Appellate

  • April 20, 2026

    High Court Won't Hear 3rd Circ. J&J Class Cert. Appeal

    The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday said it won't review a class certification challenge in a securities class action over Johnson & Johnson's cancer-related talc products in the latest development in a closely watched dispute over how courts evaluate class certification in shareholder suits.

  • April 20, 2026

    Justices Won't Consider Returning Child Under Hague Treaty

    The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday declined to review whether the Fifth Circuit applied the wrong standard of review in determining that a child brought to the U.S. without her father's permission should be returned home to Venezuela.

  • April 20, 2026

    Justices Won't Rethink Bakery Co.'s $15.6M Pension Tab

    The U.S. Supreme Court turned down a baked goods company's bid for review of the Eleventh Circuit's finding that it owed a union pension fund up to $15.6 million, leaving in place Monday a ruling that backed the union's interpretation of pension withdrawal liability law.

  • April 20, 2026

    Justices Won't Consider IP Theft Allegations Against Akin

    The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday rejected a former Cornell University graduate student's petition trying to revive his malpractice suit against Akin Gump Strauss Hauer & Feld LLP stemming from patent litigation against Illumina Inc. over DNA sequencing intellectual property.

  • April 20, 2026

    High Court Turns Away Veteran's Disability Bias Suit

    The U.S. Supreme Court refused Monday to review the dismissal of a veteran's lawsuit alleging he was let go by an aviation training provider because of his post-traumatic stress disorder and other service-related disabilities, despite his assertion that the decision against him contributed to a circuit split.

  • April 20, 2026

    Justices Won't Review Vegas Hotel Algorithmic Pricing Suit

    The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday rejected a petition seeking to revive a proposed class action accusing casino-hotel operators on the Las Vegas Strip of using software from Cendyn Group to illegally inflate room rates.

  • April 20, 2026

    Justices Decline 'Rapunzel' Dispute Over Trademark Standing

    The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday declined to hear a law professor's trademark appeal over the name "Rapunzel," leaving intact a Federal Circuit ruling that found consumers lack standing to challenge generic marks at the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office.

  • April 20, 2026

    Justices Won't Review Class Cert. In $12B VRDO Suit

    The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday declined to review a Second Circuit decision upholding class certification in a $12 billion municipal-bond antitrust lawsuit after a group of major banks argued the district court erred in not resolving an expert witness evidence dispute before granting certification.

  • April 20, 2026

    High Court Rejects Artist's Appeal In Walmart Copyright Feud

    The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday passed on reviewing a sculptor's efforts to save a portion of her copyright case against Walmart over photographs that appeared on its website, letting stand a Ninth Circuit decision that partly reversed her lower court win in the suit.

  • April 20, 2026

    Justices Won't Hear 1st Circ. Escrow Law Preemption Case

    The U.S. Supreme Court said Monday that it will not review a First Circuit decision allowing Citizens Bank NA to be sued for allegedly failing to comply with a Rhode Island interest-on-escrow law, declining to wade again into a fight over national bank preemption.

  • April 20, 2026

    Justices Skip Challenge To NC Surveyor License Law

    The U.S. Supreme Court said Monday it won't take up an appeal from a North Carolina drone operator who says his state's licensing and regulatory requirements for land surveyors restricted his First Amendment rights.

  • April 20, 2026

    Justices Won't Weigh Test For 3rd-Party Harassment

    The U.S. Supreme Court declined Monday to hear a case that hinged on the standard used by courts to assess whether employers are liable for sexual harassment perpetrated against workers by customers or clients.

  • April 17, 2026

    Starbucks Wins 5th Circ. Bid To Scrap NLRB Subpoena Order

    The Fifth Circuit on Friday vacated a National Labor Relations Board order that dinged Starbucks for sending overbroad subpoenas to pro-union employees, saying in a published opinion that the board applied the wrong legal standard for determining whether the coffeehouse chain committed an unfair labor practice.

  • April 17, 2026

    11th Circ. Revives Trademark Suit Against Frida Kahlo Family

    The Eleventh Circuit on Friday agreed to resurrect a dispute between a company that claims to own various Frida Kahlo trademarks and Kahlo's family, ruling that a lower court erred in throwing out the case for lack of jurisdiction. 

  • April 17, 2026

    9th Circ. Revives Doctor's PeaceHealth Whistleblower Suit

    A Ninth Circuit panel has reinstated a psychiatrist's claims that PeaceHealth Inc. retaliated against him for expressing concerns about potential Medicaid fraud at a Washington hospital, concluding on Friday that the district court overlooked evidence that the employer punished him by not renewing his employment contract.

  • April 17, 2026

    Missed Deadline Fatal To Patient's Stapler Suit, 4th Circ. Says

    The Fourth Circuit ruled Friday that a surgery patient's missed expert disclosure deadline rightfully ended his case seeking to hold Johnson & Johnson subsidiary Ethicon Endo-Surgery LLC liable for allegedly faulty staples used in his procedure.

  • April 17, 2026

    11th Circ. Backs Lincoln Life's Long-Term Disability Denial

    The Eleventh Circuit has affirmed a lower court's order backing Lincoln Life Assurance Company of Boston's decision to terminate long-term disability benefits for a Mattress Firm manager who injured his back in a skiing accident, finding that he failed to show that he continued to be disabled.

  • April 17, 2026

    Advocates Get FCC Prison Call Rate Cases Moved To 1st Circ.

    The D.C. Circuit has agreed that a series of consolidated appeals brought by prison phone service providers and advocacy groups challenging the Federal Communications Commission's latest prison phone rate order belongs in front of the First Circuit.

  • April 17, 2026

    OpenAI Drops 9th Circ. Appeal Over 'Cameo' TM Block

    OpenAI has abandoned its Ninth Circuit appeal of an injunction blocking it from using the term "Cameo" in relation to a component of its artificial intelligence video generator Sora 2.

  • April 17, 2026

    Texas Panel Won't Revive Woman's Legal Malpractice Suit

    A Texas appeals panel will not revive a woman's legal malpractice suit alleging her former attorney botched a hearing, leading to an unfavorable settlement in a defamation case, saying she provided no proof that the attorney's conduct had any such negative effect.

  • April 17, 2026

    Settlement Ends High Court Fight Over Arbitration Deference

    The U.S. Supreme Court dismissed a petition filed in a now-settled case relating to a vacated arbitral award favoring a former water treatment company director, which sought clarity from the justices on whether courts can second-guess the content of arbitral pleadings and filings.

  • April 17, 2026

    11th Circ. Backs School District In Black Worker's Bias Suit

    The Eleventh Circuit upheld the dismissal Friday of a Black Alabama school district worker's suit claiming she was transferred to a different job out of racial discrimination, ruling her employer showed the decision was based on her concerns about her workload, not her race.

  • April 17, 2026

    NY High Court Suspends Judge Over Racist Remarks

    A veteran judge who used the N-word among colleagues and claimed in court that a Black defendant was likely to be violent and "played the race card" has been suspended without pay by New York's highest court.

  • April 17, 2026

    Too Mentally Ill To Stand In Court, Texas Inmate Fights On

    A Texas death row prisoner who gouged out both of his eyes and suffers from schizoaffective disorder is fighting efforts to move forward with his execution, arguing that his severe psychosis leaves him unable to rationally understand why the state wants to kill him. His case highlights a broader debate over whether the Constitution should bar the execution of people with severe mental illness, even when they technically know they are on death row.

  • April 17, 2026

    Balancing The Scales: Juror Bias, First For Revenge Porn Law

    The California Supreme Court tossed the conviction and death sentence in a double slaying over the trial court's failures to investigate claims of juror bias, and an Ohio man is believed to be the first person in the nation convicted under a federal law intended to battle revenge porn.

Expert Analysis

  • Opinion

    Apple Discovery Fight Could Revive DOJ's Antitrust Appetite

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    Winning discovery disputes in the ongoing federal antitrust litigation over Apple’s app store practices is a huge opportunity for the Justice Department to return to its once-vigorous pursuit of product tying by tech monopolies, catch up with foreign competition regulators and establish clear standards for digital markets, says Ediberto Roman at Florida International University.

  • Lockdown To Ledger: COVID Rulings Inform Crypto Coverage

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    As cryptocurrencies move deeper into mainstream financial markets, courts tasked with determining whether traditional insurance policies respond to digital asset losses have been evaluating coverage through the analytical framework of COVID-19 business interruption litigation, with one key recurring theme, say attorneys at Kennedys.

  • Opinion

    State Bars Need To Get Specific About AI Confidentiality

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    Lawyers need to put actual client information into artificial intelligence tools to get their full value, but they cannot confidently do so until state bars offer clear, formal authority on which plan tiers of the three most popular generative AI tools are safe to use when sharing specific client details, says attorney Nick Berk.

  • The Federal Circuit's Evolving View Of Trade Secrets

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    In recent years, the Federal Circuit's approach to defining "readily ascertainable" information and determining sufficiency of trade secret identification has shifted, trending away from other circuits and potentially presenting a higher bar for trade secrets plaintiffs, say attorneys at MoFo.

  • What Justices' Review Of Guam Case Will Mean For Permitting

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    In U.S. Department of the Air Force v. Prutehi Guahan, the U.S. Supreme Court will address whether a federal agency's permit application is a final decision that courts can review — a question whose answer could reshape the timing and strategy of environmental litigation across the federal permitting landscape, say attorneys at Foley Hoag.

  • Opinion

    Judicial Restraint Anchors Constitutional Order

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    Contrasting opinions in two recent U.S. Supreme Court rulings — Trump v. CASA and Bost v. Illinois State Board of Elections — demonstrate how the judiciary’s constitutionally entrusted role can easily be preserved or disrupted, and invite renewed attention to the enduring importance of judicial restraint, says Ninth Circuit Judge J. Clifford Wallace.

  • Human Authorship Is Still Central To Copyright Eligibility

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    In declining to review the D.C. Circuit's ruling in Thaler v. Perlmutter — holding that a work purely generated by artificial intelligence cannot be copyrighted — the U.S. Supreme Court has reinforced the human authorship requirement, so it is critical for creators of AI-assisted projects to document their involvement, say attorneys at Morgan Lewis.

  • Resolving The Conflict In 2nd Circ. Foreign Discovery Rulings

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    The Second Circuit recently issued two seemingly inconsistent decisions regarding the federal statute that permits U.S. discovery for purposes of a foreign proceeding, but the unifying feature appears to be the broad scope for district court discretion under Section 1782, say attorneys at Katsky Korins.

  • How 2nd Circ. Gave Loper Bright Real Force In SEC Cases

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    The Second Circuit's recent decision in U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission v. Amah offers one of the first clear indications of how courts will operationalize Loper Bright, signaling that long-standing SEC enforcement theories resting on ambiguous definitional provisions are now subject to more rigorous judicial scrutiny, say attorneys at Morgan Lewis.

  • Series

    Alpine Skiing Makes Me A Better Lawyer

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    Skiing has shaped habits I rely on daily as an attorney — focus, resilience and the ability to remain steady when circumstances shift rapidly — and influences the way I approach legal strategy, client counseling and teamwork, says Isaku Begert at Marshall Gerstein.

  • Opinion

    Time To Fix The Accountability Gap In Freight Logistics

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    In Montgomery v. Caribe Transport, the U.S. Supreme Court must resolve an urgent question: whether freight broker selection in trucking accidents is categorically protected — meaning unreasonable safety decisions are insulated from liability — or subject to accountability under traditional negligence principles, says Amanda Demanda at Amanda Demanda Injury Lawyers.

  • 2 Strands Of Patent Law In High Court's 'Skinny Label' Case

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    Amarin v. Hikma, which is set for oral argument in the U.S. Supreme Court this month, highlights the distinction between two different strands of intellectual property law — analogizing a patent to either a property deed or a home, says Jonas McDavit at Spencer West.

  • Justices' Geofence Ruling May Test 4th Amendment's Future

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    When the U.S. Supreme Court decides in Chatrie v. U.S. whether law enforcement may use geofence warrants to compel Google to disclose location history data, the ruling is likely to become an important statement about the future of Fourth Amendment law in data-driven investigations, says Duncan Levin at Levin & Associates.

  • Series

    NY Banking Brief: All The Notable Legal Updates In Q1

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    In the first quarter of 2026, New York's banking developments were headlined by initiatives to expand oversight of financial institutions and strengthen consumer protection laws, including a new framework for buy now, pay later lenders, a sweeping debt collection rule and a revised corporate self-disclosure program for financial crimes, say attorneys at Proskauer.

  • Seeking A Policy Fix As Merger Reporting Fight Continues

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    A recently announced request by the Federal Trade Commission and U.S. Department of Justice for public comment on the Hart-Scott-Rodino premerger reporting requirements, as litigation challenging the commission's updated requirements continues, suggests the government's willingness to address how best to support modern merger enforcement without unduly burdening filing parties, say attorneys at Baker Botts.

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