Goodyear Narrows But Can't End Nicotine Fee Suit

By Patrick Hoff

Goodyear failed to snuff out a proposed class action alleging employees who used nicotine were unlawfully charged more to obtain health benefits, with an Ohio federal judge ruling Thursday that workers had plausibly alleged plan documents omitted key information about avoiding the surcharge.

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Coal Co. Settles Fight With Miners Over Lifetime Benefits

By Grace Elletson

Consol Energy Inc. has reached a settlement with retired miners who claimed the company reneged on promises to provide them health benefits for life, months after the Fourth Circuit declined to scrap a bench trial judgment that awarded lifetime benefits to a pair of ex-miners but denied class claims.

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Brief

Airlines, Colo. Propose Trial Dates In Sick Leave Law Case

By MJ Koo

An airline industry trade group and a Colorado labor official told a federal judge they see virtually no chance of settling the group's lawsuit over whether a state paid sick leave law applies to airline workers, proposing trial dates for early 2027 and offering competing lengths for the proceeding.

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2 More Sentenced In $11M Amtrak Health Fraud Scheme

By George Woolston

A former Amtrak employee and a New York podiatrist have been sentenced to prison for their roles in a scheme that prosecutors claim defrauded the rail carrier out of $11 million in health benefits, the U.S. attorney's office in New Jersey said.

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Pa. Justices To Hear Philly's Suit Over Opioid-Spurred Crime

By P.J. D'Annunzio

The Pennsylvania Supreme Court has agreed to weigh in on whether the city of Philadelphia can sue CVS Pharmacy Inc. and other stores under state public nuisance laws for allegedly exacerbating the opioid epidemic with their prescription drug sales.

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Series

Mentalism Makes Me A Better Lawyer

Convincing strangers I can read their minds may seem like an unusual second career for a legal practitioner, but both disciplines share several important requirements, including trust and preparation, says Warren Biro at Manatt.

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Squire Patton, Holland & Knight Report Data Breaches

By Jake Maher

Squire Patton Boggs LLP and Holland & Knight LLP were hit with cyberattacks exposing sensitive information, according to disclosures filed this week.

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Up Next At High Court: Criminal Sentences & Video Privacy

By Katie Buehler

The U.S. Supreme Court will close out its October sitting by hearing oral arguments in two cases that ask what level of deference federal district courts should give to commentary interpreting the federal sentencing guidelines, and what purchases are protected under a video consumer privacy statute.

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DOJ Aims To 'Attack Fraud From All Angles' Via New Division

By Sarah Jarvis

The U.S. Department of Justice's new fraud division has issued fresh guidance on its prosecution methodology, with the division's head directing prosecutors to seize assets before indictments and pursue upward variances in sentencing guidelines in some cases as part of a stated push to use the division's "full arsenal of criminal statutes" in combating fraud.

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Ill. Judge Lays Out Doc Demands For DOJ Misconduct Probe

By Lauraann Wood

An Illinois federal judge asked the government Friday to turn over six months of communications and certain other records as she investigates in-court inaccuracies Chicago prosecutors offered while prosecuting six anti-immigration protesters, rejecting its request to seal a filing in the process.

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Atty With False AI Citation Filings Ordered To Pay $39K

By Bonnie Eslinger

A New York federal judge who imposed case-terminating sanctions on an attorney who submitted filings with false citations generated by artificial intelligence ordered him on Friday to pay nearly $39,000 to lawyers who uncovered the problematic AI use, noting he had given them the "runaround" when they tried to collect directly.

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Grassley Attacks Dems' Claims Of Rule-Breaking Over Hearing

By Courtney Bublé

Sen. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, chair of the Senate Judiciary Committee, clapped back at Democrats for their accusations that Republicans broke Senate rules during a hearing last week at which former special counsel Jack Smith appeared.

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Calif. Jurists' Atty Tips: 'Emulate Lincoln,' 'Don't Be Boring'

By Bonnie Eslinger

Three current and former Northern California federal judges and one Morrison Foerster LLP partner during a Federal Bar Association panel discussion Thursday gave attorneys tips on "courtroom persuasion," including knowing the judges, keeping things interesting and, like the nation's 16th president, getting quickly to the winning point.

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Brief

Legal Services NYC Gets $2.5M To Build Novel Resource Hub

By Tracey Read

Legal Services NYC announced Friday that it has been awarded a $2.5 million grant from the New York State Interest on Lawyer Account Fund to create a first-of-its-kind statewide knowledge-sharing platform to help legal advocates spend more time seeking justice for low-income clients.

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GC Cheat Sheet: The Hottest Corporate News Of The Week

By Sue Reisinger

The new federal fraud division is threatening faster action and broader targets under a new enforcement policy announced recently. And the SEC warned shareholder advocacy groups that join forces could face legal scrutiny in the future. These are some of the stories in corporate legal news you may have missed in the past week.​

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Law360's Legal Lions Of The Week

By Kevin Penton

Quinn Emanuel Urquhart & Sullivan LLP, Sullivan & Cromwell LLP and Alston & Bird LLP lead this week's edition of Law360 Legal Lions, after the Sixth Circuit overturned a pivotal decision in multidistrict opioid litigation that had dramatically expanded claims against the nation's largest pharmacy benefit managers.

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Roundup

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

By Megan Norcott

The past week in London has seen PrivatBank sue its former oligarch owner, building materials provider Kingspan face a €100 million ($112 million) claim over Grenfell Tower cladding and energy giants VaroPreem and Viaro Energy become embroiled in an intellectual property row.

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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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