Legal Ethics

  • May 04, 2026

    Vrdolyak Firm Loses Bid To End Ex-Staff's Wiretapping Claims

    A Chicago federal judge on Friday said former Vrdolyak Law Group LLC employees can keep pursuing most of their claims that the firm secretly recorded workers' phone calls.

  • May 04, 2026

    Atty Seeks Docs To Back Ogletree DQ Bid In Bias Suit

    A Georgia attorney on Monday asked a federal judge to allow discovery related to her bid to have Ogletree Deakins Nash Smoak & Stewart PC disqualified from defending ADT LLC against discrimination claims while concurrently defending Microsoft Corp. in the attorney's own pregnancy bias suit.

  • May 04, 2026

    Fla. Judge Urges Rethink Of Refusal To Toss Ethics Charges

    A Florida appellate judge is pushing a judicial panel to reconsider its denial of her motion to dismiss ethics charges that she attempted to influence lower-court proceedings for an incarcerated man formerly on death row, arguing that the panel's chair does have the ability to consider her constitutional issues.

  • May 04, 2026

    Bondi Spurs Ethics Doubts By Using DOJ Official As Counsel

    Harmeet Dhillon, an official with the U.S. Department of Justice, is representing former Attorney General Pam Bondi in proceedings before the House oversight committee, which Democrats on the panel say raises ethical quandaries.

  • May 01, 2026

    Don't 'Throw' Young Attys Under Bus, Judge Warns Musk Atty

    The California federal judge presiding over Elon Musk's challenge to OpenAI's for-profit conversion criticized Musk's attorney Marc Toberoff on Friday for eliciting "waste of time" trial testimony into Musk's $97.4 billion acquisition bid, warning Toberoff he "shouldn't throw young lawyers under the bus" by not quickly acknowledging his role.

  • May 01, 2026

    Winery's Ex-Lawyer Has No Rights To Wine Brand, Judge Says

    A California federal judge has entered judgment in a battle between a Napa Valley winery and an attorney who had worked with it, ruling that the attorney had no rights to the trademark on the high-end RBS wine brand.

  • May 01, 2026

    Insurer Sanctioned For 'Willful' Discovery Defiance

    A Washington federal court on Friday said it would hold an auto insurer liable for bad faith, negligent claim handling, and violations of the state's Consumer Protection Act and Insurance Fair Conduct Act after the carrier willfully violated prior production orders in a dispute over underinsured motorist benefits.

  • May 01, 2026

    California High Court Rejects Dunn's Bid To Nix Suspension

    The California Supreme Court has declined to review a California State Bar decision to impose a one-year stayed suspension on former State Bar executive Joseph Dunn.

  • May 01, 2026

    Mich. Judge Faces Warrant After Crashing Into Bus, DUI Arrest

    A Michigan judge accused of drunken driving after crashing into a bus last month is facing criminal charges after a county prosecutor's office on Friday referred a criminal warrant request to the state's Prosecuting Attorneys Coordinating Council for transfer outside the county where the judge presides.

  • May 01, 2026

    Whistleblower Says DOJ Rushed SPLC Indictment

    A whistleblower has come forward to say a top U.S. Department of Justice official ordered prosecutors in Alabama to "rush" the indictment of the Southern Poverty Law Center despite concerns about the viability of the case, according to Democrats on the House Judiciary Committee.

  • May 01, 2026

    Texas Panel Finds No Shield For Paralegal From Stalking Suit

    A Texas appeals court has refused to throw out a suit from an attorney alleging a paralegal stalked, harassed and threatened her, finding that the paralegal's statements and communications aren't shielded by the Texas Citizens Participation Act.

  • May 01, 2026

    'No Easy Task': Atty Seeks Fees For Ending Practice Limit Law

    A New Jersey attorney and his law firm told a state judge on Friday that they should be awarded counsel fees after they successfully challenged the constitutionality of a state law provision that penalizes attorneys who specialize in debt adjustment for representing debtors.

  • May 01, 2026

    Judge Wants DOJ Answers On Timeline Of Fulton Ballot Raid

    A Georgia federal judge has ordered the U.S. Department of Justice to disclose more details about the timeline leading up to its January raid seizing ballots from Fulton County as he continues to weigh whether to force the government to return the hundreds of boxes of election materials.

  • April 30, 2026

    OpenAI Judge Pauses Trial To Probe Musk Attys On $97B Bid

    A California federal jury trial over Elon Musk's challenge to OpenAI's for-profit conversion paused on a precarious note Thursday after Musk's legal team failed to object to a document during Musk's cross-examination, and inadvertently opened the door to wide-ranging and potentially damaging evidence into Musk's $97.4 billion acquisition proposal.

  • April 30, 2026

    Mass. AG, Auditor Brace For High-Stakes Constitutional Clash

    A closely watched separation-of-powers test is playing out in Massachusetts, where the Bay State auditor will argue to the state's top court in a hearing next week that the attorney general is stonewalling her from conducting a voter-approved audit of the state legislature.

  • April 30, 2026

    Texas Panel Reopens Malpractice Suit Over 'Death Penalty'

    A Texas appeals court on Thursday revived a couple's legal malpractice suit accusing their former personal injury attorney of letting their car accident claims die, finding the trial court wrongly used a death penalty discovery sanction to exclude all the couple's evidence before trial.

  • April 30, 2026

    Texas Court Rules Atty Can't Dodge Billionaire's Fraud Claims

    A Texas appeals court kept intact a suit brought by the billionaire co-founder of Rackspace Technology Inc. alleging his former attorney aided his wife in a "contentious" divorce, saying Thursday that the attorney can't use the state's anti-SLAPP law to evade the suit.

  • April 30, 2026

    Ga. Panel Scraps Sanctions Over Special Master's Unpaid Bill

    A Georgia appellate panel threw out Thursday a contempt order entered against plaintiffs suing a host of chemical companies for toxic tort claims after they failed to pay a special master's legal fees, ruling that a trial court wrongly disregarded their protests that they couldn't afford his services.

  • April 30, 2026

    Jones Day Beats Sanctions Bid In $2M Fee Dispute

    An Illinois state judge has ruled that Jones Day can pursue punitive damages on several of its claims in a lawsuit alleging a former client made a series of unlawful transactions to avoid paying over $2 million in legal fees, and also denied sanctions sought by the ex-client against the firm.

  • April 30, 2026

    Cannabis Dispute Ends With Plaintiff Co. Facing $1.34M Default

    A California state court snuffed out a Los Angeles cannabis company's fraud lawsuit against its investors and landlords, which were accused of stealing $40 million and wrecking its cannabis license, opening the door for the ex-business partners to score a $1.34 million default judgment.

  • April 30, 2026

    'Christian Witch' Says Jenner & Block Must Face Vax Bias Suit

    A former Jenner & Block LLP employee told an Illinois federal judge that she didn't need to disclose that she's a "Christian witch" in order to seek an exemption to the law firm's COVID-19 vaccine requirement, urging the court to reject her ex-employer's bid to toss the case.

  • April 30, 2026

    Ex-Shareholders, Reed Smith Seek End To Eletson Suit

    Former shareholders of Eletson Holdings on Thursday joined with their ex-Eletson counsel at Reed Smith to ask a New York bankruptcy judge to dismiss a suit claiming they had schemed to seize control of Eletson assets in defiance of the company's Chapter 11 plan.

  • April 30, 2026

    Netflix's 'Tiger King' Funeral Clip Was Fair Use, 10th Circ. Says

    The Tenth Circuit on Thursday said Netflix Inc. made fair use of a minutelong funeral clip in its popular "Tiger King" docuseries, holding in a precedential opinion that the streaming platform's use of the footage was "significantly transformative," departing from its earlier ruling that reached the opposite conclusion.

  • April 30, 2026

    Ex-Husch Blackwell Partner Urges Discovery In ERISA Dispute

    A former Husch Blackwell LLP partner has urged a Missouri federal court to ignore the firm's request for summary judgment in a dispute over employee retirement benefits, arguing discovery should proceed in the proposed class action.

  • April 30, 2026

    Ga. Lawyer Says Fraud Coverage Ruling Misread State Law

    A Georgia attorney on Wednesday urged a federal judge to undo a recent ruling declaring his professional liability insurer doesn't owe him coverage in an underlying lawsuit alleging the lawyer schemed with a client to enrich themselves, arguing the court erred by finding his alleged conduct didn't fall under the policy.

Expert Analysis

  • Navigating AI In The Legal Industry

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    As artificial intelligence becomes an increasingly integral part of legal practice, Law360 guest commentary this year examined evolving ethical obligations, how the plaintiffs bar is using AI to level the playing field against corporate defense teams, and the attendant risks of adoption.

  • How Fractional GCs Can Manage Risks Of Engagement

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    As more organizations eliminate their in-house legal departments in favor of outsourcing legal work, fractional general counsel roles offer practitioners an engaging and flexible way to practice at a high level, but they can also present legal, ethical and operational risks that must be proactively managed, say attorneys at Boies Schiller.

  • Health, Legal Employers Face Unique Online Speech Hurdles

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    Employers in the legal and healthcare industries must consider distinctive ethical obligations and professional requirements when disciplining employees for social media posts, while anticipating an area of the law in flux as courts seek to balance speech rights and the workplace function, say attorneys at FordHarrison.

  • Series

    Nature Photography Makes Me A Better Lawyer

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    Nature photography reminds me to focus on what is in front of me and to slow down to achieve success, and, in embracing the value of viewing situations through different lenses, offers skills transferable to the practice of law, says Brian Willett at Saul Ewing.

  • Series

    Law School's Missed Lessons: Practical Problem Solving

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    Issue-spotting skills are well honed in law school, but practicing attorneys must also identify clients’ problems and true goals, and then be able to provide solutions, says Mary Kate Hogan at Quarles & Brady.

  • Opinion

    A Uniform Federal Rule Would Curb Gen AI Missteps In Court

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    To address the patchwork of courts’ standing orders on generative artificial intelligence, curbing abuses and relieving the burden on judges, the federal judiciary should consider amending its civil procedure rules to require litigants to certify they’ve reviewed legal filings for accuracy, say attorneys at Shook Hardy.

  • 3 Defense Strategies For Sporadically Prosecuted Conduct

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    Not to be confused with selective prosecutions, sporadic prosecutions — charging someone for conduct many others do without consequences — can be challenging to defend, but focusing on materiality, prosecutorial motivations and public opinion can be a winning strategy, says Jonathan Porter at Husch Blackwell.

  • Series

    The Law Firm Merger Diaries: Integrating Practice Groups

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    Enacting unified leadership and consistent client service standards ensures law firm practice groups connect and collaborate around shared goals, turning a law firm merger into a platform for growth rather than a period of disruption, says Brian Catlett at Fennemore Craig.

  • Opinion

    Supreme Court Term Limits Would Carry Hidden Risk

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    While proposals for limiting the terms of U.S. Supreme Court justices are popular, a steady stream of relatively young, highly marketable ex-justices with unique knowledge and influence entering the marketplace of law and politics could create new problems, say Michael Broyde at Emory University and Hayden Hall at the U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the District of Delaware.

  • Series

    Knitting Makes Me A Better Lawyer

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    Stretching my skills as a knitter makes me a better antitrust attorney by challenging me to recalibrate after wrong turns, not rush outcomes, and trust that I can teach myself the skills to tackle new and difficult projects — even when I don’t have a pattern to work from, says Kara Kuritz at V&E.

  • Series

    The Biz Court Digest: Welcome To Miami

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    After nearly 20 years in operation, the Miami Complex Business Litigation Division is a pioneer upon which other jurisdictions in the state have been modeled, adopting many innovations to keep its cases running more efficiently and staffing experienced judges who are accustomed to hearing business disputes, say attorneys at King & Spalding.

  • What Law Firm Liability Risks In 2025 Signal For Year To Come

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    Trends and statistics reveal that law firms of all sizes and practice areas remained attractive litigation targets this year, so firms must take concrete steps to avoid professional liability risks in the year to come, say Douglas Richmond and Andrew Ricke at Lockton Companies.

  • AI Evidence Rule Tweaks Encourage Judicial Guardrails

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    Recent additions to a committee note on proposed Rule of Evidence 707 — governing evidence generated by artificial intelligence — seek to mitigate potential dangers that may arise once machine outputs are introduced at trial, encouraging judges to perform critical gatekeeping functions, say attorneys at Lankler Siffert & Wohl.

  • Series

    The Law Firm Merger Diaries: Getting The Message Across

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    Communications and brand strategy during a law firm merger represent a crucial thread that runs through every stage of a combination and should include clear messaging, leverage modern marketing tools and embrace the chance to evolve, says Ashley Horne at Womble Bond.

  • Opinion

    Horizontal Stare Decisis Should Not Be Casually Discarded

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    Eliminating the so-called law of the circuit doctrine — as recently proposed by a Fifth Circuit judge, echoing Justice Neil Gorsuch’s concurrence in Loper Bright — would undermine public confidence in the judiciary’s independence and create costly uncertainty for litigants, says Lawrence Bluestone at Genova Burns.

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