law Is Legally Sound

By Spencer Brewer

A Fifth Circuit panel upheld a Texas law that requires voters to provide an identification number when voting by mail, finding the law complies with the Civil Rights Act and that the state designed it to combat mail-in ballot fraud.

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Ex-USPTO Heads, Judges Oppose Anti-Patent Thicket Bill

By Elliot Weld

A pro-innovation group composed of former U.S. Patent and Trademark Office officials and former Federal Circuit judges on Tuesday asked Congress to oppose a bill introduced last month that would limit so-called patent thickets used by pharmaceutical companies to restrict the production of generic counterparts to their drugs.

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Analysis

Medicaid Cuts May Worsen Incarceration-Linked Death Risks

By Hannah Albarazi

A new public health investigation reveals an association between incarceration and elevated risk of early death, not only for people who have been behind bars but for entire communities. Experts caution that impending disinvestment in Medicaid could worsen outcomes in vulnerable populations.

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Ghislaine Maxwell Slams Feds' Bid To Unseal Grand Jury Docs

By Lauren Berg

Ghislaine Maxwell, who is serving a 20-year prison sentence for trafficking children for late sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, urged a New York federal judge Tuesday to deny the government's bid to unseal grand jury transcripts, saying release of the sealed materials could jeopardize the appeal of her 2021 conviction.

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Ex-Patent Examiner Fights USPTO Exclusion At High Court

By Adam Lidgett

A former U.S. Patent and Trademark Office examiner wants the U.S. Supreme Court to review his exclusion from practicing before the agency, saying the justices should look at issues relating to a suspension he received and also federal civil rights protections.

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Approach The Bench: Justice Wecht On Judicial Campaigns

By Cara Bayles and Steven Trader

If running for judicial office often requires walking the line of being a sitting jurist and a politician, Pennsylvania Supreme Court Justice David Wecht is no stranger to that tightrope.

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