Report Finds No Evidence Mass. Judge, Prosecutor Had Affair

By Julie Manganis

A former Massachusetts state court judge and a county prosecutor were cleared in a special master's report made public Thursday about anonymous accusations that they were having an affair while he was presiding over her cases.

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Trump Had No Reason To Seek Mass. Voter Data, Judge Says

By Julie Manganis

A Massachusetts federal judge on Thursday dismissed a Trump administration lawsuit demanding the state's voter data, saying the government offered no factual basis for seeking residents' personal information.

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1st Circ. Sees Rationale For Puerto Rico 'X' Birth Marker Ban

By Carolyn Muyskens

A First Circuit panel floated a possible legal pathway for Puerto Rico to refuse to add a neutral gender option on birth certificates Thursday as the commonwealth appealed a mandate to permit nonbinary people to change their gender to "x."

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Philip Morris, RJR Keep Win In Widower's Death Suit

By Mike Curley

A Massachusetts appeals panel Thursday refused to reinstate a suit from a widower against Philip Morris USA Inc. and R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Co. over the death of his wife from COPD, saying he hadn't properly preserved his arguments for tolling the statute of limitations.

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Dunkin' Stores Cut $250K Deal In EEOC Disability Bias Suit

By Patrick Hoff

Fifteen Dunkin' franchisees and their management company will pay $250,000 to end a U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission lawsuit alleging they forced employees with disabilities and medical restrictions onto unpaid leave, according to a Thursday filing in Massachusetts federal court.

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States Tell Jury That Live Nation Isn't Above The Law

By Stewart Bishop

Counsel for 33 states and the District of Columbia on Thursday urged a Manhattan federal jury to show the world that even "a $36 billion behemoth" like Live Nation isn't above antitrust laws and find it liable for flagrantly monopolizing the U.S. live entertainment market, to the detriment of artists, venue operators and fans.

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DOJ Probes NFL TV Contracts For Anticompetitiveness

By David Steele

The U.S. Department of Justice is investigating the National Football League regarding its broadcast contracts and whether fans are being harmed by the rising cost to view games.

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Abiomed Can't Escape Blood Pump Patent Case

By Adam Lidgett

A Massachusetts federal judge has refused to let a Johnson & Johnson MedTech subsidiary dodge claims that it infringed a blood pump patent, the latest event in a wider legal battle launched against it by a unit of Swedish medical device company Getinge AB.

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Nonprofit Insurer Wants To Seek AstraZeneca Claims Revival

By Bryan Koenig

EmblemHealth asked a Massachusetts federal judge to let it seek First Circuit intervention against a decision that cut in half its proposed class action accusing AstraZeneca unit Alexion of using sham patents to protect blood disorder treatment Soliris from biosimilar rivals.

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Irish Mallinckrodt Unit Stuck In Drug Price-Fixing Suit

By Ben Zigterman

An Irish entity of drugmaker Mallinckrodt waited too long to seek dismissal of a price-fixing lawsuit brought by states based on a lack of personal jurisdiction or proper service, a Connecticut federal judge has ruled, finding that the company first raised that argument more than five years after the complaint was filed.

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Series

Alpine Skiing Makes Me A Better Lawyer

Skiing has shaped habits I rely on daily as an attorney — focus, resilience and the ability to remain steady when circumstances shift rapidly — and influences the way I approach legal strategy, client counseling and teamwork, says Isaku Begert at Marshall Gerstein.

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DLA Piper Partner Rejects Pregnant Atty's Account Of Firing

By Pete Brush

The DLA Piper partner who fired a pregnant associate said she did so lawfully, telling a Manhattan federal jury her former employee was "in over her head" and disputing that the associate raised pregnancy bias concerns on a termination call.

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6th Circ. Won't Revisit EFAA Ruling Against Adams & Reese

By Patrick Hoff

The Sixth Circuit said it won't reconsider its ruling that a law barring mandatory arbitration of sexual harassment cases kept a former Adams & Reese LLP paralegal's sex harassment and disability bias suit in court, concluding that the firm's objections were already considered.

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Roundup

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

By Laura Stewart Liberty

The past week in London has seen the owner of an oil tanker stuck in the Strait of Hormuz sued by an energy company and an insurer, law firm Boodle Hatfield LLP and two Serle Court barristers sued by a group of Winston Churchill's great-grandchildren, and Welsh Water hit with a fresh class action over polluted rivers.

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Calif. Atty Avoids Sanctions For Filing Bogus Citations With AI

By Matt Perez

A California attorney has avoided sanctions over his use of artificial intelligence for a filing in a civil rights case, which resulted in false citations.

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Another Gov't Atty From Vt. Joins Stris & Maher's Team

By Jack Rodgers

A former civil chief of the U.S. Attorney's Office for the District of Vermont has joined Stris & Maher LLP's practice as a partner, the firm announced Friday.

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GC Cheat Sheet: The Hottest Corporate News Of The Week

By Sue Reisinger

Other states might follow the lead of California and break with President Donald Trump's policies in implementing guardrails for state agencies to contract with AI companies. And after three individual indictments last month for selling banned tech to China, Supermicro has hired Munger Tolles & Olson LLP to conduct an independent investigation, assigned its general counsel to lead an internal compliance review, and shaken up its compliance leadership.

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NJ Justices Won't Review Beasley Allen's DQ From Talc Cases

By George Woolston

The New Jersey Supreme Court has declined to review a lower court's order booting the Beasley Allen Law Firm from multicounty litigation in the Garden State over Johnson & Johnson's talcum powder, according to an order made public Friday.

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Conn. Justices Block Agency's Bias Probe Into Atty Licensing

By Brian Steele

Because citizens blocked the legislature from reviewing court decisions when ratifying the state's 1818 constitution, a Connecticut human rights agency has no power to investigate alleged bias in attorney licensing decisions, the Connecticut Supreme Court ruled Friday in a unanimous opinion.

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Airline Worker Asks To Expand Sanctions Row In Bias Case

By Emily Brill

A Southwest Airlines flight attendant who was fired after sending her union's president pictures of aborted fetuses is pushing for additional remedies in a sanctions dispute stemming from her long-running religious discrimination lawsuit against the airline, from which she received $800,000 after winning a jury trial in 2022.

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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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Trump Taps Personal Atty For 2nd Circ.

By Courtney Bublé

President Donald Trump announced on Friday evening he's tapping Matthew Schwartz, his attorney in the New York hush money case, for the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit. 

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