Appellate

  • January 28, 2025

    Pa. Justices Won't Hear 3rd Circ. Pot Deportation Question

    In a split decision, the Pennsylvania Supreme Court has opted not to take up a question from the Third Circuit on whether a man from the Dominican Republic can be automatically deported for a possession with intent to deliver charge without specific proof of the drug he had in his possession.

  • January 28, 2025

    Wynn Fraud Trial Still On As Appeals Court Declines To Step In

    A Wynn Resorts subsidiary cannot challenge a decision allowing a trial on accusations that it misled the former owner of the site of its Encore Boston Harbor casino into cutting the property's sale price by $40 million, the state's intermediate-level appeals court has ruled.

  • January 27, 2025

    5th Circ. Wipes Out FTC Rule Targeting Auto Industry Scams

    A split Fifth Circuit panel on Monday vacated the Federal Trade Commission's Combating Auto Retail Scams, or CARS, rule prohibiting bait-and-switch tactics and hidden charges in the car buying and leasing process, siding with car dealers and finding that the FTC didn't give adequate notice of the proposed rulemaking.

  • January 27, 2025

    'It's Complicated': 4th Circ. Baffled Over NC Ballot Fight

    The Fourth Circuit on Monday sought to wade through a procedural quagmire over whether a legal challenge involving North Carolina's contested associate justice race belongs in state or federal court, questioning how to proceed after the Tar Heel State's top court last week all but dismissed the matter.

  • January 27, 2025

    Lummis Tells 2nd Circ. SEC 'Flouts' Congress In Crypto Cases

    Sen. Cynthia Lummis, R.-Wyo., told the Second Circuit that the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission's ongoing suit against Coinbase Inc. has complicated congressional efforts to set rules for digital assets, filing her support for the crypto exchange's bid for a quick ruling from the appeals court on how securities laws apply to the transactions on its platform.

  • January 27, 2025

    Palo Alto Networks Inside-Trader Wins Resentencing At 9th Circ.

    The Ninth Circuit on Monday upheld securities fraud convictions of a former Palo Alto Networks engineer for raking in $7 million by trading on stolen inside information but remanded the case for resentencing, saying a lower court was wrong to use his trading gains to estimate the cybersecurity company's loss.

  • January 27, 2025

    ​​​​​​​States Back In Spotlight As Feds Exit Net Neutrality Debate

    The Sixth Circuit might have recently hammered the last nail into the coffin of federal net neutrality rules, but states are poised to fill the void — just as some did when the last Trump administration tanked a previous broadband regulatory regime.

  • January 27, 2025

    Justices To Weigh Feds' Liability In Ga. Wrong-House Raid

    The U.S. Supreme Court agreed Monday to hear the appeal of a Georgia family that was the victim of a botched FBI no-knock raid of their home, taking up a pair of questions that will test of the boundaries of the Federal Tort Claims Act.

  • January 27, 2025

    Keep Damages Rules, Let Newman Hear Case, Fed. Circ. Told

    The full Federal Circuit has been urged by startups and attorneys to reject calls by Google to tighten rules for admitting patent damages testimony, while counsel for suspended U.S. Circuit Judge Pauline Newman told the court it can't lawfully decide the case without her.

  • January 27, 2025

    4th Circ. Says Servicemembers Law Doesn't Bar Arbitration

    The Fourth Circuit ruled Monday that the Servicemembers Civil Relief Act, a federal law that grants financial protections to members of the U.S. armed forces, does not override mandatary arbitration agreements in lenders' contracts with military borrowers.

  • January 27, 2025

    Civil Liberties Org. Says FDIC's Court 'Eviscerates' Civil Rights

    The New Civil Liberties Alliance told the Fifth Circuit on Monday to spurn the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp.'s attempt to level a fraud judgment against a banker, saying the agency's in-house court sidesteps the constitutional right to a jury trial.

  • January 27, 2025

    Cisco Tells Fed. Circ. To Uphold Win In Cybersecurity IP Row

    Cisco has defended its retrial victory in a multibillion-dollar computer security patent case by telling the Federal Circuit the new judge had seen through a cybersecurity startup's legal "tactics."

  • January 27, 2025

    Justice Thomas Slams 6th Circ. In Habeas Petition Dissent

    U.S. Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas on Monday called out the Sixth Circuit for "repeated disrespect" for the law in granting what he said was inappropriate habeas relief, a practice he said is costly to the justice system and victims in a dissent from a denial of writ of certiorari.

  • January 27, 2025

    Yen Libor-Rigging Case Lands Before 2nd Circ. Again

    Institutional investors urge the Second Circuit to again revive a lawsuit accusing Bank of America, UBS and others of rigging the interbank borrowing rate for Japanese yen, arguing in a brief Monday that a lower court judge dismissed the case on "obviously erroneous grounds with little (if any) supporting analysis."

  • January 27, 2025

    3rd Circ. Says Class Cert. Won't Work In Junk Fax Suit

    Since Fox Rehabilitation Services used "highly individualized methods" to seek consent from the entities it sent faxes to, it would be too difficult for a lawsuit accusing the company of sending unsolicited ads to proceed as a class action, a split Third Circuit panel has ruled.

  • January 27, 2025

    Late Filings Didn't Stymie Tax Challenges, Conn. Justices Say

    Failing to file timely appraisals on commercial properties valued over $1 million was not fatal to several owners' tax assessment challenges under a new state law, the Connecticut Supreme Court ruled Monday, agreeing that a trial judge properly reopened the cases months after a missed deadline.

  • January 27, 2025

    6th Circ. Says Union Can't Save Cook For Missing The Boat

    The Sixth Circuit upheld a win for the nation's oldest maritime union Monday, finding that the organization had no ability to defend a cook who was fired by a steamship company after she missed her boat.

  • January 27, 2025

    SEC OKs Nasdaq Pulling Diversity Rules After 5th Circ. Loss

    The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission has greenlighted Nasdaq's proposal to undo the exchange's rules requiring that companies listed on it disclose board diversity data, following a narrow, en banc ruling from the Fifth Circuit last month finding the rules ran afoul of federal securities law.

  • January 27, 2025

    DC Circ. Skirts Google's Employer Status In NLRB Dispute

    The D.C. Circuit appeared unlikely Monday to decide whether the National Labor Relations Board correctly tagged Google as the joint employer of quality assurance contractors, with a panel seeming skeptical that it can weigh in a year after Google ended its deal with the workers' direct employer.

  • January 27, 2025

    Fed. Circ. Rules Smartphone Camera Patent Claims Are Invalid

    The Federal Circuit ruled Monday that all the claims in a pair of patents relating to smartphone camera technology were invalid, backing most of various Patent Trial and Appeal Board decisions involving tech giants like Apple, Google and LG.

  • January 27, 2025

    Justices Won't Review $90M Facebook Privacy Settlement

    The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday declined to review a case involving a $90 million settlement for claims Facebook illegally tracked logged-out users' browsing activity, rejecting an argument from an objector who challenged plaintiff service awards and $26.1 million in attorney fees.

  • January 27, 2025

    Pa. Social Club Can't Revive COVID-19 Coverage Suit

    The Pennsylvania Superior Court on Monday backed the dismissal of a Scranton social club's suit seeking to recover pandemic-related losses, citing the state high court's landmark ruling last year that physical loss or damage requires tangible alteration to property.

  • January 27, 2025

    Ga. Appeals Panel Revives Malpractice Suit Against Law Firm

    The Georgia Court of Appeals partly reinstated a malpractice suit accusing a Georgia law firm and one of its former attorneys of failing to show up at a client's bench trial that ended with a $100,000 judgment against the client.

  • January 27, 2025

    Broadcom Unit Loses Patent In Netflix Fight At Fed. Circ.

    A Broadcom subsidiary had no luck at the Federal Circuit on Monday in breathing new life into data caching patent claims that were asserted in the chipmaker's legal war with Netflix, but later rejected by the U.S. Patent Trial and Appeal Board.

  • January 27, 2025

    Contractor Seeks DC Circ. Approval Of $200M Arbitral Award

    A toll road contractor asked the D.C. Circuit to approve a $200 million arbitral award against the Peruvian city of Lima over a failed construction contract, saying the city's argument that the contract was obtained through corruption had already been rejected by two arbitration panels and a federal judge.

Expert Analysis

  • 2nd Circ. American Girl Ruling Alters Test Purchase Norms

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    The Second Circuit's recent ruling in American Girl v. Zembrka overturns years of precedent that required completed test purchase shipments to establish jurisdiction in infringement cases, but litigators shouldn't abandon the strategy entirely, say Robert Wasnofski and Sara Gates at Dentons.

  • State Of The States' AI Legal Ethics Landscape

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    Over the past year, several state bar associations, as well as the American Bar Association, have released guidance on the ethical use of artificial intelligence in legal practice, all of which share overarching themes and some nuanced differences, say Eric Pacifici and Kevin Henderson at SMB Law Group.

  • Cos. Face Increasing Risk From Environmental Citizen Suits

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    Environmental citizen suits stepping in to fill the regulatory vacuum concerning consumer goods waste may soon become more common, and the evolving procedural landscape and changes to environmental law may contribute to companies' increased exposure, say J. Michael Showalter and Bradley Rochlen at ArentFox Schiff.

  • 11th Circ. Kickback Ruling May Widen Hearsay Exception

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    In a $400 million fraud case, U.S. v. Holland, the Eleventh Circuit recently held that a conspiracy need not have an unlawful object to introduce co-conspirator statements under federal evidence rules, potentially broadening the application of the so-called co-conspirator hearsay exception, say attorneys at ArentFox Schiff.

  • 8 Childhood Lessons That Can Help You Be A Better Attorney

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    A new school year is underway, marking a fitting time for attorneys to reflect on some fundamental life lessons from early childhood that offer a framework for problems that no legal textbook can solve, say Chris Gismondi and Chris Campbell at DLA Piper.

  • 2 Rulings Show How Courts Assess Health Benefit Denials

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    Two recent decisions from federal appeals courts offer important insights into how courts are assessing denials of health benefit claims brought under the Employee Retirement Income Security Act, including guidance on how plan administrators should evaluate claims and what documents must be disclosed, says Mark DeBofsky at DeBofsky Law.

  • 2nd Circ. Provides NY Pathway For Fighting Foreign Infringers

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    A recent decision from the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit provides a road map for expeditiously obtaining personal jurisdiction in New York against foreign trademark infringers based on a single purchase of counterfeit goods, meaning the Second Circuit could now be the preferred venue for combating foreign infringement, says Jeffrey Ratinoff at Spencer Fane.

  • Recent Securities Cases Highlight Risks In AI Disclosures

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    Increasing public disclosure about the use and risks of artificial intelligence, and related litigation asserting that such disclosures are false or misleading, suggest that issuers need to exercise great care with respect to how they describe the benefits of AI, say Richard Zelichov and Danny Tobey at DLA Piper.

  • Sublimit And Policy Interpretation Lessons From Amtrak Case

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    The recently settled dispute between Amtrak and its insurers over sublimit coverage illustrates that parties with unclear manuscript policies may wish to avoid litigation in favor of settlement — as the New York federal court declined to decide the case by applying prior term interpretations, says Laura Maletta at Chartwell Law.

  • 3rd Circ. Hertz Ruling Highlights Flawed Bankruptcy Theory

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    The Third Circuit, in its recent Hertz bankruptcy decision, became the latest appeals court to hold that noteholders were entitled to interest before shareholders under the absolute priority rule, but risked going astray by invoking the flawed theory of code impairment, say Matthew McGill and David Casazza at Gibson Dunn.

  • Opinion

    Barrett Is Right: Immunity Is Wrong Framework In Trump Case

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    Justice Amy Coney Barrett’s concurrence in Trump v. U.S., where the majority opinion immunized former presidents almost entirely from criminal prosecution for official actions, rests on a firmer constitutional foundation than the majority’s immunity framework, says Matthew Brogdon at Utah Valley University.

  • Opinion

    This Election, We Need To Talk About Court Process

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    In recent decades, the U.S. Supreme Court has markedly transformed judicial processes — from summary judgment standards to notice pleadings — which has, in turn, affected individuals’ substantive rights, and we need to consider how the upcoming presidential election may continue this pattern, says Reuben Guttman at Guttman Buschner.

  • A Look At The PTAB's Assessment Of Prior Art Exceptions

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    The Patent Trial and Appeal Board's approach over the last 10 years to assessing Section 102(b) prior art exceptions reveals a few trends, including that evidence of common ownership may have a higher likelihood of successfully disqualifying prior art under Section 102(b)(2)(C) at the institution stage, say Louis Panzica and David Holman at Sterne Kessler.

  • Series

    Playing Diplomacy Makes Us Better Lawyers

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    Similar to the practice of law, the rules of Diplomacy — a strategic board game set in pre-World War I Europe — are neither concise nor without ambiguity, and weekly gameplay with our colleagues has revealed the game's practical applications to our work as attorneys, say Jason Osborn and Ben Bevilacqua at Winston & Strawn.

  • 5th Circ. Shows Admin Rules Can Survive Court Post-Chevron

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    The Fifth Circuit's textual analysis of the Fair Labor Standards Act, contributing to its recent affirming of the U.S. Department of Labor’s authority to set an overtime exemption salary threshold, suggests administrative laws can survive post-Chevron challenges, say Jessi Thaller-Moran and Erin Barker at Brooks Pierce.

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