Expert Analysis

• Class Actions At The Circuit Courts: September Lessons

  

  In this month's review of class action appeals, Mitchell Engel at Shook Hardy discusses six recent rulings involving pecuniary loss in false price comparison advertising, privity in an insurance fee class, antitrust standing, immigration class representatives, retirement beneficiary class commonality, and Rule 23(f) appeals in Fair Labor Standards Act claims.

• Florida Condo Ruling Offers Tips For Contractor Lien Disputes

  

  A recent Florida appellate decision, holding condo owners may challenge liens placed on their units, despite not being party to the underlying disputed agreement their association struck with contractors, offers lessons on lien enforcement to both contractors and condo owners, say attorneys at Adams & Reese.

• BIA Ruling Could Make Immigration Bond A Catch-22

  

  A recent Board of Immigration Appeals decision refining the way immigration judges assess flight risk, when read broadly, could create a circular rule under which a noncitizen can be treated as a flight risk because they have too few ties to the U.S., but also because they have too many, says Georgianna Pisano Goetz at the National Immigrant Justice Center.

• 8th Circ. Ruling Raises Bar For Seeking Disability Benefits

  

  The Eighth Circuit's recent ruling in Post v. Bisignano signals that claimants seeking Social Security disability benefits may need to offer convincing proof of functional restrictions beyond their treating doctors' opinions and illustrates that the court's proclaimant jurisprudence no longer prevails, says Mark DeBofsky at DeBofsky Law.

• Series

  Playing Bid Whist Makes Me A Better Lawyer

  

  As a child, I viewed bid whist as a family tradition and a source of friendly card game competition, but as a lawyer, I see it as a tool that has helped me cultivate skills like communication, teamwork, risk assessment and composure, says Keyonn Pope at Riley Safer.

• Teva, Wyeth Show How Claimed Advances Shape Enablement

  

  Two recent Federal Circuit decisions involving method-of-treatment claims — Teva v. Eli Lilly and Wyeth v. AstraZeneca — reached opposite enablement outcomes from strikingly similar procedural postures, but a closer comparison of the cases reveals a three-step framework for understanding the court's reasoning, says Kendall Gurule at Polsinelli.

• Opinion

  Calif. Bill Goes Too Far In Trying To Regulate Attorney AI Use

  

  California’s first-in-the-nation act regulating how attorneys and arbitrators use generative artificial intelligence will likely soon become law, but read broadly, the provisions may dissuade lawyers from employing AI at all, thereby depriving them of key work tools, says Joshua Wurtzel at Schlam Stone.

• Wis. Coverage Ruling Rejects Strict Ensuing Loss Test

  

  In Cincinnati Insurance v. Ropicky, the Wisconsin Supreme Court recently examined the relationship between an insurance policy's construction defect exclusion and ensuing loss exception, providing policyholders support in claiming that an additional cause may produce covered damage despite an excluded condition being part of the loss sequence, says Alexander Hopkins at SDV Fenchurch.

• The Preemption Gap In Prediction Market High Court Petitions

  

  The Supreme Court is considering three certiorari petitions following a split in prediction market litigation between the Third and Ninth circuits, but one of the petitions would not allow the court to reach the express preemption question, which would leave the dispute half-resolved, says Jordan Garman at Withers.

• 5th Circ. Embedding Decision Could Recast Copyright Claims

  

  The Fifth Circuit's decision in Emmerich v. Particle Media addresses decades of ambiguity surrounding whether embedded content can constitute copyright infringement, potentially affecting how defense counsel fight against such claims, say attorneys at Greenberg Glusker.

• A Texas Ruling May Offer Guidance On Freight Broker Liability

  

  The U.S. Supreme Court's decision in Montgomery v. Caribe Transport removed federal preemption defenses to freight broker negligent-selection claims, and a July verdict in Texas against C.H. Robinson raised further questions about how brokers can achieve compliance — but another recent Texas decision involving Home Depot may offer some answers, say attorneys at Baker Donelson.

• 9th Circ. Ruling Raises Bar For Arbitration Pacts Via Email

  

  The Ninth Circuit's recent holding in Rickes v. Thermo Fisher that the mere delivery of an email doesn't establish an employee's assent to the arbitration agreement underscores that rollout processes should both give employees notice of the agreement and create evidence of their assent, say attorneys at Sullivan & Cromwell.

• Opinion

  Fed. Circ. Should Redefine Functionality In Design Patents

  

  The Federal Circuit should establish a framework for identifying the relevant article of manufacture to which functionality analysis applies, in order to enhance doctrinal clarity and better reflect the statutory foundations of design patent law, say attorneys at Knobbe Martens.

• 9th Circ. Ruling Marks New Chapter In Risk Factor Tug-Of-War

  

  The Ninth Circuit's recent dismissal of a securities fraud class action against SunPower is the latest in a growing line of cases addressing whether, if ever, a company's risk factor disclosures can give rise to potential liability, an area where the law remains unsettled, say attorneys at Alston & Bird.

• Where AI Patent Risk Begins And How Records Can Help

  

  The Federal Circuit's recent decision in Dental Monitoring v. Align highlights the importance of documenting how artificial intelligence-assisted inventions work, and how humans contributed, as such records can support inventorship, written description, eligibility and definiteness requirements, say attorneys at Sterne Kessler.