Analysis

The Issues That Could Decide The Tom Goldstein Tax Case

By Jared Foretek

Federal prosecutors are set to begin making their case against famed U.S. Supreme Court lawyer and SCOTUSblog founder Tom Goldstein at trial Wednesday, alleging that he deliberately hid millions of dollars in high-stakes poker winnings from the Internal Revenue Service between 2016 and 2021 and lied on mortgage applications.

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Analysis

How AI Is Causing Real Copyright Uncertainty

By Chris Villani

As artificial intelligence is used increasingly to generate images, sounds, software and other products, attorneys say they are left navigating an uncertain landscape when it comes to securing copyright protections for AI-assisted outputs, with few signs of clarity on the horizon.

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Justices Sign Off On Dismissal Of FIFA Bribery Cases

By Alex Lawson

The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday erased criminal bribery convictions against a former media executive and an Argentine sports marketing company stemming from the FIFA corruption probe, following through on federal prosecutors' surprising decision to abandon the cases last month.

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Justices Won't Hear Challenge To Foreign Word TM Rule

By Ivan Moreno

The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday denied a trademark appeal from an apparel company seeking to register "Vetements," the French word for "clothes," in a case that challenged a long-standing doctrine used to determine whether a foreign word can qualify as a mark.

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Justices Nix Bid To Revive $5M Lindell Challenge Award

By Caroline Simson

The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday opted not to review a software developer's petition seeking to revive his $5 million arbitral award against MyPillow CEO Mike Lindell, in which he had sought clarity on whether manifest disregard of the law is a valid basis on which such awards may be vacated.

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US Backs Tarnishment Provision Constitutionality At 9th Circ.

By Rae Ann Varona

Jack Daniel's has urged the Ninth Circuit to affirm a district court's ruling that a company's poop-themed "Bad Spaniels" dog toy tarnished the whiskey maker's trademark, while the federal government separately opposed the toy maker's contention that the Lanham Act's tarnishment provision violates the First Amendment.

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Aristocrat Inks $127.5M Deal In Slot Machine Trade Secret Suit

By Hailey Konnath

Gambling game company Light & Wonder Inc. has agreed to pay competitor Aristocrat Technologies Inc. $127.5 million to put to rest allegations Light & Wonder misappropriated Aristocrat's trade secrets in developing its Dragon Train and Jewel of the Dragon slot machine games, according to an announcement made Monday.

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Paramount Sues In Del. For Warner Bros., Netflix Merger Facts

By Jeff Montgomery

Paramount Skydance Corp. sued Warner Bros. Discovery Inc. in Delaware Chancery Court Monday for court-compelled disclosure of more details on WBD's proposed $82.7 billion tie-up with Netflix, and reported that it plans to run a slate of candidates for WBD's board to push Paramount's offer.

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Judge Tosses Meta Rival's Mobile Streaming Patent Lawsuit

By Adam Lidgett

A Washington federal judge has tossed the remainder of a lawsuit claiming Meta infringed mobile streaming application patents from a competing social media platform and refused to let the patent owner rewrite its complaint again.

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Calif. Judge Trims Antitrust Suit Over High School Athlete NIL

By Dorothy Atkins

A California federal magistrate judge on Friday trimmed a high school athlete's proposed antitrust class action against California high school sports regulators and media companies, dismissing for good allegations over amateurism and transfer rules but allowing the plaintiff to amend claims over name, image and likeness tied to athletes' home schools.

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TTAB Cancels 'Reefer Madness' TM Over Prior Apparel Sales

By Ivan Moreno

The Trademark Trial and Appeal Board has canceled a Colorado cannabis company's "Reefer Madness" registration for use on mugs and apparel, after a challenge from a business that argued it had priority over the mark for merchandise sales following a musical theater production of the same name.

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Musician Accusing Mellencamp Of Theft Denies Faking Report

By Craig Clough

A musician alleging that John Mellencamp's 1996 hit song "Key West Intermezzo (I Saw You First)" stole from his own noncharting track denied to a California federal judge Monday that he wrote a report attributed to his music expert and then failed to make him available for a meaningful deposition.

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Apple Hit With False Ad Suit Over Digital Content Sales

By Gina Kim

Apple customers have sued the company in California state court, alleging it deceptively "sells" popular Apple TV programs and films without informing them that the limited digital license to any of the content could be terminated at any time. 

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Gamestop's 'Buy Online' Option Is Deceiving, Shopper Says

By Gina Kim

Gamestop has been hit with a proposed false advertising class action in California federal court over an alleged "bait and switch" scheme that doesn't tell customers who pay for digital video games that they are only purchasing a limited license that may not be available to them in the future.

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Ad Tech Rivals Say 'Unique Harms' Make Complaints Separate

By Bryan Koenig

Google's advertising placement technology competitors have told a New York federal judge their half-dozen complaints should remain separate, arguing that letting the search giant tee up a consolidation motion would hamper, rather than streamline, their antitrust claims, which followed the U.S. Department of Justice's successful litigation against the company.

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Nielsen Gets 4-Day Pause On National-Local Data Tying Block

By Bryan Koenig

Nielsen has just four days to seek Second Circuit intervention before an order goes into effect blocking it from conditioning full access to its nationwide radio data on also buying local data, after a New York federal judge refused Monday to pause that mandate beyond a brief administrative stay.

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Viamedia Seeks Late Addition To Ad Market Witness List

By Cara Salvatore

Viamedia Inc. asked an Illinois federal judge to allow a post-discovery witness addition to an upcoming trial against Comcast over competition in the cable ad sales market, saying it discovered the man's relevant knowledge after he joined Viamedia's board.

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Catching Up With Delaware's Chancery Court

By Jarek Rutz

The Delaware Chancery Court closed out the week with developments ranging from leadership changes in a $13 billion take-private case and posttrial sparring over a major earnout to fresh governance fights, revived fraud claims and sanctions tied to advancement rights.

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High Court Won't Hear Whistleblowers' FCC Fraud Claims

By Christopher Cole

The U.S. Supreme Court declined Monday to review whether the D.C. Circuit erred by rejecting two lawyers' claims that entities linked to UScellular defrauded the government by falsely claiming small business credits in a federal spectrum auction.

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5th Circ. Urged Again To Find FCC Subsidy Regime Unlawful

By Christopher Cole

A conservative think-tank has again launched a Fifth Circuit legal challenge to the federal government's fee regime used to pay for telecommunications subsidies, less than a year after the U.S. Supreme Court upheld the funding arrangement's constitutionality.

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FCC Scraps Verizon's 60-Day Phone Unlocking Mandate

By Christopher Cole

The Federal Communications Commission on Monday waived a rule stemming from Verizon's takeover of discount provider TracFone that forced the company to open its cellphones to other carriers after 60 days.

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Disney's OpenAI Deal Could Be Turning Point In IP Licensing

The Disney-OpenAI agreement last month is less an anomaly than an early attempt to define what licensed generative use of entertainment intellectual property looks like in practice, including how artificial intelligence user-generated content is permitted without eroding ownership and control, says Alex Locke at Meister Seelig.

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Series

Judges On AI: How Courts Can Boost Access To Justice

Arizona Court of Appeals Judge Samuel A. Thumma writes that generative artificial intelligence tools offer a profound opportunity to enhance access to justice and engender public confidence in courts’ use of technology, and judges can seize this opportunity in five key ways.

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Bruce Fein Axed As Counsel In Maduro's NY Drug Case

By Rachel Rippetoe

A New York federal judge on Monday said constitutional lawyer Bruce Fein could not represent Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro after Fein admitted to having never spoken to or entered into an agreement of representation for the foreign leader, who was indicted on narco-conspiracy charges this month.

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Haynes Boone Opens Boston Office Led By Ex-K&L Gates Atty

By Tracey Read

Haynes Boone announced Monday that it has opened its 20th office in Boston, and that it has added a former K&L Gates LLP asset management and investment funds partner to lead the Beantown launch.

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4 Ways DOJ Probe Into Powell Could Be Risky For Trump

By Jon Hill

The criminal probe that President Donald Trump's U.S. Department of Justice has opened into Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell dramatically escalates administration pressure on the central bank, but it is not without significant potential risks for the White House.

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SEC Draws From BigLaw To Appoint Enforcement Deputies

By Jessica Corso

Two former BigLaw attorneys, one of whom served as counsel to President Donald Trump during his first term in office, have joined the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission as deputy directors of enforcement, the agency announced Monday.

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Approach The Bench: Judge Bough On Ethics

Years of experience as a plaintiff's attorney influenced U.S. District Judge Stephen Bough's disclosure rules for litigators appearing in his court.

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Sitting Judges Advocate For Bill To Allow Them To Carry Guns

By Courtney Bublé

Three federal judges have come out in support of a Republican-led bill to allow judges and prosecutors to carry concealed firearms across state lines.

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NJ US Atty Office's 3-Person Leadership Unlawful, Court Told

By Emily Sawicki

Criminal defendants in the District of New Jersey are challenging the three-person leadership structure now in place at the Garden State's U.S. attorney's office following the disqualification of Alina Habba, telling the court their due process rights have been violated by the allegedly unlawful system.

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Compromise Funding Bill Gives Judiciary $9.7B

By Courtney Bublé

Congressional appropriators have unveiled a bipartisan compromise funding bill for the federal judiciary for fiscal 2026, which includes the judiciary's requested funding for court security and federal public defenders.

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House Passes Bill To Double Ch. 7 Trustee Fee

By Clara Geoghegan

A bipartisan bill doubling the fixed per-case fees for Chapter 7 trustees is headed to President Donald Trump for a signature, after the U.S. House of Representatives passed it Monday night.

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