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Appellate
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July 21, 2025
Enterprise Need Only Check License, Conn. Panel Rules
Enterprise Rent-A-Car can not be held liable for renting a vehicle to a man who became intoxicated and struck a jogger and his dog later that day, a Connecticut appeals court ruled, saying the company was only required to inspect the driver's physical license and not to find out if the state had limited him to vehicles equipped with car breathalyzers.
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July 21, 2025
Mich. Justices Raise Bar For Prisoner Contraband Cases
The Michigan Supreme Court ruled Monday that possession of contraband in prison is not a strict liability offense, meaning prosecutors must prove that a prisoner was, at minimum, reckless in obtaining drugs or alcohol while behind bars.Â
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July 21, 2025
Guinea Tells DC Circ. $22M Award Can't Be Enforced
The Republic of Guinea has urged the D.C. Circuit not to revive a consulting company's bid to enforce a $22 million arbitration award, saying a lower court correctly found that it was unclear whether the country agreed to arbitrate the dispute in the first place.
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July 21, 2025
9th Circ. Narrows 'Remain In Mexico' Block During Appeal
A split Ninth Circuit panel ruled that a California federal judge's nationwide block of the Remain in Mexico program can only apply to the clients of the nonprofit that brought the underlying challenge while the Trump administration's appeal proceeds.
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July 21, 2025
Baseball Training Co. Must Face Suit Over Mom's Injury
Indiana's court of appeals ruled that a baseball training center cannot escape a lawsuit accusing the business of negligence after an admittedly unstable training screen fell over and caused a head injury to the mother of one of the trainees.
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July 21, 2025
Split 8th Circ. OKs Fed Charges In Cop Car Burning Case
A split Eighth Circuit panel has ruled that a man convicted in Arkansas federal court of firebombing three police vehicles must face his sentence, ruling that, because the departments to which the cars belonged received federal money, the U.S. government is allowed to bring charges against the man.
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July 21, 2025
Wash. Plastic Surgeon Can't Get $13M Jury Verdict Overturned
A Washington appeals court panel refused on Monday to undo a $13 million jury verdict against a plastic surgeon in a medical malpractice case, rejecting the doctor's argument that the lower court wrongly allowed evidence of state regulators' unrelated disciplinary proceedings against her.
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July 21, 2025
Justices Asked If Frontier Law Covers 'Corner Crossing' Case
A Wyoming ranch owner is asking the U.S. Supreme Court to review a Tenth Circuit decision that four hunters who crossed over its property to reach public lands didn't trespass, arguing that state law prohibits "corner crossing" and that no federal easement exists across private land for public access.
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July 21, 2025
Ex-Judges Call SAP Hypocritical In 'Self-Serving' Fintiv Appeal
Retired Federal Circuit Judges Randall Rader and Kathleen O'Malley are urging their former court to reject SAP America Inc.'s challenge to how the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office is implementing new policies, saying the agency is acting within its limits and that SAP is selfishly contradicting arguments it previously made at the U.S. Supreme Court.
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July 21, 2025
Calif. Court Orders Drug Deal Retrial Over Mistaken Admission
A California state appeals court on Monday demanded a new trial on drug dealing charges for a man who admitted to possessing cocaine while on probation, finding a trial court judge had erroneously admitted botched testimony the man gave in a probation hearing.
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July 21, 2025
How GOP Judges Teed Up 4th Circ.'s Supreme Court Shutout
No appeals court found the U.S. Supreme Court's latest term less endearing than the Fourth Circuit, where a supersize shutout accentuated a multiyear slump for the once-favored circuit and repeatedly vindicated conservative dissenters on the left-leaning bench.
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July 21, 2025
Board Says Salvadoran Women Not A Social Group Under INA
The Board of Immigration Appeals has dismissed a Salvadoran woman's attempt to revive her application for asylum and withholding of removal, ruling that a particular social group based solely on an individual's sex and nationality is "overbroad and insufficiently particular."Â
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July 21, 2025
Energy Litigation To Watch In The 2nd Half Of 2025
Courtroom showdowns between the Trump administration and blue states over U.S. energy and climate change policy will dominate the energy litigation landscape for the rest of 2025. Here is what the energy industry will be watching closely in the second half of the year.
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July 21, 2025
Pa. Hospital Can Shield Some Docs In Birth Injury Suit
A Pennsylvania state appeals panel won't force a hospital to turn over all of its internal reports in a suit by parents alleging that the hospital's negligence led to their son's injuries at birth, finding that the hospital sufficiently showed that two of the three contested files are privileged.
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July 21, 2025
Mich. Panel Upholds Atty Fee For Court-Appointed Counsel
A Michigan appellate panel has upheld a sentence requiring a defendant to pay a $400 attorney fee to her court-appointed counsel, rejecting her contentions that it was an unconstitutional fine and that the court failed to determine whether she had the ability to pay.
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July 21, 2025
Calif. High Court Says Biotech Investor Suit Belongs In Del.
The California Supreme Court on Monday ruled that a lawsuit pursued by a minority investor alleging San Diego-based EpicentRx and its officers bamboozled investors belongs in Delaware Chancery Court, rejecting arguments that enforcing the biopharmaceutical company's forum selection clause violated Golden State jury trial protections.
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July 21, 2025
Catching Up With Delaware's Chancery Court
Last week at the Delaware Court of Chancery, a major settlement between Meta Platforms Inc. and its investors reached on the proverbial courthouse steps during day two of a trial ended an $8 billion-plus suit accusing the company's directors and officers of breaching privacy regulations and corporate fiduciary duties tied to allegations dating to the Cambridge Analytica scandal more than a decade ago.
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July 21, 2025
Tax-Lien Biz Atty Tells Jury He Didn't Seek To Dupe Lender
Counsel for a former compliance lawyer accused of pilfering from a $20 million line of credit extended to his tax-lien investment firm told a Manhattan federal jury Monday that the defendant was "sloppy," but never intended fraud.
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July 21, 2025
DC Circ. Strikes Down Gag Order On X Corp. Subpoenas
A D.C. Circuit panel has struck down a lower court's sweeping order blocking X Corp. from informing users about government data requests, with the appeals court finding the district court failed to identify specific harm that would come from keeping users in the loop.
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July 21, 2025
11th Circ Says. Experian Not Liable For Credit Dispute Costs
The Eleventh Circuit upheld a win for Experian PLC when it held that a consumer's attempts to correct inaccurate information in a credit report can't constitute an injury without evidence that the data was published to a third party or some other actual or imminent harm.
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July 21, 2025
EPA Asks 9th Circ. To Reverse Calif. Judge In Fluoride Suit
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency is asking the Ninth Circuit to reverse a California federal judge who ruled that the EPA's current "optimal" level of fluoride in drinking water poses an unreasonable risk of lowering children's IQ.
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July 21, 2025
Dentist Can't Shake $11.4M Verdict Over Patient's Cancer
A Pennsylvania Superior Court on Monday affirmed an $11.4 million verdict against a dentist who allegedly ignored signs of skin cancer during appointments, rejecting her argument that the evidence didn't support the verdict.
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July 21, 2025
4th Circ. Reverses Portion Of Railroads' Broadband Suit
The Fourth Circuit has ruled that the Association of American Railroads has standing to challenge a Virginia state law requiring railroads to allow for broadband crossings, reversing a trial court decision and dealing another blow to a law that the Virginia Supreme Court already gutted on state constitutional grounds in May.
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July 21, 2025
Reed Smith's Doc Block Motion 'Hyperbolic,' 2nd Circ. Told
Reed Smith LLP cannot block the new owners of reorganized Greece-based international shipping company Eletson from viewing files already in its possession, the company has told the Second Circuit, arguing the law firm's emergency motion to stop the new owners from accessing the files was intentionally timed to head off anticipated district court rulings.
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July 21, 2025
Ex-Eckert Seamans Atty Drops Pa. License Over Cash Scheme
A onetime Eckert Seamans Cherin & Mellott LLC attorney who allegedly asked clients for direct payments to circumvent the firm has surrendered his Pennsylvania law license, but is now alleging state disciplinary authorities violated a deal to keep the records private if he agreed to the disbarment.
Expert Analysis
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Google Damages Ruling Offers Lessons For Testifying Experts
The Federal Circuit's recent decision in EcoFactor v. Google represents a shift in how courts evaluate expert testimony in patent cases, offering a practical guide for how litigators and testifying experts can refine their work, says Adam Rhoten at Secretariat.
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Series
Law School's Missed Lessons: Communicating With Clients
Law school curricula often overlook client communication procedures, and those who actively teach this crucial facet of the practice can create exceptional client satisfaction and success, says Patrick Hanson at Wiggam Law.
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One Year On, Davidson Holds Lessons On 'Health Halo' Claims
A year after the Ninth Circuit's Davidson v. Sprout Foods decision — which raised the bar for so-called health halo claims — food and beverage companies can draw insights from its finding, subsequently expanded on by other courts, that plaintiffs must be specific when alleging fraud in healthfulness marketing, say attorneys at Sidley.
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Justices' NRC Ruling Raises New Regulatory Questions
In Nuclear Regulatory Commission v. Texas, the U.S. Supreme Court avoided ruling on the NRC's authority to license private, temporary nuclear waste storage facilities — and this failure to reach the merits question creates new regulatory uncertainty where none had existed for decades, say attorneys at Holland & Knight.
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Rocket Mortgage Appeal May Push Justices To Curb Classes
Should the U.S. Supreme Court agree to hear Alig v. Rocket Mortgage, the resulting decision could limit class sizes based on commonality under Rule 23 of the Federal Rules of Evidence as opposed to standing under Article III of the U.S. Constitution, say attorneys at Carr Maloney.
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3 Judicial Approaches To Applying Loper Bright, 1 Year Later
In the year since the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Chevron deference in its Loper Bright Enterprises v. Raimondo decision, a few patterns have emerged in lower courts’ application of the precedent to determine whether agency actions are lawful, say attorneys at Husch Blackwell.
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Trending At The PTAB: Shifts In Parallel Proceedings Strategy
Dynamics are changing between the Patent Trial and Appeal Board and federal courts, with two recent discretionary denials and one Federal Circuit decision offering takeaways for both patent owners and challengers navigating parallel proceedings, say attorneys at Finnegan.
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What Businesses Need To Know To Avoid VPPA Class Actions
Divergent rulings by the Second, Sixth and Seventh Circuits about the scope of the Video Privacy Protection Act have highlighted the difficulty of applying a statute conceived to regulate the now-obsolete brick-and-mortar video store sector in today's internet economy, say attorneys at DTO Law.
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Series
Adapting To Private Practice: From US Rep. To Boutique Firm
My transition from serving as a member of Congress to becoming a partner at a boutique firm has been remarkably smooth, in part because I never stopped exercising my legal muscles, maintained relationships with my former colleagues and set the right tone at the outset, says Mondaire Jones at Friedman Kaplan.
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Opinion
IRS Should Work With Industry On Microcaptive Regs
The IRS should engage with microcaptive insurance owners to develop better regulations on these arrangements or risk the emergence of common law guidance as taxpayers with legitimate programs seek relief in the federal courts, says Dustin Carlson at SRA 831(b) Admin.
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FLSA Interpretation Patterns Emerge 1 Year After Loper Bright
One year after the U.S. Supreme Court's monumental decision in Loper Bright Enterprises v. Raimondo, four distinct avenues of judicial decision-making have taken shape among lower courts that are responding to their newfound freedom in interpreting the Fair Labor Standards Act through U.S. Department of Labor regulations, say attorneys at Kutak Rock.
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A Pattern Emerges In Justices' Evaluation Of Veteran Statute
The recent Soto v. U.S. decision that the statute of limitations for certain military-related claims does not apply to combat-related special compensation exemplifies the U.S. Supreme Court's view, emerging in two other recent opinions, that it is a reviewing court's obligation to determine the best interpretation of the language used by Congress, says attorney Kenneth Carpenter.
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Fed. Circ. In May: Evaluating Opportunistic Trademark Filings
The Federal Circuit's decision last month in the "US Space Force" trademark case gives the Trademark Trial and Appeal Board additional clarity when working through opportunistic trademark filings, particularly when the mark's value is primarily due to the potential value of a false connection, say attorneys at Knobbe Martens.
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Opinion
Senate's 41% Litigation Finance Tax Would Hurt Legal System
The Senate’s latest version of the Big Beautiful Bill Act would impose a 41% tax on the litigation finance industry, but the tax is totally disconnected from the concerns it purports to address, and it would set the country back to a time when small plaintiffs had little recourse against big defendants, says Anthony Sebok at Cardozo School of Law.
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Drawbacks For Taxpayers From Justices' Levy Dispute Ruling
The Supreme Court's June decision in Commissioner v. Zuch, holding the Tax Court lacks jurisdiction to resolve disputes where the IRS has stopped pursuing a levy, may require taxpayers to explore new tactics for mitigating the increased difficulty of appealing their liability via collection due process hearings, says Matthew Roberts at Meadows Collier.