Judge Skeptical Of Bid To Toss FTC's Zillow, Redfin Case

By Matthew Perlman

A Virginia federal judge seemed skeptical on Wednesday as Zillow Group Inc. and Redfin Corp. pushed their bid to toss the Federal Trade Commission's case over an alleged agreement between the real estate listing companies to not compete for rental ads.

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Live Nation Judge Not 'Inclined' To Delay Trial For Appeal

By Pete Brush

A Manhattan federal judge said Wednesday he is likely to deny counsel for Live Nation's request to appeal rulings sending the government's monopolization claims to trial, after antitrust regulators called that request a "desperate plea" for a delay.

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Amazon, DC AG Delay Antitrust Trial, Again

By Jared Foretek

A local D.C. judge has agreed to delay trial in the city's antitrust lawsuit against Amazon once again, pushing the scheduled start next year from May to September, with the two sides citing the government shutdown's impact on a related Federal Trade Commission case as the cause for the hold-up.

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$17.9M Drug Price-Fixing Deal Advances Despite Objections

By Aaron Keller

A Connecticut federal judge on Wednesday advanced a $17.9 million generic drug price-fixing settlement between 48 states and territories and pharmaceutical companies Bausch Health US LLC, Bausch Health Americas Inc. and Lannett Co. Inc., sidelining objections by consumers suing separately in a Pennsylvania multidistrict litigation case.

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Netflix Swaps Out Latham For Munger Tolles In Antitrust Suit

By Bonnie Eslinger

Latham & Watkins LLP withdrew Wednesday as defense counsel for Netflix in a proposed consumer class action in Illinois federal court claiming Meta cut an illegal deal ceding the video streaming market to Netflix, which is now represented by Munger Tolles & Olson LLP.

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Dems Demand Explanation For DOJ Antitrust Chief's Exit

By Lauren Berg

Two Democrats on the House Judiciary Committee demanded Wednesday that U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi explain to lawmakers why the U.S. Department of Justice's antitrust chief was forced to resign, expressing concern about the administration's potential interference with merger reviews and antitrust litigation.

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Cox Tells Calif. It Needs Final Ruling On Charter By July

By Nadia Dreid

Cable behemoth Cox Communications has told the California Public Utilities Commission that it needs a final decision by July on its $34.5 billion merger with Charter so that the companies have time to close the deal before their federal merger clearance period expires.

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EU, UK To Share Info On 'Significant' Antitrust Probes

By Bryan Koenig

British and European Union officials signed a new agreement Wednesday promising to notify each other of major merger and antitrust probes and coordinate their efforts "when necessary," in what they called the first dedicated competition cooperation agreement following the United Kingdom's withdrawal from the EU.

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Google Wins Second Shot To Trim £14B Ad Tech Class Action

By William Janes

Google won a second shot on Wednesday at trimming a £13.6 billion ($18.4 billion) U.K. class action on behalf of website and application publishers who alleged that the U.S. tech giant abused its dominance in the advertising market.

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NCAA Settling Tennis Players' Prize Money Class Action

By Tom Lotshaw

Two tennis players asked a North Carolina federal judge to put class action litigation accusing the NCAA of violating antitrust laws by stopping college athletes from accepting prize money in outside tournaments on hold while the parties hash out a settlement agreement.

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Joe Gibbs Racing Seeks Injunction Against Ex-Director, Rival

By Abigail Harrison

NASCAR giant Joe Gibbs Racing LLC is urging a North Carolina federal court to hand it a temporary restraining order and preliminary injunction that will prevent its ex-competition director from using its trade secrets to benefit a direct competitor.

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Grand Slams Can't Break Away From Suit, Tennis Players Say

By David Steele

Tennis Grand Slam tournament operators are too entrenched in the system of alleged mistreatment of players to be separated from those allegations against the sport's governing bodies, the players told a New York federal court in opposing the tournament organizers' bid to escape their lawsuit.

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Talent Shop Hits Back Against UFC Fighters' Discovery Claims

By Tom Lotshaw

A sports talent agency told a Nevada federal judge that it can't be held in contempt for violating a discovery order when it has worked to address real challenges with providing information to fighters who accuse Ultimate Fighting Championship of suppressing wages.

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It's Kickoff Time For FCC Look At Sports Media Marketplace

By Christopher Cole

Sports streaming's rise and the impact of a fragmenting sports programming marketplace on local broadcasters will get new attention from regulators at the Federal Communications Commission.

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Considering The Prospects Of A Robinson-Patman Act Revival

Following a flurry of activity under the Biden administration, Federal Trade Commission price-discrimination cases under the Robinson-Patman Act are at a crossroads, and state-level enforcement could become the next frontier in this area, say attorneys at Hogan Lovells.

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Rebuttal

Substantial Legal Grounds Supported HPE-Juniper Challenge

A recent Law360 guest article argued that the Hewlett Packard-Juniper Networks settlement was part of a trend of antitrust agencies reanchoring themselves in evidence by resisting ill-founded merger challenges, but the complaint against HPE-Juniper actually relied on substantial legal grounds and modern analytical frameworks, says attorney Richard Wolfram.

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AI Trade Secret Conviction Highlights Espionage Risks

A California federal court's conviction last month of an ex-Google engineer who stole artificial intelligence trade secrets for the benefit of China is the latest in a series of foreign economic espionage cases and illustrates the urgent need for U.S. companies to implement robust security measures, says attorney Peter Toren.

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How Epstein Referred Clients To BigLaw Partners In His Orbit

By Aebra Coe

Billionaire and child sex offender Jeffrey Epstein always had top lawyers in his orbit. He also had extensive and lasting relationships with several partners at BigLaw firms, files newly released by the Department of Justice show.

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Goldstein Placed Under Home Confinement Until Sentencing

By Jared Foretek

SCOTUSblog founder Thomas Goldstein was placed under home confinement by a Maryland federal judge until his sentencing, but will likely be able to keep his $3 million D.C. home after the jury that convicted him separately found there wasn't a clear nexus between the property and his mortgage fraud conviction.

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'One Way Or Another, ICE Will Comply,' Minn. Judge Vows

By Lauren Berg

The Minnesota federal court's chief judge who admonished U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement for violating nearly 100 court orders concerning the Trump administration's immigration operations in the state vowed Thursday "to do whatever is required to protect the rule of law," including holding government officials in criminal contempt.

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IRS Broke Law 42K Times By Giving Info To ICE, Judge Says

By Anna Scott Farrell

The federal judge who stopped the Internal Revenue Service from sharing taxpayer addresses with immigration authorities said Thursday that a recent admission by the agency showed that it broke the law more than 42,000 times last summer when it disclosed addresses by relying on a computerized matching system.

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Calif. Atty Agrees To Discipline From State Bar Over AI Errors

By Hailey Konnath

A Los Angeles attorney has agreed to be disciplined for filing appellate briefs rife with artificial intelligence-hallucinated case law quotations, according to a stipulation approved Wednesday by the California State Bar Court, which found that he "recklessly and with gross negligence failed to perform legal services with competence."

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Reed Smith Says Atty Can't Expand Pay Bias Damages Period

By Grace Elletson

Reed Smith LLP is urging a New Jersey state court to rule that an attorney who claimed the firm unlawfully underpaid her cannot expand the time window for which she's seeking damages, arguing a legal doctrine used to revive continuing claims can't be used to collect back pay.

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Feds Seek To Toss DOJ Official's Suit Over Epstein-Talk Firing

By Lynn LaRowe

The U.S. Department of Justice has asked a D.C. federal court to ax a wrongful termination lawsuit brought by a former DOJ official who was fired after he was surreptitiously filmed talking about Jeffrey Epstein on what he thought was a date, saying district courts don't have jurisdiction and the matter belongs in front of the Merit Systems Protection Board.

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Atty Owns 'Sloppy' Incorrect Citations Before Texas Justices

By José Luis Martínez

A Houston attorney told a Texas appellate panel Thursday that incorrect case citations in his brief were "sloppy" and "embarrassing," taking responsibility for errors that included nonexistent cases and inaccurate quotations.

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Brief

Senate Judiciary Advances Illinois US Atty

By Nadia Dreid

The Senate Judiciary Committee advanced the nomination of Gregory Gilmore to be U.S. attorney for the Central District of Illinois in a quick vote that passed without comment.

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