Shell, Enviro Group Ordered To 'Actually Speak For 4 Hours'

By Dorothy Atkins

An apparently frustrated Connecticut federal judge on Wednesday ordered Shell and an environmental advocacy group to try to resolve remaining disputes in Clean Water Act litigation before they appear before him again, ruling that counsel "must actually speak for four hours," and "time spent composing e-mails, even lengthy ones" doesn't count.

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NY Appeals Panel Doubts NYC's Climate Suit Can Be Revived

By Frank G. Runyeon

New York state appeals judges voiced skepticism Wednesday of New York City's bid to revive its lawsuit against major energy companies for "greenwashing" their gasoline products, highlighting the lack of alleged false claims and questioning whether they were even misleading.

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Energy Sec. Defends Grant Cuts To House Reps

By Gautama Mehta

U.S. Energy Secretary Chris Wright on Wednesday appeared to contradict statements from government attorneys who admitted that cancellations of clean energy grants were politically motivated, seeking to clarify instead the extent of the perceived political bias.

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Smaller Deals Drove US Private Equity In Q1 As Exits Slumped

By Al Barbarino

U.S. private equity dealmakers closed more transactions in the first quarter of 2026 than a year earlier but deployed less capital as exits plunged, signaling a shift to smaller deals amid heightened macroeconomic and geopolitical uncertainty.

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Brief

EU Announces Duties Against Imported Filament, Softwood

By Dylan Moroses

The European Commission announced antidumping duties Wednesday for imported glass fiber filament from Egypt, Bahrain and Thailand, as well as duties for imported softwood lumber from Brazil.

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Texas Can't Revive Anti-ESG Law While Appeal Plays Out

By Sarah Jarvis

A Texas federal judge refused to pause an injunction pending appeal on a state law restricting state investments in businesses that aim to reduce their reliance on fossil fuels, finding the law's language clearly intends to disfavor groups with certain viewpoints and is unlikely to survive appeal.

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Trade Group Shelves EPA Emissions Rule Fight For 6 Months

By Jared Foretek

The American Petroleum Institute is pausing its challenge to new power plant emissions standards for six months while the Environmental Protection Agency weighs the group's administrative petition for reconsideration, even as another energy trade group looks to oppose environmental and public health groups in their continuing fight against the standards.

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Mexican Businessman Cleared In Texas Pemex Bribes Case

By Bonnie Eslinger

A Texas federal judge has acquitted a Mexican businessman living in the U.S. whom a jury convicted of bribing foreign officials to secure business from Mexico's state-owned oil company, saying prosecutors didn't provide the translators who interpreted evidence at trial for cross-examination.

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V&E, Kirkland Advise On $650M Natural Gas Storage Sale

By Al Barbarino

Spire Inc. said Wednesday it has agreed to sell its natural gas storage assets in Wyoming and Oklahoma to global infrastructure investor I Squared Capital for $650 million.

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Oilfield Co. Required Worker LLCs, Denied OT, Suit Says

By Benjamin Morse

An oilfield services company misclassified workers as independent contractors and required them to create their own limited liability companies to continue working there, according to a proposed collective and class action filed in Colorado federal court.

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Judge Ices Calif. Climate Suit As Justices Mull Boulder Case

By Tom Lotshaw

A California state court judge has put on hold coordinated climate litigation that state and local governments have filed against oil and gas companies while the U.S. Supreme Court considers a similar case brought by the city and county of Boulder, Colorado.

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Electric Co-Op Denies Delaying Minn. Broadband Projects

By Christopher Cole

A regional electric cooperative has denied assertions that it has hindered pole improvements necessary for a broadband provider to fulfill its deployment obligations in Minnesota under the Federal Communications Commission's Rural Digital Opportunity Fund.

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Energy Tech Co., Execs Sued Over $2.4B AI Power Deal

By Katryna Perera

Energy technology company Babcock & Wilcox Enterprises Inc. and its top brass face an investor suit alleging they made misstatements about an agreement to deliver power to an artificial intelligence data center project and failed to disclose that B&W's largest shareholder was on both sides of the deal.

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Solar Co. Freedom Forever Hits Ch. 11 With Over $500M Debt

By Rick Archer

California-based home solar panel installer Freedom Forever filed for Chapter 11 protection in Delaware bankruptcy court Wednesday with more than $500 million in debt, including $114 million owed to residential solar panel financing firm Mosaic.

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Alaska's Pebble Mine Allies Say EPA Project Veto Is Illegal

By Joyce Hanson

Two Alaska Native groups, the state and a mining company have urged a federal judge to vacate a U.S. Environmental Protection Agency veto blocking a proposed mineral project that could harm salmon populations, saying the EPA overstepped its authority under the Clean Water Act.

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The 2026 Lawyer Satisfaction Survey: Where Do You Stand?

How is your work-life balance? Are you content with your compensation and opportunities for advancement at work? Take the 2026 Law360 Lawyer Satisfaction Survey and share your thoughts.

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Opinion

CBP's $166B Tariff Refund Portal Needs 4 Safeguards

Before launching its automated web portal to process tariff-refund disbursements on April 20, U.S. Customs and Border Protection should apply the expensive lessons learned from the pandemic-era employee retention credit, says Peter Gariepy at RubinBrown.

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Decoding Arbitral Disputes: Tracing Paths To Award Recovery

Recent subpoenas to Adidas and Hilton deployed in Blasket Renewables v. Spain, pending in D.C. federal court, show arbitration award recovery to be a disciplined exercise in constructing visibility, applying pressure and sequencing procedural advantage, says Josep Galvez at 4-5 Gray's Inn Square.

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Meta, Uber Verdicts Top Product Liability Trials

By Emily Field

So far this year, juries have delivered landmark verdicts against Meta and Google in pending litigation over whether major social media companies design platforms that ultimately harm young users. Uber also saw a defeat in the first federal bellwether to go to a jury over its liability for assaults committed by its drivers earlier this year, and opening arguments started this week in the second trial in another sexual assault case brought by a rider. Here are the highlights of verdicts that topped headlines so far into 2026.

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Analysis

Bondi's Contempt Defenses Are Strong, But Not Without Risk

By Phillip Bantz

Former U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi currently has some potentially powerful defenses against Congress' relatively limited abilities to force her to comply with a subpoena to be deposed under oath about the Epstein files, but her exposure to being held in criminal contempt could shift with the political winds, experts said.

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Calif. Lawyer Sues Over State Bar Investigations

By Andrea Keckley

A California trial lawyer claimed in a federal lawsuit filed Wednesday that he has been unfairly investigated by the state bar since 2019, alleging the office "illegally prioritizes revenue-generation over protection of the public."

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Analysis

AGs' Win Over Live Nation Leaves DOJ Watching From The Side

By Bryan Koenig

Live Nation Entertainment Inc.'s across-the-board trial rout by 34 state attorneys general underscores the ascendancy of state antitrust enforcers looking to fill perceived enforcement gaps left by the U.S. Department of Justice during President Donald Trump's second term.

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NJ US Atty's Office Turmoil Doesn't Nix Conviction, Judge Rules

By Carla Baranauckas

A federal judge on Thursday rejected a New Jersey criminal defendant's attempt to dismiss his conviction and disqualify the state's top federal prosecutor, holding that the appointment of the current U.S. attorney complies with federal law and that any earlier defects in leadership do not warrant dismissal.

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Ramey Says Sanctions Violation Was 'Misunderstanding'

By Elliot Weld

William Ramey, an intellectual property attorney sanctioned in several federal jurisdictions, told a California federal judge Thursday that any violations of a previous sanctions order regarding his ability to practice law in the state were due to "good-faith misunderstanding of the scope of the court's order — not willful disregard."

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Judge Doubts Broad Shift In Immigration Hearing Access

By Jared Foretek

A D.C. federal judge appeared unconvinced Thursday by a human rights group's claim that the public is getting less access to immigration court hearings in Minnesota during the second Trump administration.

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Optimum Defends Antitrust Suit Against Apollo, BlackRock

By Alex Wittenberg

Apollo, Ares, BlackRock and other financial giants are colluding to block Optimum Communications Inc. from negotiating a debt refinancing to avert bankruptcy, acting as a "cartel" and locking Optimum out of credit markets, Optimum said in a brief opposing the investors' bid to dismiss its antitrust suit in New York.

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Sentencing Commission Votes To Enact Modest Reform Agenda

By Stewart Bishop

The U.S. Sentencing Commission on Thursday voted to enact multiple revisions to the federal sentencing guidelines, including the first inflationary adjustment in over a decade for calculating penalties for economic crimes, but declined to take action on a series of more transformational changes that were under consideration.

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