Roundup

Product Liability's Regulatory & Legislative Recap So Far

By Emily Field

Over the summer and early fall, lawmakers proposed measures aimed at putting safeguards around the rapidly growing industry of artificial intelligence, as public concerns over its safety climb in tandem. The new nominee to head the U.S. Food and Drug Administration also faced sharp queries over her views on vaccines and birth control.

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Jury Selection Starts In 2nd Social Media Bellwether In LA

By Craig Clough

Jury selection began Wednesday in a California courtroom for the second bellwether trial focused on allegations that major social media companies are harming the mental health of children, with Meta Platforms Inc. returning to the defense table next to Snap Inc., which is facing jurors on the claims for the first time.

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Shipbuilder Must Face Bridge Wreck Suit In US, 3rd Circ. Told

By Linda Chiem

The Dali cargo ship's owner and manager told the Third Circuit on Wednesday that a Pennsylvania federal judge improperly tossed their lawsuit alleging South Korean shipbuilder HD Hyundai Heavy Industries Co. Ltd. designed and built a "fatally flawed" ship that subsequently slammed into Baltimore's Francis Scott Key Bridge.

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Brief

Insurer Drops Coverage Suit Over Titan Sub Implosion

By Hope Patti

An insurer has dropped its suit seeking a declaration that it owes no coverage to nonprofit OceanGate Foundation in an underlying action filed by the family of a French explorer who died during the Titan deep-sea submersible's 2023 expedition, according to a Washington federal court filing.

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Mining Cos. Sanctioned Over Discovery In Peru Lead Case

By Mike Curley

A Missouri federal judge has issued sanctions against mining companies, including one run by billionaire Ira Rennert, in a lawsuit by Peruvians alleging the defendants exposed children to toxins, finding that the companies filed two separate actions in Florida to get around discovery orders in the present case.

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'Lessons Learned': 9th Circ. Judge Doubts Uber Clawback Bid

By Dorothy Atkins

A Ninth Circuit judge doubted Uber's request Wednesday to claw back 42 documents inadvertently produced in sexual assault multidistrict litigation during its attorney-client privilege rereview, telling counsel, "At a certain point, we have to say stop, put your pencils down," and asking why this shouldn't be "an example of lessons learned."

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7th Circ. Takes Up Ill. Ban On Firearm Silencers

By Celeste Bott

A Seventh Circuit panel questioned Wednesday whether firearm silencers should be considered part of a constitutionally protected weapon or are merely optional accessories, as gun owners seeking to overturn Illinois' ban argued the devices improve firearms' functionality and protect users from hearing damage.

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DraftKings Fights Bid To Link Bettor Suit To Promos Action

By Ganesh Setty

DraftKings Inc. urged an Illinois federal court to not reassign an Illinois man's personal injury action over his sports gambling addiction to a judge in the district overseeing a separate proposed class action challenging DraftKings' advertising practices, arguing they are materially different.

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Full 4th Circ. Won't Rehear Boeing Investor Class Ruling

By Katryna Perera

The Fourth Circuit on Wednesday denied a request from Boeing investors for the full court to rehear a panel's decision overturning class certification in a suit against the aerospace company over its alleged concealment of safety issues with its 737 Max fleet.

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Homebuilder Sues Subcontractors In Fla. Seminole Tribe Case

By Carolina Bolado

Lennar Homes LLC has roped dozens of subcontractors into the Seminole Tribe of Florida's lawsuit over construction defects in more than 550 homes built for its members, arguing that if Lennar is held liable, it is entitled to damages from the subcontractors who did the work.

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Tort Liability When AI Goes Rogue: Product Liability

The recent Hugging Face cyberattack led by artificial intelligence agents, as well as reports from AI companies themselves, suggest that sometimes there may be no reasonable way to predict or prevent harm by rogue agentic AI — but product liability law could provide a remedy in some cases, says Donald Hawthorne at Carter Ledyard.

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3 Strategies To Reduce AI Sycophancy In Legal Work

The tendency of generative artificial intelligence models to tell users what they want to hear can reinforce attorneys’ confirmation bias when testing the strength of arguments, and it can’t simply be prompted away — but a few practices can help mitigate it, says Michael Ott at Ice Miller.

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Weil To Wind Down As Top Attorneys Abandon Firm

By Daniel Moritz-Rabson, Alex Wittenberg and Aebra Coe

Weil Gotshal & Manges LLP, the restructuring powerhouse that led Lehman Brothers, Enron and General Motors through bankruptcy, told Law360 Pulse Wednesday that the firm is preparing to wind down operations.

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BigLaw Tip Middleman To Admit Role In $3.5M Trading Scheme

By Chris Villani

An alleged middleman in a sweeping scheme to trade off of deal information stolen from major law firms has agreed to plead guilty and potentially faces a prison term of nearly a decade, according to a plea agreement filed Wednesday in Massachusetts federal court.

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Judge Hellerstein, Gruff Moderator Of Major Cases, Dies At 92

By Pete Brush

Judge Alvin K. Hellerstein, a former litigator and sometimes impatient Manhattan federal jurist who presided over decades of high-profile cases that often came under close appellate scrutiny, died Wednesday at the age of 92.

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LA's Top Federal Prosecutor 'Unlawfully Serving,' Judge Finds

By Christine DeRosa

A federal judge has ruled that Los Angeles' top federal prosecutor isn't legally serving in the role and that he is disqualified from participating in or supervising two criminal prosecutions.

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Proskauer, Reddit Attys Called To Testify In Data-Scraping Suit

By Bryan Koenig

A New York federal judge on Wednesday called for live testimony from two Proskauer Rose LLP attorneys and Reddit's deputy general counsel as he weighs the law firm's bid to represent Perplexity AI in a lawsuit from Reddit, the firm's former client, over alleged data scraping.

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BakerHostetler Malpractice Case To Expand With RICO Claim

By Emily Johnson

A Georgia federal judge has allowed a trustee who has accused BakerHostetler and an Atlanta-based attorney of legal malpractice to file an amended complaint after the trustee asked to add claims of Georgia RICO Act violations.

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Mich. Judge Weighs Toshiba Legal Bills Discovery Fight

By Melanie Dorsey

A Michigan federal judge on Wednesday questioned whether she needs to review specific objections to DTE Electric Co. and Consumers Energy Co.'s multimillion-dollar attorney fee request before deciding whether Toshiba Corp. must disclose its own legal bills and litigation expenses following a nearly $394.4 million jury verdict over a botched power plant overhaul.

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SC Gov.'s Counsel Still In The Running For Federal Judgeship

By Courtney Bublé

The chief legal counsel for South Carolina Gov. Henry McMaster is "being actively considered" for a federal judgeship, according to the White House, but it's not a done deal yet.

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Analysis

Albright Left Key Issue In Billion-Dollar IP Fight Unanswered

By Dani Kass

In May 2025, then-U.S. District Judge Alan Albright watched a jury hold that VLSI Technology is controlled by Fortress Investment Group, but by the time he left the bench in August 2026, the judge had yet to decide whether that ownership would let Intel avoid billions of dollars in patent infringement verdicts.

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