Analysis

What To Watch As The FTC Targets Drug Patent Listings

By Ryan Davis

The Federal Trade Commission has been scrutinizing patents listed by drugmakers on a key federal database, warning several companies that their listings are improper and drive up drug prices. Here's a look at what the agency and others could do next.

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Netflix Fails To Show Inventor, Funder Violated Injunction

By Dani Kass

A California federal judge has said Netflix couldn't prove a Finnish inventor violated an injunction tied to his concealment of certain legal funds, or that a litigation fund manager the inventor worked with needs to face claims tied to that concealment.

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Apple Tells Fed. Circ. Albright Set Transfer Bar Too High

By Adam Lidgett

Apple has asked the Federal Circuit to overrule U.S. District Judge Alan Albright in Texas after he refused to transfer patent litigation against it to the Northern District of California, saying the decision flouted Fifth Circuit precedent.

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Jury Awards Electric Jet Startup $72M In Boeing IP Case

By Greg Lamm

A Washington federal jury said Thursday that The Boeing Co. should pay Zunum Aero Inc. $72 million for misappropriating the electric jet startup's trade secrets and souring a deal with a potential investor, in an award partially subject to trebling under state law.

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Cher Gets Key Win In Royalty Fight With Sonny Bono's Widow

By Ivan Moreno

The Emmy, Grammy, Oscar and Tony-winning star Cher has now won a key victory in California federal court in a dispute over song royalties with the widow of ex-husband Sonny Bono, with a judge concluding that Mary Bono must continue to pay the female half of Sonny & Cher composition royalties under a 1978 marriage settlement agreement, or MSA, following their 1975 divorce.

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ITC Judge Clears Amazon In Video Tech Co.'s Patent Case

By Adam Lidgett

A U.S. International Trade Commission judge has found that Amazon hasn't broken federal patent trade law by importing streaming products, dealing a setback to video technology company DivX LLC in its infringement case.

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Warren Pushes To Clinch 'Popular' Drug Patent 'March-In' Plan

By Lauren Berg

Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., and Rep. Lloyd Doggett, D-Texas, Thursday urged the U.S. Department of Commerce to finalize a proposal that would allow the government to take possession of "taxpayer-funded" patents on drugs and lease them to generic-drug makers, saying the "popular framework will help reduce exorbitant drug costs."

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State Farm Says Atari Seeks Windfall With IP Suit Over Ad

By Ivan Moreno

State Farm Mutual Automobile Insurance Co. has urged a Texas federal judge to dismiss a copyright complaint from Atari Interactive Inc., saying the insurer did nothing wrong when it briefly used part of the 1980s arcade game Crystal Castles in a commercial to attract younger customers.

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DOJ's Kanter Says AI Cos. Could Exploit Creators

By Matthew Perlman

The head of the U.S. Department of Justice Antitrust Division, Jonathan Kanter, said Thursday that a lack of competition between artificial intelligence companies could allow them to exploit writers, artists and other content creators.

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Albright Urged To Up Flypsi's $12M Trial Win Against Google

By Hannah Albarazi

 A Texas jury verdict requiring Google to pay $12 million in damages to software developer Flypsi Inc. for patent infringement is insufficient, Flypsi has told U.S. District Judge Alan Albright, asking the court to order a damages retrial or award it ongoing royalties and require Google to pay attorney fees.

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Divided PTAB Sinks Wildseed Mobile IP In Wins For Google

By Andrew Karpan

The Patent Trial and Appeal Board has issued a pair of rulings wiping out claims in two patents asserted by a litigation outfit targeting the way that ads work on YouTube, but the decisions included a rare dissent-in-part from an administrative judge who disagreed on how a 2005 Sony patent application fit into the dispute.

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Apple Gets PTAB To Ax Patent Claims On Waking Up Phone

By Adam Lidgett

Apple has successfully challenged an inventor's patent covering a way for a mobile phone to show information by a user just looking at it, with the Patent Trial and Appeal Board finding several claims were invalid as obvious.

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Sorority, Ex-Affiliate End Trademark Suit After Mediation

By Travis Bland

A sorority and a former affiliate have agreed to scrap a trademark dispute alleging the affiliate continued to use the sorority's name and symbols after their relationship had been severed.

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NCAA V. Athletes Suits Paused As Parties Talk Final Deal

By David Steele

The consolidated cases in the class action against the NCAA over athletes' name, image and likeness compensation were stayed by a California federal judge Thursday, the next step toward finalizing the multibillion-dollar settlement the two sides reached last week.

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NCAA Loses Bid To Sink Reggie Bush Defamation Suit

By Elaine Briseño

The NCAA has failed in its bid to get an early toss of the defamation suit filed by 2005 Heisman Trophy winner Reggie Bush, with an Indiana court ruling a dismissal is premature at this point because the former running back has met the pleading standards.

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Alston & Bird Adds IP Litigator From BakerHostetler In LA

By James Mills

Alston & Bird LLP is boosting its intellectual property team, bringing in a BakerHostetler IP litigator as a partner in its Los Angeles office.

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The Fed. Circ. In May: The Printed Matter Doctrine's Scope

The Federal Circuit’s recent ruling in Ioengine v. Ingenico, which addressed the scope of the printed matter doctrine as applied to transmitted data or program code, restores the doctrine’s status as a relatively narrow part of patent law, say Jeremiah Helm and Sean Murray at Knobbe Martens.

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12 Keys To Successful Post-Trial Juror Interviews

Post-trial interviews offer attorneys an avenue to gain valuable insights into juror decision making and get feedback that can inform future litigation strategies, but certain best practices must be followed to get the most out of this research tool, say Alexa Hiley and Brianna Smith at IMS Legal.

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Perspectives

Trauma-Informed Legal Approaches For Pro Bono Attorneys

As National Trauma Awareness Month ends, pro bono attorneys should nevertheless continue to acknowledge the mental and physical effects of trauma, allowing them to better represent clients, and protect themselves from compassion fatigue and burnout, say Katherine Cronin at Stinson and Katharine Manning at Blackbird.

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Orrick Leads List Of Top Law Firms For Women, Diversity

By Aebra Coe

Talent strategies firm Seramount released its latest list of the 45 best law firms for women and diversity this week, with the 2024 cohort of winners showing strides over previous years in representation, advancement and benefits for lawyers who are women or from other underrepresented groups.

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Houston Judge's Vast Display Reflects 25 Years On Bench

By Catherine Marfin

Along the hallways leading to U.S. District Judge Keith P. Ellison's Houston courtroom hang hundreds of notes, photos, thank-you cards and other correspondence, serving as a kind of interactive scrapbook of Judge Ellison's 25 years on the bench.

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Analysis

In Rarity, 1 Party's Judges Gain 100% Control Of Circuit Bench

By Jeff Overley

At the First Circuit, the judges' robes are all black, but the judges are all blue. It's a new and unusual instance of one political party's judicial picks controlling each active seat on a federal appeals court, and the Democratic dominance could prove magnetic for ideologically charged litigation.

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WDTX Chief Adds New Hurdle For Patent Attys Eyeing Albright

By Dani Kass

The Western District of Texas' chief judge has made it harder for parties to have their patent cases end up in U.S. District Judge Alan Albright's court by refusing to automatically connect related litigation.

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Orrick's $8M Deal To End Data Breach Claims Nears Prelim OK

By Bonnie Eslinger

A California federal judge indicated Friday that she'll preliminarily approve Orrick Herrington & Sutcliffe LLP's $8 million deal to end putative class claims over a 2023 data breach that purportedly exposed personal information for 638,000 individuals, but said the "very broad" scope of the settlement's release "raised my eyebrows."

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Smith Gambrell Faces Slimmed Data Breach Suit

By Emily Sawicki

A California federal judge has trimmed the claims a proposed class of data breach victims brought against international law firm Smith Gambrell & Russell LLP, leaving the firm to face claims of negligence, invasion of privacy and violation of the California Unfair Competition Law.

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Analysis

Blockbuster Summer: 10 Big Issues Justices Still Must Decide

By Katie Buehler

As the calendar flips over to June, the U.S. Supreme Court still has heaps of cases to decide on issues ranging from trademark registration rules to judicial deference and presidential immunity. Here, Law360 looks at 10 of the most important topics the court has yet to decide.

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Analysis

Del. Chancellor Questions 'Rush' To Amend Corporation Law

By Jeff Montgomery

Weeks before the Delaware State Bar Association sent state lawmakers a draft bill explicitly allowing corporations to broadly cede some governance rights to chosen stockholders, Chancellor Kathaleen St. J. McCormick of Delaware Chancery Court made an unprecedented, direct appeal to think twice.

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Analysis

How Trump's Hush Money Sentencing Could Get 'Dicey'

By Phillip Bantz

Now convicted of nearly three dozen felonies, former President Donald Trump must move through the machinery of the New York state court system's sentencing process, which involves sitting down for an interview with a probation officer and a chance to directly address a judge he's called biased and "corrupt."

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Trump Condemns NY Trial As Verdict Echoes In DC

By Rachel Scharf

A day after his conviction on 34 felony counts, former president Donald Trump on Friday attacked the Manhattan jury's verdict in a lengthy speech that mischaracterized multiple elements of the case as the decision reverberated through Washington, D.C.

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Trump's New York Prosecutors Called To House Hearing

By Courtney Bublé

Rep. Jim Jordan, R-Ohio, chair of the House Judiciary Committee and its Select Subcommittee on the Weaponization of the Federal Government, demanded on Friday that Manhattan prosecutors appear for a hearing on June 13 on the prosecution of former President Donald Trump, who was convicted on Thursday of 34 felonies.

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Disbarring Giuliani Would 'Protect The Public,' DC Panel Says

By Alison Knezevich

A Washington, D.C., attorney ethics panel agreed Friday that Rudy Giuliani's role in former President Donald Trump's attempt to overturn Pennsylvania's presidential election in 2020 amounted to misconduct "of the utmost seriousness," and that disbarring him would "protect the public, the courts, and the integrity of the legal profession."

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Don't Fear AI Hallucinations, Embrace Them, Scholar Says

By Law360 Staff

When it comes to artificial intelligence, most early adopters fear the so-called hallucinations that the systems can produce. However, one scholar says the creativity those hallucinations represent is a valuable feature lawyers should embrace.

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Lambda Legal To Expand With $180M Campaign

By Matt Perez

Lambda Legal, a national nonprofit focused on the civil rights of LGBTQ+ people and those living with HIV, announced on Friday a $180 million fundraising campaign, along with an organizational strategy that aims to expand its legal team significantly by 2026.

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Texas Judge Opts Not To Recuse And Tosses Chamber Suit

By Emily Sawicki

A Texas federal judge has thrown out the U.S. Chamber of Commerce's suit seeking to block the Federal Trade Commission from implementing a ban on noncompete clauses because a different plaintiff was first to file, adding he declined to recuse himself because no companies in his stock portfolio were parties in the case.

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Ore. Watchdog Says Open Discipline Makes 'Stronger' Attys

By Thy Vo

An Oregon attorney watchdog group said Friday that the state's radical transparency in attorney disciplinary proceedings makes for "stronger lawyers," arguing largely open access to records and trials has combated misconceptions that regulators are there to protect lawyers.

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Illinois Strengthens Atty Ethics Rules For Harassment, Bias

By Celeste Bott

The Illinois Supreme Court has announced that the state's professional conduct rules for attorneys have been amended to deem the act of engaging in harassment or discrimination as professional misconduct, and not just in the event a court or administrative agency finds that a lawyer violated a law prohibiting such actions.

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DOJ Looks To End A Legacy Of Bias In Sex Assault Cases

By Hannah Albarazi

The U.S. Department of Justice says that legal fallacies and misogynistic stereotypes often lead prosecutors to decline to charge alleged perpetrators of sexual violence, but new guidance from the department is pushing prosecutors to give more credence to victims and see that their claims are more thoroughly investigated.

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Law360's Legal Lions Of The Week

By Kevin Penton

Brewer Attorneys & Counselors, the American Civil Liberties Union Foundation and attorneys Eugene Volokh and Alan Morrison lead this week's edition of Law360 Legal Lions, after the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that the National Rifle Association can proceed with certain claims in the gun rights group's lawsuit against a former New York state official.

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The Top In-House Hires Of May

By Michele Gorman

Legal department hires during the last full month of spring included high-profile appointments at Southwest, Hormel and UnitedHealth. Here, Law360 Pulse looks at some of the top in-house announcements from May.

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GC Cheat Sheet: The Hottest Corporate News Of The Week

By Sue Reisinger

Consumers have asked a federal judge to sign off on their $197 million class action settlement with Visa and Mastercard over claims the companies conspired with banks on ATM access fees. And Microsoft's President Brad Smith is going to tell Congress about what the company is doing to upgrade cybersecurity, including linking executive pay to it.

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Off The Bench: NCAA Transfers Freed, Atty Plays Cards Right

By David Steele

In this week's Off the Bench, the NCAA agrees to more historic rule changes while experts examine its post-House settlement future, and a patent lawyer looks back at his transformation into a poker champion.

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

By Laura Stewart Liberty

This past week in London has seen financier Crispin Odey file a defamation claim against the Financial Times, Ford hit with the latest "Dieselgate" claim and a human rights activist bring a privacy claim against Saudi Arabia. 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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