Hormel Inks $1B Brakebush Deal In Long-Term Chicken Play

By Al Barbarino

Hormel Foods said Wednesday it has agreed to purchase a Wisconsin supplier of processed chicken to food-service establishments for more than $1 billion, with Faegre Drinker Biddle & Reath LLP advising Hormel and Michael Best & Friedrich LLP representing the seller.

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Icee Scores $23M In Slush Puppie Frozen Drink TM Fight

By Elliot Weld

Frozen drink company Icee was awarded $23 million in damages against rival Slush Puppie Ltd. by an Ohio federal judge who found that Slush Puppie had tried to divert customers to a product called Slushy Jack's and capitalize on Slush Puppie's brand recognition after selling the trademark rights to it.

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Monster Energy Bares Teeth Over Car Parts Co.'s Claw Mark

By Gina Kim

Monster Energy has accused Monster Transmission of copying its "M" logo, complete with the claw and scratch design and bright green-and-black color scheme, and trading on the energy drink company's recognition and goodwill in the motorsports and automotive industry.

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Baby Food Co. Will Keep Posting Test Results, Texas AG Says

By Jonathan Capriel

Baby food company Plum Organics has committed to continuing to publish heavy metal test results for its infant food products, according to a deal it signed with the Texas attorney general's office to end a state investigation.

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Trump's Rationale On Forced Labor Tariffs Misses, CIT Told

By Dylan Moroses

The U.S. Trade Representative's report justifying President Donald Trump's latest round of global tariffs based on imports produced with forced labor should prove insufficient, counsel for small businesses told a panel of U.S. Court of International Trade judges during oral arguments Wednesday.

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DOJ Calls Meat Plant Workers' Wage-Fixing Deals 'Inadequate'

By Bryan Koenig

The U.S. Department of Justice intervened Tuesday in Colorado federal court antitrust litigation accusing the country's largest meat producers of fixing wages at their beef and pork processing plants, arguing that the class action settlements resolving the case are insufficient because they do nothing to block future wage-fixing.

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Smithfield Foods Can't Escape EEOC Age Bias Suit

By Patrick Hoff

Meat processor Smithfield Foods must face a U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission lawsuit alleging it fired a senior sales employee because she was approaching 60, after a Georgia federal judge concluded that a jury should sort out the company's shifting explanations for letting her go.

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'Bikini Barista' Owner Asks Judge To Trim $1.8M Award

By Benjamin Morse

The owner of Beehive Espresso, which operates Seattle-area kiosks known as bikini barista coffee stands, asked a state judge to rethink a $1.86 million judgment for baristas, arguing that the court imposed uniform assumptions about unpaid work and employee cash contributions without showing those figures reliably applied across the class.

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Water Co. Escapes Consumer Protection Claim In PFAS Case

By Brian Steele

A proposed class of Connecticut Water Co. customers who allege their drinking water was contaminated with toxic forever chemicals cannot bring a claim for unfair trade practices because they are already suing under an exclusive product liability law, a state court judge has ruled.

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Berkshire Units Face Claims Of Bad Faith Over $36M Verdict

By Danielle Ferguson

A pair of Berkshire Hathaway insurers acted in bad faith by refusing to settle a personal injury suit within $3 million limits before a jury trial ended in a $36 million verdict against a property owner and its grocery store tenant, the owner told a New York federal court.

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Hemp Interests Say Texas THC Rule Defies Federal Law

By Sam Reisman

A trio of hemp interests challenging a Texas policy redesignating intoxicating hemp products as Schedule I substances have urged a federal judge to declare that the policy is both preempted by federal law and inconsistent with Texas state law.

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Dropbox Fights Sanctions Bid After Being Cleared In IP Case

By Adam Lidgett

Dropbox is arguing that a licensing company is asking for "completely unprecedented" sanctions over claims that Dropbox submitted new, undisclosed expert opinions at a 2023 trial where a jury cleared the online file-sharing company of infringement allegations.

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AI Meeting Recaps Pose New Discovery And Privilege Risks

The New York City Bar Association’s recent ethics opinion, cautioning attorneys not to record nonclient conversations with artificial intelligence tools, reflects an emerging view that AI meeting recaps are now a distinct business record category, meaning counsel should set meeting-level controls and apply framework-level updates, says William Wright at Faegre Drinker.

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The Law360 Pulse Prestige Leaders: A Look At The Top Firms

Today's most prestigious firms attract top talent and marquee clients while posting record profits. Here's a look at the top 10 firms in this year's Law360 Pulse Prestige Leaders, a ranking of the firms that stand out for their prominence, power and distinction.

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DOJ Accuses Judges Of Ethics Violations With Press Remarks

By Jack Karp

Several Minnesota federal judges ran afoul of their ethical obligations when they commented on President Donald Trump's immigration policies in a recent news article, the U.S. Department of Justice said in a judicial misconduct complaint filed Wednesday.

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Federal Bar Discussion Looks At Courts' Role In Regulating AI

By Bonnie Eslinger

A Federal Bar Association discussion Wednesday in California about AI and how it will be regulated in the United States prompted the Northern District's new chief judge to ask whether Congress' "inability to pass laws" will leave it to the courts "to figure out how we're going to do this."

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DOJ Atty Picked For Judgeship Probed On Fulton County Raid

By Courtney Bublé

A top U.S. Department of Justice official tapped for a federal judgeship faced questions from Democratic lawmakers on Wednesday about the department's investigation in Fulton County, Georgia, over Trump's allegations of fraud in the 2020 election.

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Texas AG Says ABA Stifling Law School Competition

By Spencer Brewer

The Texas Attorney General announced an investigation into the American Bar Association relating to alleged anticompetitive conduct in the association's accreditation of law schools, claiming Wednesday that the ABA "weaponized its accreditation authority" to push "unconstitutional racial and gender preference requirements."

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Sen. Blackburn Sues Smith For Seizing Phone Records

By James Boyle

U.S. Sen. Marsha Blackburn alleges in a federal complaint filed Wednesday that Jack Smith illegally subpoenaed her phone records as part of an investigation into alleged efforts to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential election.

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3rd Circ. Calls Westlaw AI Fight 'Ordinary Copyright Case'

By Ivan Moreno

The Third Circuit said the first appellate fight over artificial intelligence training and fair use ultimately came down to an "ordinary copyright case," affirming that Ross Intelligence infringed Thomson Reuters' Westlaw headnotes when it used them to train a competing legal research platform.

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Blank Rome Seeks Time To Exit LIV Golf's Fla. Office

By Ben Zigterman

Blank Rome LLP on Wednesday filed a limited objection to LIV Golf's motion to reject its sublease at an office building in West Palm Beach, Florida, saying it didn't receive any advance notice and would like until the end of October to transition to a new office.

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Roundup

Defamation Litigation Roundup: Candace Owens, Firm DQ

By Theresa Schliep

In this month's review of defamation fights, Law360 highlights a new suit over right-wing media personality Candace Owens and her conspiracy theories about the killing of conservative activist Charlie Kirk, as well as Quinn Emanuel's disqualification from a suit against a former client.

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Tort Report: Uber Owes $40M In Abandoned Rider Death Case

By Y. Peter Kang

A $40 million arbitration award in a case over an Uber incident and looming litigation against the federal government over a highly publicized U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement raid on a Hyundai-LG plant in Georgia lead Law360's Tort Report, which compiles recent personal injury and medical malpractice news that may have flown under the radar.

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Roundup

Hub Hires: Mintz, Foley Hoag, Barclay Damon

By Chris Villani

Boston saw several significant moves across its legal landscape as the summer wound down, with Foley Hoag adding an experienced debt finance attorney from Goodwin Procter, a boutique white collar firm snagging a longtime federal prosecutor, and Mintz getting new leadership for the first time in nearly two decades.

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