Analysis

USPTO Plan To Limit AIA Reviews Is In White House's Hands

By Ryan Davis

Rules proposed by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office to place new limits on patent challenges are being scrutinized by a White House agency, which has held dozens of meetings with groups advocating for and against the plan in recent weeks.

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DOT Tells 2nd Circ. Congestion Pricing Fight In Wrong Court

By Linda Chiem

The Trump administration doubled down on its efforts to eliminate New York's congestion pricing, telling the Second Circuit that the underlying contract dispute was heard in the wrong court and that it shouldn't be handcuffed to now-disfavored policies of earlier administrations anyway.

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CIT Unconvinced By Commerce's Landing Gear Scope Finding

By Jack McLoone

The U.S. Department of Commerce's finding that certain imported landing gear subassemblies are in the scope of duty orders on Chinese chassis doesn't mesh with the plain language of the orders, the U.S. Court of International Trade ruled.

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Justices Told Award Moots Burford's 3rd Circ. Challenge

By Caroline Simson

A German claims aggregator is citing an award it received in ongoing arbitration involving Burford Capital as reason for the U.S. Supreme Court to pass on the litigation funder's certiorari petition seeking review of an unfavorable Third Circuit decision.

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Pa. Co. Pulled Job Offer After Failed Pot Test, Suit Says

By Jonathan Capriel

A former employee is suing a trucking and logistics company in Pennsylvania federal court, claiming it illegally rescinded a job offer after he tested positive for marijuana, despite him telling the company about his state-issued medical cannabis card.

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Boeing Plaintiffs Seek Board, Exec Records In Door-Plug Suit

By Ben Adlin

Passengers suing The Boeing Co. over the 2024 blowout of an aircraft door panel urged a Washington state judge to force the aerospace giant to hand over documents that allegedly tie the incident to decisions made at the company's former headquarters in Illinois.

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Lawmakers Push For Protections In $10M Spirit Data Sale

By Kelcey Caulder

More than 120 mostly Democratic lawmakers raised concerns Thursday about the proposed $10 million sale of Spirit Airlines' internal data to Google for artificial intelligence training, saying the sale would involve an "extraordinary volume" of internal records containing individuals' sensitive information.

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Brief

Airlines, Colo. Propose Trial Dates In Sick Leave Law Case

By MJ Koo

An airline industry trade group and a Colorado labor official told a federal judge they see virtually no chance of settling the group's lawsuit over whether a state paid sick leave law applies to airline workers, proposing trial dates for early 2027 and offering competing lengths for the proceeding.

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Zoox Investors, Directors Clash Over Amazon Deal Class

By Jarek Rutz

The Delaware Chancery Court on Thursday took under advisement a bid to certify a class of former Zoox Inc. common stockholders challenging Amazon.com Inc.'s $1.3 billion acquisition of the autonomous vehicle company, after hearing arguments over whether releases signed by most proposed class members prevent the case from proceeding on a classwide basis.

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Bolt Refused Chance To Appeal £190M VAT Ruling

By Josh White

Ride-hailing giant Bolt said Thursday it was disappointed in the U.K. Supreme Court's refusal of the company's appeal over its claim to a value-added tax margin scheme to reduce an estimated liability of £190 million ($251.6 million).

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Trade Court Remands Commerce's Freight Coupler Duties

By Dylan Moroses

The U.S. Department of Commerce failed to sufficiently explain how attached freight couplers are within the scope of countervailing and antidumping duties placed on freight rail couplers imported from China, the U.S. Court of International Trade ruled Thursday, remanding the matter back to Commerce for further explanation.

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2 More Sentenced In $11M Amtrak Health Fraud Scheme

By George Woolston

A former Amtrak employee and a New York podiatrist have been sentenced to prison for their roles in a scheme that prosecutors claim defrauded the rail carrier out of $11 million in health benefits, the U.S. attorney's office in New Jersey said.

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Trucking Co. Owner Gets 2 Years For $3.5M Amazon Fraud

By Brian Steele

A Connecticut man who admitted to swindling $3.5 million from Amazon.com Inc. by tricking the online retailer into believing he had completed transportation jobs must serve two years in prison, a federal judge has ruled.

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FedEx Inks $30M Deal In Wash. Breaks, Noncompete Suit

By MJ Koo

FedEx has agreed to pay up to nearly $31 million to settle claims in a Washington federal court that it failed to provide required meal and rest breaks, manipulated employee time records and barred lower-earning workers from holding outside jobs.

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Enviro Group, Feds End Suit Over Alaska Refuge Road Work

By Crystal Owens

The state of Alaska, the federal government and an environmental nonprofit have agreed to dismiss a dispute over a 500-acre land exchange that will allow road construction on Izembek National Wildlife Refuge lands.

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11th Circ. Voids Fla. Septic Permit Ban Over New FWS Rule

By David Aaro

The Eleventh Circuit issued a win Thursday for Florida environmental regulators who had been ordered to temporarily stop issuing new septic tank permits over concerns for the well-being of manatees, saying the lower court relied on a federal rule that was no longer valid.

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DOJ Clears Mobile Parking Payment Merger

By Nadia Dreid

The Justice Department is waving through a merger between two mobile parking payment companies after finding that their union wouldn't pose a problem for competition within the United States.

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Pa. Legislators Want More Time To Regulate 'Skill Games'

By Matthew Santoni

Three Pennsylvania lawmakers and a coalition of "skill games" operators want the state Supreme Court to extend a deadline before police start seizing the game terminals, hoping to give the state Legislature more time to pass a law governing the games after the court found them to be illegal slot machines.

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IP Rights Group Urges Against Litigation Funding Disclosure

By Elliot Weld

An inventor rights advocacy group has told a federal courts rules committee that requiring the disclosure of who is funding civil litigation would put independent inventors at a disadvantage when trying to enforce patents against a larger company.

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Goodyear Narrows But Can't End Nicotine Fee Suit

By Patrick Hoff

Goodyear failed to snuff out a proposed class action alleging employees who used nicotine were unlawfully charged more to obtain health benefits, with an Ohio federal judge ruling Thursday that workers had plausibly alleged plan documents omitted key information about avoiding the surcharge.

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Energy Companies' Win In NYC Greenwashing Suit Affirmed

By Tom Lotshaw

A New York appeals court on Thursday affirmed the dismissal of a New York City suit accusing BP, Exxon and Shell of deceiving consumers about the environmental effects of their gasoline products and alternative energy investments.

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Series

Mentalism Makes Me A Better Lawyer

Convincing strangers I can read their minds may seem like an unusual second career for a legal practitioner, but both disciplines share several important requirements, including trust and preparation, says Warren Biro at Manatt.

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Squire Patton, Holland & Knight Report Data Breaches

By Jake Maher

Squire Patton Boggs LLP and Holland & Knight LLP were hit with cyberattacks exposing sensitive information, according to disclosures filed this week.

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Up Next At High Court: Criminal Sentences & Video Privacy

By Katie Buehler

The U.S. Supreme Court will close out its October sitting by hearing oral arguments in two cases that ask what level of deference federal district courts should give to commentary interpreting the federal sentencing guidelines, and what purchases are protected under a video consumer privacy statute.

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DOJ Aims To 'Attack Fraud From All Angles' Via New Division

By Sarah Jarvis

The U.S. Department of Justice's new fraud division has issued fresh guidance on its prosecution methodology, with the division's head directing prosecutors to seize assets before indictments and pursue upward variances in sentencing guidelines in some cases as part of a stated push to use the division's "full arsenal of criminal statutes" in combating fraud.

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Ill. Judge Lays Out Doc Demands For DOJ Misconduct Probe

By Lauraann Wood

An Illinois federal judge asked the government Friday to turn over six months of communications and certain other records as she investigates in-court inaccuracies Chicago prosecutors offered while prosecuting six anti-immigration protesters, rejecting its request to seal a filing in the process.

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Atty With False AI Citation Filings Ordered To Pay $39K

By Bonnie Eslinger

A New York federal judge who imposed case-terminating sanctions on an attorney who submitted filings with false citations generated by artificial intelligence ordered him on Friday to pay nearly $39,000 to lawyers who uncovered the problematic AI use, noting he had given them the "runaround" when they tried to collect directly.

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Grassley Attacks Dems' Claims Of Rule-Breaking Over Hearing

By Courtney Bublé

Sen. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, chair of the Senate Judiciary Committee, clapped back at Democrats for their accusations that Republicans broke Senate rules during a hearing last week at which former special counsel Jack Smith appeared.

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Calif. Jurists' Atty Tips: 'Emulate Lincoln,' 'Don't Be Boring'

By Bonnie Eslinger

Three current and former Northern California federal judges and one Morrison Foerster LLP partner during a Federal Bar Association panel discussion Thursday gave attorneys tips on "courtroom persuasion," including knowing the judges, keeping things interesting and, like the nation's 16th president, getting quickly to the winning point.

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Brief

Legal Services NYC Gets $2.5M To Build Novel Resource Hub

By Tracey Read

Legal Services NYC announced Friday that it has been awarded a $2.5 million grant from the New York State Interest on Lawyer Account Fund to create a first-of-its-kind statewide knowledge-sharing platform to help legal advocates spend more time seeking justice for low-income clients.

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GC Cheat Sheet: The Hottest Corporate News Of The Week

By Sue Reisinger

The new federal fraud division is threatening faster action and broader targets under a new enforcement policy announced recently. And the SEC warned shareholder advocacy groups that join forces could face legal scrutiny in the future. These are some of the stories in corporate legal news you may have missed in the past week.​

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Law360's Legal Lions Of The Week

By Kevin Penton

Quinn Emanuel Urquhart & Sullivan LLP, Sullivan & Cromwell LLP and Alston & Bird LLP lead this week's edition of Law360 Legal Lions, after the Sixth Circuit overturned a pivotal decision in multidistrict opioid litigation that had dramatically expanded claims against the nation's largest pharmacy benefit managers.

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Roundup

UK Litigation Roundup: Here's What You Missed In London

By Megan Norcott

The past week in London has seen PrivatBank sue its former oligarch owner, building materials provider Kingspan face a €100 million ($112 million) claim over Grenfell Tower cladding and energy giants VaroPreem and Viaro Energy become embroiled in an intellectual property row.

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In Case You Missed It: Hottest Firms And Stories On Law360

For those who missed out, here's a look back at the law firms, stories and expert analyses that generated the most buzz on Law360 last week.

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