Trump Avoids Jail As Judge Points To Presidential Status

By Frank Runyeon and Stewart Bishop

A New York state judge on Friday spared President-elect Donald Trump any incarceration for his 34-count felony hush money conviction, citing the changed legal landscape, which affords the chief executive with "extraordinary legal protections."

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Justices Seem Inclined To Uphold TikTok Sale-Or-Ban Law

By Katie Buehler

The U.S. Supreme Court seemed likely Friday to uphold a law requiring TikTok to divest from its Chinese parent company over national security concerns or face a nationwide ban, despite some justices expressing concern over the law's impact on the free speech rights of Americans who use the wildly popular social media platform.

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Vince McMahon Resolves SEC Probe Over Secret Settlements

By Ryan Harroff

Embattled World Wrestling Entertainment co-founder Vince McMahon signed two multimillion-dollar deals to buy silence from a former employee and a contractor without making the required disclosures to organization officials and staffers, according to a settlement announced Friday by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission.

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Giuliani Held In Contempt Again, This Time In DC

By Ali Sullivan

A D.C. federal judge Friday held Rudy Giuliani in contempt for continuing to repeat false claims that two Georgia poll workers meddled with the outcome of the 2020 presidential election, marking the second time in a week the former New York City mayor has been found in civil contempt.

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Feds Back Musk's Microsoft-OpenAI Board Overlap Concerns

By Bryan Koenig

The U.S. Department of Justice and Federal Trade Commission weighed in Friday on Elon Musk's California federal lawsuit against OpenAI, arguing that the artificial intelligence research organization and its co-defendant Microsoft can't fight claims of improper board overlap just by saying the overlap has ended.

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Ye Inks $625K Deal To End Misclassification Suit

By Emmy Freedman

Ye and his clothing company, Yeezy Apparel LLC, will pay $625,000 to resolve a class action accusing them of incorrectly classifying design workers as independent contractors and thus causing them to lose out on overtime wages, an order in California state court said.

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Funkadelic Keyboardist Fights Sanctions Bid In Royalty Dispute

By Danielle Ferguson

The widow of Parliament-Funkadelic's founding keyboardist told a Michigan federal judge Friday that she should not be sanctioned in a royalty dispute with bandleader George Clinton, saying she didn't try to hide what she said is an irrelevant settlement agreement with a record company.

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MSG Wants Ex-Knick's Assault Case Booted Over Lost Texts

By Cara Salvatore

Madison Square Garden told a federal judge Thursday that longtime New York Knick Charles Oakley deserves to have his long-running assault case thrown out and his lawyers sanctioned because he allegedly discarded text messages, a day after Oakley's own spoliation claim.

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Up Next At High Court: Porn ID Check & Retiree Discrimination

By Katie Buehler

The U.S. Supreme Court will return to the bench Monday for a full argument session, in which the justices will debate whether a Texas law requiring pornography websites to verify their visitors aren't minors violates the First Amendment and if retirees have the right to sue former employers for benefits discrimination. 

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ESPN, Fox, Warner Bros. Abruptly Scrap Sports Streaming JV

By Bryan Koenig

ESPN, Fox and Warner Bros. Discovery called off their Venu joint live sports streaming venture Friday, just days after ESPN parent company The Walt Disney Co. used the acquisition of a majority stake in streaming startup FuboTV Inc. to nix Fubo's challenge to Venu on the courthouse steps.

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Social Media Apps Fail To Trim Calif. Mental Health Mass Tort

By Rachel Scharf

Meta Platforms, YouTube, Snap and TikTok have lost a bid to cut failure-to-warn claims from consolidated litigation over their social media platforms' alleged harm to youth mental health, with a California state judge ruling that neither the Communications Decency Act nor the First Amendment bar liability based on an app's own features.

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Microsoft Pushes To Thwart 'Scheme' To Bypass AI Security

By Allison Grande

A Virginia federal judge has authorized Microsoft Corp. to seize a website that the tech giant alleges has been instrumental to a "sophisticated scheme" by foreign-based cybercriminals to circumvent safety guardrails built into artificial intelligence services in order to create offensive and harmful content, according to court filings made public Friday. 

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Couple Says EBay, Top Brass Can't Duck Trial In Stalking Suit

By Chris Villani

A Massachusetts couple argued Friday that eBay Inc. and several of its top executives were at least aware of a harassment campaign perpetrated by employees of the online retailer and should not be let off the liability hook.

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Paramount Wants Out Of User's Video Privacy Suit

By Rae Ann Varona

Paramount Global urged a New York federal court to dismiss a California man's putative class action accusing it of unlawfully sharing streaming platform users' personal information to third parties like Facebook and TikTok, saying the man lodged inadequate theories of disclosure and otherwise consented to the alleged disclosure.

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Plex Says Subscriber's Privacy Lawsuit Must Be Arbitrated

By Caroline Simson

Streaming platform Plex is urging a California federal court to nix a proposed data privacy class action, accusing the plaintiffs of using the litigation as a tactic to "coerce" it into settling more than 400 pending arbitrations.

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Comcast Urges 2nd Win Over Viamedia Market Shutout Claims

By Lauraann Wood

Comcast and Viamedia clashed Friday over whether an Illinois federal judge should decide if Comcast's platform connecting spot cable providers to advertisers is a one- or two-sided platform as she determines whether Viamedia's market monopoly claims should go to trial, as the Seventh Circuit once envisioned.

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Roundup

Off The Bench: Venu Deal Off, Fox Suit, Gender Rules Wobble

By Alex Lawson

In this week's Off The Bench, a last-minute merger ends litigation over the new sports streaming service Venu, only for its backers to mothball the project entirely, Fox Sports is rocked by lurid sexual harassment claims, and a federal judge knocks down an attempt to expand transgender discrimination protections.

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X Asks 9th Circ. To Back Dismissal Of $500M Severance Suit

By Grace Elletson

Social platform X urged the Ninth Circuit to uphold the dismissal of a suit claiming it owes workers $500 million in severance after Elon Musk bought the business and conducted mass layoffs, arguing the lower court correctly found that the ex-employees couldn't sue under federal benefits law.

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X Fights Finding Severance Row Contract Claims Can Survive

By Dorothy Atkins

X Corp. and Elon Musk squared off with ex-Twitter workers in Delaware federal court, filing dueling briefs that took opposing stances over whether a district judge should adopt a recommendation to keep alive some breach-of-contract allegations in the workers' proposed class action claiming they were cheated out of severance benefits.

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Faster Permits Needed For Next G's, Wireless Cos. Say

By Christopher Cole

Wireless infrastructure builders are hoping for a more inviting regulatory environment at the federal and state levels as technology progresses and have put broadband permitting reform at the top of their legislative wish list for 2025.

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Brief

Advocates Press For Renewed Broadband Subsidy Bill

By Christopher Cole

A public interest group on Friday pushed the new Congress to renew a broadband subsidy for low-income households that ran out of money last year.

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Live Nation Dodges Dierks Bentley Concert Death Suit

By Y. Peter Kang

A Connecticut appeals court affirmed Friday the dismissal of a suit accusing Live Nation of causing a Dierks Bentley concertgoer to drive drunk and cause a fatal car crash, saying a public nuisance claim can't apply to the concert promoter in a drunk driving scenario.

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6 Predictions For Cyber Risk And Insurance In 2025

This year is likely to bring with it some thorny and expensive cyber challenges, including increased ransomware activity, more data breach class actions and continued efforts to define business interruption loss calculations, say attorneys at Wiley.

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2024 Was A Banner Year For Shareholder Activism

Shareholder activism campaigns in 2024 continued at an elevated pace globally, with activist investors exploiting valuation gaps and pushing aggressively for corporate governance reforms, including the ouster of many companies' chief executives, a trend that could continue once President-elect Donald Trump takes office, say attorneys at Sidley.

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7 Ways 2nd Trump Administration May Affect Partner Hiring

President-elect Donald Trump's return to the White House will likely have a number of downstream effects on partner hiring in the legal industry, from accelerated hiring timelines to increased vetting of prospective employees, say recruiters at Macrae.

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As Lawyers Face Wildfire Losses In LA, Firms Step Up To Help

By Jake Maher

Amid the tragedy of losing their homes to the wildfires engulfing Los Angeles, attorneys have found hope in the support of their firms and colleagues.

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US Legal Sector Sheds 1,200 Jobs In December

By Xiumei Dong

After three months of steady recovery, the U.S. legal sector's job growth reversed course in December, with a loss of 1,200 positions, according to preliminary data from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics released Friday.

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Bonus Spotlight

Goodwin Procter Extends Bonus Season With Milbank Match

By Tracey Read

The 2024 bonus season has trickled into January, with Goodwin Procter LLP announcing it will give associates year-end and special bonuses matching those given by other BigLaw firms, Law360 Pulse confirmed Friday.

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Former SDNY US Atty Williams Returns To Paul Weiss

By Anna Sanders

Damian Williams is rejoining Paul Weiss Rifkind Wharton & Garrison LLP after four years as the U.S. attorney for the Southern District of New York under President Joe Biden, the firm announced Friday.

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Feds Want 16 Mos. For Oath Keepers' Atty In Jan. 6 Case

By Lauren Berg

A former attorney for the far-right Oath Keepers group should be sentenced to 16 months in prison for her participation in the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol, prosecutors have told a D.C. federal judge, saying her conduct and lack of remorse warrants a significant sentence.

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Sen. Durbin Questions Trump AG Nominee's Lobbying

By Courtney Bublé

U.S. Sen. Dick Durbin, D-Ill., the top Democrat on the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee, pressed federal agencies Friday to provide information on President-elect Donald Trump's attorney general nominee's past role as a foreign lobbyist ahead of her confirmation hearings next week due to concerns about possible conflicts of interest.

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Smith Appeals Injunction On Release Of Trump Report

By Carolina Bolado

Special counsel Jack Smith has notified the Eleventh Circuit that he is appealing a temporary injunction blocking the release of his final report on his investigations into President-elect Donald Trump for election meddling and retention of classified documents.

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Ga. Law Firm Latest To Fight Corporate Transparency Act

By David Hansen

A federal law designed to combat money laundering violates the U.S. Constitution by forcing lawyers to disregard attorney-client privilege, a Georgia lawyer told a federal court, joining a chorus seeking legal action to stop the law.

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Wright Must Detail $108M Damages Claim Against Accusers

By Aebra Coe

Joshua Wright, a former commissioner of the Federal Trade Commission, must reappear for a deposition to answer previously unanswered questions posed by two women he's suing for defamation on the details of his $108 million damages claim against them, a Virginia judge ruled Friday.

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New York To Administer NCBE's NextGen Bar Exam In 2028

By Matt Perez

New York's highest court has announced the jurisdiction will adopt the Next Generation bar exam developed by the National Conference of Bar Examiners beginning July 2028.

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Litigation Funder Forms New Biz To Oversee Group Claims

By Tabitha Burbidge

Litigation funder Asertis confirmed Friday it has joined forces with law firm KP Law PC to create a one-stop shop for managing legal claims through a unique platform that offers funding, litigating and insuring services.

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Colorado Conduct Panel Dings Judges For Disclosure Lapses

By Greg Lamm

A Colorado judicial commission on Friday criticized 48 judges for failing to file state-mandated personal financial disclosure reports in 2023, saying the lapses "cast a shadow" over the state's judiciary but did not warrant public discipline because no judges were dishonest or improperly secretive.

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Law360's Legal Lions Of The Week

By Kevin Penton

Sive Paget & Riesel PC and Kaplan Martin LLP lead this week's edition of Law360 Legal Lions after the Third Circuit denied an emergency motion for an injunction to halt New York City's highly litigated congestion pricing toll program.

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GC Cheat Sheet: The Hottest Corporate News Of The Week

By Sue Reisinger

A new report from a national group declares that general counsel and their corporate boards face five key dilemmas in 2025, thanks to the nation's chaotic and rapidly changing times. And in sports broadcasting, Disney and two other media companies have settled Fubo's lawsuit against their joint streaming venture, which they agreed to end.

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

By Max Austin

This past week in London has seen legal services group RBG Holdings face a winding-up petition from founder Ian Rosenblatt amid soured talks about the group's leadership, J.P. Morgan file a fresh claim against WeRealize, retailer Asda face an intellectual property claim over a specific type of mandarin and financier Nathaniel Rothschild sue German entrepreneur Lars Windhorst and his investment vehicle Tennor International. Here, Law360 looks at these and other new claims in the U.K.

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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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