A Michigan state jury has sided with automaker Mercedes-Benz in a lawsuit over its GL450, one of which caught fire following a head-on collision, killing a mother and her 9-year-old daughter and leaving a son and father, a former University of Wisconsin basketball coach, with lifelong injuries.
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TOP NEWS

Mercedes Wins In Mich. Trial Over SUV Fire That Killed 2

By Jonathan Capriel

A Michigan state jury has sided with automaker Mercedes-Benz in a lawsuit over its GL450, one of which caught fire following a head-on collision, killing a mother and her 9-year-old daughter and leaving a son and father, a former University of Wisconsin basketball coach, with lifelong injuries.

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Alsup Refuses To Vacate Hearing Into OPM Mass Firings

By Dorothy Atkins

U.S. District Judge William Alsup on Monday denied the Trump administration's request to vacate an upcoming evidentiary hearing into the U.S. Office of Personnel Management's mass firings of probationary federal employees, and required OPM director Charles Ezell to appear in person or else be deposed.

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Justices Reject Red-State Bid To End State Climate Torts

By Keith Goldberg

The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday refused to consider a request from red states to stop climate change torts against fossil fuel companies brought by blue-state governments.

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Fla. Businessman Settles COVID-19 False Claims For $20M

By David Minsky

A Florida businessman has agreed to pay more than $20 million to settle numerous alleged violations of the False Claims Act with the U.S. government, which accused him of lying to obtain Small Business Administration loans meant to help companies stay afloat during the COVID-19 pandemic.

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AUTOMOTIVE

Adviser Wants OK Of $15M Award Against Electric Car Co.

By Joyce Hanson

A financial advisory firm has asked an Illinois federal judge to enforce a nearly $15 million arbitral award it won against a Dubai-headquartered electric vehicle company, saying the carmaker refused to pay what it owed under a consulting agreement to become publicly listed.

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DOT Pulls Biden Enviro Justice Highway Funding Policy

By Linda Chiem

The U.S. Department of Transportation on Monday rescinded Biden-era memorandums that advised state and local agencies receiving funds from 2021's Bipartisan Infrastructure Law to prioritize highway, road, bridge and other projects that promoted social justice or climate resiliency goals.

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Kia Hit With Pa. Class Claims Over Engine Defects In 2 Models

By George Woolston

Kia has been hit with a proposed class action in Pennsylvania federal court alleging that the automaker's recall for more than 137,000 Kia Soul and Seltos models from between 2021 and 2023 didn't go far enough to remedy damages felt by vehicle owners over engine issues.

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EPA Climate Grantee Sues Citibank, Agency Over Frozen Cash

By Juan-Carlos Rodriguez

A climate-change-focused nonprofit is accusing Citibank NA and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency in D.C. federal court of breaching a contract to deliver billions of dollars in grant funding that's been frozen by the Trump administration.

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Brief

NJ Man Gets 18 Months In $50M Off-Road Tire Ponzi Scheme

By Ryan Harroff

A New Jersey man who pled guilty to wire fraud for his role in a $50 million Ponzi scheme in which he took investor money on the promise he could buy and resell off-the-road tires at a substantial profit has been sentenced to 18 months in prison.

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RAIL

Tribe Says BNSF Can't Derail $400M Trespass Judgment

By Greg Lamm

A Washington tribe is urging the Ninth Circuit to uphold a lower court's finding that BNSF Railway Co. must pay nearly $400 million for years of illegally running oil cars across tribal territory, saying the railroad's claim that it strips away lawfully earned profits "makes little sense."

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TRUCKING

Truckers Win Conditional Class Treatment For Wage Dispute

By Lauraann Wood

An Illinois federal judge said he would give conditional class treatment to truck drivers who say Forsage Logistics Inc. and its owner illegally misclassified them as independent drivers and failed to pay them all wages they're owed.  

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Freight Co. Says Cellphone Dealer Ignoring Discovery Bids

By George Woolston

A freight coordination company said it has no choice but to ask a North Carolina federal court to sanction a cellphone dealer who sued it after a truckload of devices was stolen, claiming that it hasn't received adequate discovery responses.

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LEGAL INDUSTRY

National Lawyers Guild Slams Trump's Perkins Coie Order

By Rachel Riley

The Seattle Chapter of the National Lawyers Guild denounced President Donald Trump's recent executive order revoking Perkins Coie LLP's security clearances, saying on Monday the decision "exemplifies his complete disregard for the rule of law and his contempt for core American democratic values."

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GOP Sens. Escalate Fight With ABA Over 'Leftist' Statements

By Courtney Bublé

A group of Senate Republicans are once again going after the American Bar Association, which they claim has become a "leftist" organization, and announced Monday they will disregard ABA ratings on judicial nominees and encouraged the Trump administration and their colleagues to do the same.

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Paul Hastings Reelects Chair, Managing Partner To 2nd Terms

By Tracey Read

Paul Hastings LLP Chair Frank Lopez and Managing Partner Sherrese Smith have been reelected to their second three-year terms, the firm said Monday.

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Judge Who Shot Wife Gets Mistrial As Jury Hangs On Murder

By Gina Kim

A California judge declared a mistrial Monday in the murder trial of Orange County Superior Court Judge Jeffrey Ferguson, who shot and killed his wife in their Anaheim Hills home in 2023, after jurors said they remained at an impasse over whether he was guilty of second-degree murder.

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Analysis

SEC Leaves Meme Coin Fraud For Other Cops To Chase

By Aislinn Keely

The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission staff's decision to say that so-called meme coins are beyond the agency's purview is a welcome change from past practices, experts say, but the devil is in the details when it comes to policing fraud and helping consumers recover when projects go bust.

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Del. Bar Panel OKs Corp. Law Bill To Curb Class Suits, Fees

By Jeff Montgomery

A key panel of the Delaware's State Bar Association overwhelmingly approved on Monday a pending bill to put new constraints on corporate stockholder lawsuits, over objections that the measure will snuff out shareholder protections from conflicted boards and corporation controllers.

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High Court Will Review Colo.'s Conversion Therapy Ban

By Katie Buehler

The U.S. Supreme Court announced Monday that it will review a challenge to Colorado's ban on licensed therapists providing conversion therapy to transgender minors, in a case that asks whether the state's law is a permissible regulation of professional conduct or an unconstitutional restriction of speech.

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2 Firms Sued After Cyber Thief Steals $442K From Estate

By Ryan Harroff

Law firms SutterWilliams LLC and Allender & Allender PA were hit with a negligence and malpractice suit after a cybercriminal allegedly used spoofed email accounts to trick an attorney at the latter firm into handing over $442,600 from the sale of a late Pennsylvania sheriff's deputy's house in Florida.

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Paul Hastings Adds Kirkland Atty As Global M&A Co-Chair

By Tracey Read

Paul Hastings LLP has hired a third global co-chair for its mergers and acquisitions practice who was one of the youngest M&A partners in the world to have announced well over $1 trillion in deals, the firm said Monday.

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Hagens Berman Comms With Ghosting Client Kept Privileged

By Ryan Boysen

Hagens Berman Sobol Shapiro LLP doesn't have to turn over texts and emails with a client who disappeared from a putative class action against Apple and Amazon, a Washington federal judge has ruled, despite the tech giants' accusations that the firm lied about those communications.

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J. Crew Wins Confirmation Of Ex-GC's Arbitration Loss

By Lauren Berg

A New York federal judge confirmed an arbitrator's ruling Monday that found J. Crew hadn't fired its former legal chief, Maria DiLorenzo, in retaliation for her complaints about colleagues' discriminatory comments about her hearing loss.

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Clerks May Seek Political Jobs On 'Case-By-Case Basis'

By Emily Sawicki

Individual federal judges may determine whether their clerks may seek political posts while employed by the judiciary, the Judicial Conference of the United States' Committee on Codes of Conduct now recommends, months after issuing guidance advising clerks to hold off seeking such roles until their clerkships end.

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COMPANIES IN TODAY'S NEWS

AbbVie Inc.

Alliance Defending Freedom

Amazon.com Inc.

Amcor PLC

American Arbitration Association

American Bar Association

American Federation of Government Employees

American Federation of State County & Municipal Employees

Apple Inc.

BNSF Railway Co.

Chevron Corp.

Citigroup Inc.

Constellation Brands Inc.

Exxon Mobil Corp.

Human Rights Campaign

J. Crew Group Inc.

Kellanova Co.

Kia Corp.

Loop Capital Markets LLC

Mars Inc.

Mercedes-Benz USA LLC

NASDAQ Inc.

PCS Wireless LLC

RXO Inc.

Space Exploration Technologies Corp.

Starr International Co. Inc.

Tesla Inc.

Verizon Communications Inc.

Wells Fargo & Co.

Wynn Resorts Ltd.

LAW FIRMS IN TODAY'S NEWS

A&O Shearman

Allender & Allender

Altshuler Berzon

Arete Law Group

Bernstein Burkley

Bernstein Litowitz

Bowman & Brooke

Carpey Law

Clifford Chance

Covington & Burling

Cravath Swaine

Davis Wright Tremaine

DeVore Acton

Dhillon Law Group

Flannery Georgalis

Goldberg Segalla

Goodman Kalahar

Hagens Berman

Hunton Andrews

Jenner & Block

K&L Gates

Kirkland & Ellis

Latham & Watkins

Lewis Brisbois

Lichten & Liss Riordan

Littler Mendelson

Nicoletti Hornig

Orrick Herrington

Pacifica Law Group

Paul Hastings

Pearman Law Firm

Perkins Coie

Proskauer Rose

Redgrave LLP

Saxena White

Sidley Austin

Spector Rubin

Tousley Brain

Ven Johnson Law

Weber Gallagher

Weil Gotshal

Wigdor LLP

Workplace Law Partners

GOVERNMENT AGENCIES IN TODAY'S NEWS

California Attorney General's Office

City and County of San Francisco, California

Colorado Department of Regulatory Agencies

Commodity Futures Trading Commission

Executive Office of the President

Federal Highway Administration

Federal Trade Commission

Fish and Wildlife Service

Judicial Conference of the United States

Minnesota Attorney General's Office

National Park Service

New Jersey Attorney General's Office

Small Business Administration

Swinomish Indian Tribal Community

U.S. Agency for International Development

U.S. Attorney's Office for the Northern District of California

U.S. Attorney's Office for the Northern District of Florida

U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit

U.S. Department of Education

U.S. Department of Justice

U.S. Department of Transportation

U.S. Department of the Treasury

U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia

U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania

U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Florida

U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California

U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Florida

U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Illinois

U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York

U.S. District Court for the Western District of Washington

U.S. Environmental Protection Agency

U.S. Office of Personnel Management

U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission

U.S. Supreme Court

United States District Court for the Southern District of Ohio