Seeger Weiss, Motley Rice Want $675M In Bayer Deal Fees

By Hailey Konnath

Plaintiffs attorneys with Seeger Weiss LLP, Motley Rice LLC, Ketchmark & McCreight PC, Holland Law Firm, Williams Hart Boundas LLP and Waters Kraus Paul & Siegel have asked for a fee award of $675 million for their work on the $7.25 billion Roundup settlement with Bayer AG, according to a petition.

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Celgene Gets Final OK For $239M Deal, Atty Fees

By Emilie Ruscoe

Investors in biopharmaceutical company Celgene Corp. have gotten a final nod for their $239 million deal to end proposed class claims that the company overstated commercial prospects for two of its drugs, and the investors' four-firm legal team will get fees and costs of nearly $57.3 million for their work on the case.

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Authors Accuse OpenAI Of Arguing Differently On Each Coast

By Elliot Weld

An attorney representing authors accusing OpenAI of feeding their copyrighted works into training data for large language models told a New York federal magistrate judge Tuesday that the AI startup was asserting vastly different positions in New York and in an ongoing trial in California about whether it ever intended to become a for-profit enterprise.

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Bernstein Litowitz Client Wins Battle To Lead Kyndryl Suit

By Sydney Price

Bernstein Litowitz Berger & Grossmann LLP will lead a proposed class of investors accusing information technology services company and IBM spinoff Kyndryl Holdings Inc. of misleading shareholders with representations that the company had sufficient control over its cash management practices, a Manhattan federal judge said on Tuesday.

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Mich. Cannabis Dispensary Chain Calls Tip Suit 'Frivolous'

By Benjamin Morse

A cannabis retailer and one of its co-owners urged a Michigan federal court to toss a proposed collective action accusing the company of improperly confiscating employee tips, calling the suit "frivolous" and denying any unlawful tip-pooling practices.

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NextEra Cuts $9.5M Deal In Nuclear Power Wage-Fixing Case

By Hailey Konnath

NextEra Energy has agreed to shell out $9.5 million to put to rest proposed class action allegations it conspired with other nuclear energy producers to fix wages, according to a notice filed Tuesday in Maryland federal court.

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Alaska Airlines Strikes Deal In Military Pilots' Leave Suit

By Grace Elletson

Alaska Airlines has agreed to settle a pilot's class action claiming the company didn't let employees on military leave accrue the same amount of sick and vacation time benefits civilian employees collected on other types of leave, according to a Washington federal court filing.

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Quotient Investors Seek Approval Of $48M Merger Deal

By Jarek Rutz

Investors in Coupons.com parent Quotient Technology Inc. have asked Delaware's Chancery Court to approve a $48 million settlement resolving claims that the company's former CEO, its financial adviser and the buyers steered Quotient's $430 million sale to Neptune Retail Solutions at too low a price.

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NJ Court Not Sure Bristol-Myers Investor Pled Negligence

By George Woolston

A New Jersey appellate panel on Tuesday pushed back on an investor's insistence that his complaint over Bristol-Myers Squibb's $74 billion acquisition of Celgene satisfied pleading standards for securities lawsuits, echoing a trial court judge's concern that claims of disclosure requirement shortfalls sounded more in fraud than negligence.

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Elanco On Hook For Bulk Of $9M Flea & Tick Meds Deal

By Bryan Koenig

Elanco Animal Health Inc. will pay $6.75 million while Petco, PetSmart, Chewy, Petsense and PetMeds are all on the hook for six-figure payouts under a settlement Tuesday resolving lawsuits accusing Elanco of paying pet supply retailers not to stock generic versions of its Advantix topical flea and tick prevention drug.

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Zillow Fights Buyers' Effort To Revise Home Loan Lawsuit

By Grace Dixon

Zillow told a Washington federal court that homebuyers should not be allowed to amend their complaint alleging the real estate platform used its market dominance to inflate costs nationwide, arguing the late changes cure none of the deficiencies in the buyers' claims.

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​​​​​​​Amazon Beats Sanctions Bid Over Supplement Product Pages

By Ben Adlin

A Washington federal judge declined to sanction Amazon for allegedly failing to preserve product pages for dietary supplements that shoppers claim were improperly labeled, ruling that the retail giant fulfilled its duty to retain the information despite storing it as lines of code instead of viewable documents.

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3rd Circ. Says Financial Services Rule Thwarts Privacy Suit

By P.J. D'Annunzio

The Third Circuit declined to reinstate class claims made by a group of John Hancock customers from Illinois accusing Amazon Web Services Inc. and Pindrop Security Inc. of collecting consumers' voice data without their consent, ruling Tuesday that exemptions under Illinois and federal law applied.

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Cigna Says HIPAA Doesn't Save Website Privacy Suit

By Matthew Santoni

A proposed group of Cigna health plan participants can't cite HIPAA to keep up their claims that the insurer improperly tracked their private information through its websites, since the privacy law doesn't cover the kind of information the company collected, the insurer told a Pennsylvania federal court.

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Royal Caribbean Says Judge Misread Arb. Law In Voyeur Suit

By Mike Curley

Royal Caribbean Cruises Ltd. is urging a Florida federal court to reject a magistrate judge's report recommending that a proposed class action over a former crew member's hidden camera voyeurism not go to arbitration, saying the magistrate judge misread maritime law.

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Bitcoin Depot Allowed Crypto Scam Via ATMs, Couple Says

By Zak Kostro

Bitcoin Depot systematically facilitated fraud involving cryptocurrency through its bitcoin ATM network, which targeted consumers who have lost thousands of dollars through the machines, according to a proposed class action in Idaho federal court brought by a couple who alleged they fell victim to such a scam.

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Tribal Lender Says Immunity Bars Putative RICO Class Action

By Joyce Hanson

A tribal lending company alongside its officers and members of the Big Valley Band of Pomo Indians of the Big Valley Rancheria have asked a North Carolina federal judge to toss a proposed class action against it, arguing the predatory loan suit can't survive.

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Brief

Tobacco Giant RJ Reynolds Sued Over Telemarketing Texts

By Abigail Harrison

Cigarette and e-cigarette giant R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Holdings Inc. was accused in North Carolina federal court of violating federal law by texting residential telephone numbers listed on the National Do Not Call Registry.

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Google, Meta Hit With Suits Over Use Of Voices For AI

By Adam Lidgett

A group of journalists and voice actors has hit Google, Meta, Microsoft, chipmaking giant Nvidia and speech synthesis software company ElevenLabs with proposed class actions in Illinois federal court accusing the companies of wrongly using the plaintiffs' voices to train their artificial intelligence models.

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Under Armour Says Insurers Shouldn't Get Repayment Interest

By Hope Patti

Under Armour told a Maryland federal court that the insurers it reimbursed after the Fourth Circuit capped its coverage for a securities class action, government investigations and derivative matters at $100 million are not entitled to millions of dollars in prejudgment interest.

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Florida Court Won't Stay Everglades Site Atty Access Order

By Ganesh Setty

A Florida federal judge has rejected Gov. Ron DeSantis' bid to stay her preliminary injunction requiring noncitizens detained at the South Florida Detention Facility to have outgoing phone access to legal counsel, finding that his motion merely repeated prior arguments.

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Detainees Fight GEO's 'Second Bite' Quick Appeal Bid

By Benjamin Morse

A group of former immigrant detainees urged a Colorado federal judge to reject The GEO Group Inc.'s latest bid for a quick appeal in a forced labor class action, arguing the company is trying to relitigate a years-old ruling.

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Judge Won't Toss Boston Property Tax Retaliation Claims

By Carolyn Muyskens

Boston must face a proposed class action accusing the city of inflating the valuations of some properties after owners appealed their tax bills, a state court judge has ruled.

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Ga. Atty Seeks Judge's Recusal From Discrimination Suit

By Emily Johnson

A lawyer said a Georgia federal judge should recuse herself because she has shown favor to the defendants through her decisions in a proposed class action alleging a pattern of racial discrimination in the attorney's State Bar of Georgia's discipline case.

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Fox Rothschild Adds Trial Partner From Nelson Mullins In Fla.

By Madison Arnold

Fox Rothschild LLP has expanded its litigation department in West Palm Beach, Florida, with a new partner from Nelson Mullins Riley & Scarborough LLP.

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Operational AI Washing: A New Securities Class Action

In rising claims of operational AI washing — plaintiffs alleging that artificial intelligence was invoked to explain corporate business decisions in ways that may obscure underlying financial distress — earnings calls, restructuring disclosures and board-level communications will serve as key defense evidence, say attorneys at Akerman.

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Mass. Draft Regs Signal Nationwide Scrutiny Of Junk Fees

Massachusetts Attorney General Andrea Campbell's new draft regulations for assisted living facilities is only her latest move in the war on junk fees — and part of a national reordering of consumer protection enforcement in which states are aggressively and creatively asserting authority, says Steve Provazza at Arnall Golden.

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4 Emerging Approaches To AI Protective Order Language

Over the last year, at least five federal district courts have issued or analyzed specific protective order provisions restricting the use of generative artificial intelligence platforms with protected materials, establishing that proactive AI-specific provisions are now standard practice and demonstrating that no single model works for every case, says Joel Bush at Kilpatrick.

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Murdaugh Murder Conviction Overturned By SC High Court

By Parker Quinlan

The South Carolina Supreme Court on Wednesday overturned a double murder conviction and ordered a new trial for disgraced attorney Alex Murdaugh, finding the jury in his first trial was biased by a clerk of court who allegedly sought a guilty verdict in a ploy to juice sales of her book about the trial.

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Texas Atty Must Pay $5M For Groping Opposing Counsel

By Lynn LaRowe

A Texas state appellate court on Wednesday refused to disturb a $5 million jury verdict against a San Antonio lawyer for grabbing the buttocks of opposing counsel at the courthouse where they were arguing a family law proceeding in 2019.

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DOJ Goes After DC Bar, Courts For Discipline Of Ex-DOJ Atty

By Hailey Konnath

The U.S. Department of Justice on Wednesday sued the D.C. Office of Disciplinary Counsel, D.C. Board on Professional Responsibility, D.C. Court of Appeals and the District of Columbia, claiming that they were "punishing" a former Trump administration DOJ official and trying to "control the executive branch."

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DOJ Fraud Division Set To Shake Up White-Collar Enforcement

By Phillip Bantz

President Donald Trump's administration created the U.S. Department of Justice's National Fraud Enforcement Division with a narrow focus on combating government program fraud, but a move to retain federal prosecutors focused on other types of fraud could signal a wider scope with potential ripple effects across white-collar enforcement.

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Arbitrators See Global Stakes In Trump BigLaw EO Fight

By Caroline Simson

Ahead of a D.C. Circuit hearing on Thursday in the Trump administration's effort to revive executive orders imposed against four BigLaw firms, an official at the College of Commercial Arbitrators told Law360 this week there are several things arbitrators are going to be watching for.

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Apple Targets Hagens Berman 'Gamesmanship' In ICloud Suit

By Bryan Koenig

Apple has lashed out at Hagens Berman Sobol Shapiro LLP for trying to withdraw a named plaintiff from an iCloud antitrust case in California federal court without discovery into any directions she received to preserve now-deleted emails, raising concerns that the withdrawal is meant to "paper over lost evidence."

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Michigan Federal Judge Gets Probation For Drunken Driving

By Susan Smiley

Michigan federal Judge Thomas L. Ludington was sentenced by a state judge Wednesday to six months probation and fined $1,175 in after pleading no contest to a misdemeanor drunken-driving charge last month in Emmet County.

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6th Circ. Says Kentucky Judicial Hopefuls May Tout Ideology

By Emily Sawicki

Kentucky judicial hopefuls are cleared to discuss their political leanings on the campaign trail, according to a precedential ruling by the Sixth Circuit, which permanently enjoined the state's Judicial Conduct Commission from pursuing an enforcement action against two candidates who described themselves as "conservatives" and "Republicans" amid the 2022 election season.

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Judge Says LegalForce Must Pay $93K After Losing TM Suit

By Elliot Weld

A California federal judge on Wednesday ordered LegalForce RAPC Worldwide PC to pay nearly $93,000 in fees and costs to the company that operates LawFirms.com, finding the case to be exceptional because LegalForce alleged facts it knew were false and took steps to obscure other facts that showed its case was meritless.

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CORRECTED: Senate Advances 13 US Attorneys In En Bloc Vote

By Courtney Bublé

The Senate voted 46-45, along party lines, to advance the nomination of 13 U.S. attorneys on Monday as part of a larger nominations package. Correction: A previous version of this article incorrectly stated the status of the nominees in the Senate.

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