2nd Circ. Chilly To Additional Discovery In Cigna Pension Suit

By Kellie Mejdrich

The Second Circuit on Tuesday seemed reluctant to restart proceedings in a long-running suit against Cigna from retirees who challenged changes to their pensions, appearing unwilling to upend a decision to turn down post-judgment discovery in the class action.

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Medical Practice Faces Bid For Extra $22M After $49M Verdict

By Aaron Keller

The Westchester Medical Group PC should be forced to pay a Connecticut cancer patient and her husband an extra $22 million in interest, plus other costs, on top of a $49 million jury verdict for failing to diagnose the fatal illness in its early stages, the patient and husband have argued.

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Georgia Panel Tosses $123K Fee Award After Defense Win

By Chart Riggall

A Georgia appellate panel tossed on Tuesday an award of $123,000 in attorney fees to defense counsel after their win in a medical malpractice trial, ruling that a state judge failed to show how she arrived at the figure.

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Congress Rallies More For Bills On Copyrights Than Patents

By Adam Lidgett

There have been more intellectual property bills floated in Congress that are supportive of copyright rights than patent rights, according to a new report looking at how lawmakers treat the IP system.

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Woman Pleads Guilty In $51M Medicare Fraud Scheme

By Aneeta Mathur-Ashton

A San Diego woman has pled guilty in California federal court to billing Medicare for nearly $51 million in fake prescriptions and trying to hide the scheme through money laundering and kickbacks to doctors.

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Defendant Says Rx Software Was Guide For Docs, Not Fraud

By Carolina Bolado

A man accused of swindling Medicare out of nearly half a billion dollars was simply trying to make it easier for doctors to navigate labyrinthine Medicare regulations to get orthotic braces approved for their patients, his attorney told jurors in Florida federal court Tuesday.

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Watchdog Says Ex-Fla. Rep Used Straw Donors For Campaign

By David Minsky

A Washington, D.C.-based watchdog organization accused former Florida Rep. Sheila Cherfilus-McCormick of improperly funding her 2022 reelection bid to the U.S. House of Representatives, saying she orchestrated a complex straw donor scheme to funnel $725,000 in Haitian "dark money" into her campaign. 

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Brief

Purdue Pharma Sentencing Punted For In-Person Attendance

By Clara Geoghegan

A New Jersey federal judge delayed Oxycontin maker Purdue Pharma's criminal sentencing by a week, saying rescheduling would give an in-person attendance option to hundreds of observers who tuned in virtually Tuesday.

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Feds Say Pot Foes Lack Standing To Stop CMS Hemp Program

By Sam Reisman

Federal health regulators have told a D.C. federal judge that anti-pot advocates' attempt to block a program to ease access for Medicare beneficiaries to federally legal hemp products that have small amounts of THC was not bolstered by the addition of a pharmaceutical company as a co-plaintiff.

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ProMedica Wins Bid To Unseal Gov't Probe Briefs In FCA Suit

By P.J. D'Annunzio

Nursing home operator ProMedica Health Systems Inc. has succeeded in its bid to unseal government briefs in a whistleblower case over alleged problems caused by understaffing at its facilities, with a Pennsylvania federal judge ruling that a presumption of openness with court records trumped the government's concerns about disclosure of its investigative methods.

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Novo Nordisk Unit Can't Slip Former Exec's Sex, Age Bias Suit

By Patrick Hoff

A Novo Nordisk unit must face a former finance director's lawsuit claiming she was fired because she was an older woman who complained about a male co-worker's behavior, with a North Carolina federal judge ruling her allegations were detailed enough to stay in court.

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Colo. Nurses Seek OK For $14M Wage Class Settlement

By Benjamin Morse

A group of nurses urged a Colorado federal judge to grant preliminary approval to a $14 million class action settlement resolving claims that their employer failed to properly calculate overtime and provide required breaks.

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Fed. Circ. Keeps Banner Witcoff And Saiber Off Patent Case

By Elliot Weld

The Federal Circuit kept intact the disqualification of two law firms from a patent ownership fight on Tuesday, saying it had not been shown a district judge made a clear error in removing them.

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Amgen Faces ERISA Suit Over Health Plan Tobacco Surcharge

By Gina Kim

A former Amgen Inc. employee filed a proposed class action in California federal court Tuesday alleging the biotech company discriminatorily imposes an "egregiously high" $150-a-month surcharge on employees who use tobacco products, while failing to adequately notify them of reasonable pathways to avoid the fees, in violation of federal benefits law.

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Nourish Can't Ax Wiretap Claims In Google Data Sharing Row

By Allison Grande

An Illinois federal judge has refused to cut wiretap and negligence claims from a proposed class action accusing telehealth provider Nourish Inc. of deploying tracking tools that illegally transmitted website visitors' sensitive health information to Google, while tossing several privacy and contract allegations and rebuking the plaintiffs for filing a "press release complaint."

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Brief

Squires Stands By Ending Skincare IPR Over ITC Overlap

By Dani Kass

U.S. Patent and Trademark Office Director John Squires has shot down Sinclair Pharma Ltd.'s request to revive its challenge to Hydrafacial LLC's skin treatment patent, which the director had terminated based on related proceedings at the U.S. International Trade Commission.

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E-Discovery Quarterly: Recent Rulings On ESI Control

Several recent federal court decisions have perpetuated a split over what constitutes “control” of electronically stored information — with judges divided on whether the standard should turn on a party's legal right or practical ability to obtain the information, say attorneys at Sidley.

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Norton Rose Faces $100M Suit Over Withdrawn Patent App

By Celeste Bott

Norton Rose Fulbright was sued in Illinois state court Tuesday by an advertising tech company claiming that the law firm mishandled a patent application and caused it to be deemed withdrawn, but kept the company in the dark about the loss of its valuable patent rights for over a year.

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Lockheed Birth Defect Trial Judge 'Disappointed' By Attys

By Cara Salvatore

A Florida federal judge said Tuesday he's "puzzled and disappointed" in counsel who appear "unprepared" on the eve of trial in a suit by children who blame their birth defects on Lockheed Martin's chemical handling practices at an Orlando defense system manufacturing and research facility.

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Hunter Biden Blasts Winston & Strawn Tactics In Fee Row

By Emily Sawicki

As a discovery dispute between Hunter Biden and Winston & Strawn LLP drags on amid a suit over allegedly unpaid legal bills, the former president's son accused the BigLaw firm, which once represented him in a Delaware criminal case and other matters, of resorting to "what is uncomfortably close to an ad hominem attack" against him.

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Analysis

Bondi's Proposed Rule Change May Shield Her In Ethics Case

By Phillip Bantz

A federal rule change that Pam Bondi proposed before she was fired as U.S. attorney general could stymie an ethics complaint against her in Florida, which is expected to be refiled after the state bar declined to take up the case during her tenure, experts say.

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Messner Reeves Accused Of $8.3M Trust Account Fraud

By Zach Dupont

Colorado law firm Messner Reeves LLP was hit with a lawsuit Tuesday in federal court from five businesses claiming it stole more than $8 million from them in a fraudulent loan scheme involving a now-defunct sports arena and hotel project in Las Vegas.

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Alston & Bird Says Goliath Investors Can't Claim Malpractice

By Carolina Bolado

Alston & Bird LLP urged a Florida federal court on Wednesday to toss a malpractice suit claiming the firm facilitated a $328 million cryptocurrency scam at Goliath Ventures Inc., arguing that the proposed class of Goliath investors who brought the suit were never clients of the firm.

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Analysis

House GOP Again Pushes Data Privacy Bill To Override States

By Allison Grande

House Republicans on Wednesday took their latest crack at establishing a cohesive nationwide data privacy framework, floating legislation that would give consumers more control over their personal information while preempting a growing patchwork of state laws, although early criticisms indicate that the issues that have long stymied these efforts persist.

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330+ Groups Urge DOJ To Restore Immigration Aid Staff

By Courtney Bublé

More than 300 legal services providers, faith-based institutions and community groups are calling on the U.S. Department of Justice to fully restore a program that allows nonlawyers to assist low-income and indigent persons in immigration proceedings.

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Acting DOJ Inspector General Tapped For Permanent Post

By Jack Karp

President Donald Trump has nominated the U.S. Department of Justice's acting inspector general, who investigated the FBI's probe into Trump's links with Russia, to remain in that role on a permanent basis, according to a White House announcement.

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Paint Co. Says Injury Firm Used Stolen Data To Solicit Clients

By Abigail Harrison

A paint company has asked a North Carolina federal court to boot the opposing counsel in a putative data breach class action, accusing them of finding stolen data on the dark web and using it to solicit potential plaintiffs before victims were even notified of the breach.

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