Washington

  • June 03, 2025

    9th Circ. Skeptical Tribe Can Circumvent DOI For Recognition

    A Ninth Circuit panel appeared skeptical Tuesday of the Chinook Indian Nation's bid to revive its suit seeking a declaration that it's a federally recognized tribe, with all three judges doubting whether federal courts can make a determination usually made by the U.S. Department of the Interior.

  • June 03, 2025

    9th Circ. Skeptical About Nixing Wash. Bias Enforcement Ban

    The Ninth Circuit on Tuesday appeared hesitant to grant Washington state's bid to wipe out an injunction that bars it from enforcing state anti-discrimination law against a Christian employer that wants to hire co-religionists, but the judges signaled a willingness to depart from the trial court's rationale.

  • June 03, 2025

    9th Circ. Gives Crypto Victims Chance At Greater Recovery

    A Ninth Circuit panel found that a California federal court can reopen the restitution phase of a criminal crypto extortion case post-sentencing after the victims said they lost out on millions of dollars in recovery due to a miscommunication among government offices.

  • June 03, 2025

    Valve Patent Troll Case Paused Over Legal Fee Dispute

    A Washington federal judge paused video game company Valve Corp.'s lawsuit over alleged patent trolling on Tuesday to give the defendants time to find new legal counsel, as their current attorneys seek to exit the dispute, claiming unpaid legal bills.

  • June 03, 2025

    Seaplane Co. Spars With Manufacturer On Fatal Crash Cause

    A Washington state charter flight company is seeking vindication in a state court lawsuit over a 2022 seaplane crash in the Seattle area that killed 10 people, contending that the plane's Canadian manufacturer is ultimately to blame because it lied to regulators about the model's airworthiness to get approval in the 1950s.  

  • June 03, 2025

    Consumers Defend Amending Apple, Amazon Antitrust Case

    Consumers accusing Apple and Amazon of reaching a deal to restrict the sale of Apple devices on the e-commerce site told a Washington federal court there's no need to reconsider letting them amend the complaint despite the original lead plaintiff dropping out of the case.

  • June 03, 2025

    Wash. Judge Clears The Way For Redfin Merger Vote

    A Washington federal judge on Tuesday refused to stop Redfin shareholders from voting Wednesday on a $1.75 billion merger with Rocket Cos., finding that with new disclosures made by the company, investors have enough information to make an informed decision.

  • June 03, 2025

    9th Circ. Wary Of Dormant Commerce Application To Cannabis

    A Ninth Circuit panel on Tuesday appeared skeptical that constitutional doctrine barring states from impeding interstate commerce should apply to the federally illegal marijuana market in a pair of cases involving cannabis business licenses in Washington state and Sacramento, California.

  • June 03, 2025

    Rosen, Pomerantz To Lead Seattle Biotech Class Action

    The Rosen Law Firm PA and Pomerantz LLP will serve as co-lead counsel for shareholders accusing Seattle-based Sana Biotechnology Inc. of misleading investors about its ability to develop certain genetic therapy treatments.

  • June 03, 2025

    Fed. Bill Pushes For Streamlined Access To Tribal Disaster Aid

    A trio of Washington state federal lawmakers has reintroduced a bill in the U.S. House of Representatives that would fast-track the process for tribal nations to apply for resources to manage the impact of extreme weather and natural disasters, and address their environmental resiliency and relocation goals.

  • June 03, 2025

    T-Mobile Can't Shut Down Ex-Employee's Race Bias Case

    T-Mobile can't end a former employee's suit claiming she was given a minimal bonus and eventually terminated because she's Black, a Washington state federal judge ruled, saying the company's assertion that she had performance issues was inconsistent with the evidence.

  • June 03, 2025

    The Law360 400: A Look At The Top 100 Firms

    A rebound in client work sent the nation’s largest law firms into growth mode last year, driving a wave of hiring, mergers and strategic moves that reshaped the top tier of the Law360 400. Here's a preview of the 100 firms with the largest U.S. attorney headcounts.

  • June 03, 2025

    BakerHostetler Adds Two Real Estate Partners In Seattle

    BakerHostetler said it has added a former K&L Gates LLP real estate partner and a real estate practice group leader from a regional firm in its Seattle office.

  • June 02, 2025

    Amazon Defeats Prime Subscribers' Privacy Suit For Good

    A Washington federal judge has permanently tossed Amazon Prime subscribers' proposed class action alleging that the company illegally disclosed their personal viewing habits, ruling that they still haven't plausibly alleged that Amazon "actually and affirmatively" shared their information.

  • June 02, 2025

    Homeland Security Blocked From Scrapping TSA Union Deal

    A Washington federal judge on Monday blocked the U.S. Department of Homeland Security from scrapping a union deal for Transportation Security Administration workers, saying the American Federation of Government Employees had a "strong" argument that DHS was retaliating for challenging the Trump administration's "attacks on federal workers."

  • June 02, 2025

    PacificCorp Fights Wash.'s Carbon Limit Program At 9th Circ.

    PacificCorp urged the Ninth Circuit on Monday to revive claims alleging Washington's carbon emissions cap-and-invest program unconstitutionally discriminates against out-of-state customers by imposing emissions allowances for power exported out of state, while Washington argued that the lawsuit seeks to create a "loophole" that would result in a "free pass" on emissions.

  • June 02, 2025

    Retired Wash. High Court Justice Charles Wiggins Dies At 77

    Retired Washington Supreme Court Justice Charles K. Wiggins, who served a decade on the state's high court, died last week from complications due to Parkinson's disease at the age of 77, according to a news release.

  • June 02, 2025

    Amazon Gets A Look At Some Of FTC's Antitrust Suit Theory

    A Washington federal judge said Monday the Federal Trade Commission must hand over some information about the underlying legal theories in its landmark antitrust case against Amazon but mostly agreed with the agency that the company's discovery requests were "premature."

  • June 02, 2025

    9th Circ. Sends Express Scripts Opioid Case To State Court

    The Ninth Circuit sent California's public nuisance lawsuit against Express Scripts and OptumRx over opioid dispensing back to state court Monday and denied the pharmacy benefit managers' bid to stay the remand pending appeal, saying the U.S. Supreme Court's 2009 Nken decision controls, not its later Coinbase ruling.

  • June 02, 2025

    Nike Floods Inboxes With Misleading Sales Promos, Suit Says

    A Nike customer has filed a proposed class action in Washington state court accusing the sports apparel giant of flooding his inbox with promotional emails with misleading subject lines to trick him into acting quickly to take advantage of discount deals that don't have a legitimate expiration date.

  • June 02, 2025

    Alaska Airlines, Flyers Say Boeing Can't Ditch Calif. Blowout Suit

    Boeing's extensive business ties to California sufficiently establish a Golden State federal court's specific personal jurisdiction over a lawsuit stemming from a January 2024 midair door plug blowout aboard an Alaska Airlines flight, the airline and passengers told a federal judge Friday.

  • June 02, 2025

    Seattle Owner Questions Insurer's $8.5M Water Damage Denial

    A Seattle building owner urged a Washington federal court to grant it a partial early win in a coverage dispute over $8.5 million in water damage, telling the court that under state law, none of the four exclusions its insurer cited when denying coverage are applicable to the water intrusion loss.

  • June 02, 2025

    SAP Seeks High Court Review Of Revived Tying Claims

    German software giant SAP on Monday asked the U.S. Supreme Court to look at a Ninth Circuit decision that resuscitated tying claims brought by U.S. rival Teradata, saying the issue of antitrust liability badly needs the court's attention in matters relating to modern, technologically integrated products.

  • June 02, 2025

    FERC 'Never' Considered Costs Of NW Pipeline, 5th Circ. Told

    The state of Washington told a Fifth Circuit panel Monday that the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission " never rationally considered what the true costs" were for a TC Energy Corp. pipeline expansion project in the Pacific Northwest.

  • June 02, 2025

    High Court Rejects Bard Patent Misuse Dispute

    The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday said it won't consider the Ninth Circuit's decision to revive a $53 million breach of contract suit C.R. Bard Inc. filed against Atrium Medical Corp. over patent royalties and patent misuse.

Expert Analysis

  • Opinion

    Undoing An American Ideal Of Fairness

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    President Donald Trump’s orders attacking birthright citizenship, civil rights education, and diversity, equity and inclusion programs threaten hard-won constitutional civil rights protections and decades of efforts to undo bias in the law — undermining what Chief Justice Earl Warren called "our American ideal of fairness," says Reuben Guttman at Guttman Buschner.

  • Expect To Feel Aftershocks Of Chopra's CFPB Shake-Up

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    Publications released by Consumer Financial Protection Bureau personnel in the last days of the Biden administration outline former Director Rohit Chopra's long-term vision for aggressive state-level enforcement of federal consumer financial laws, opening the doors for states to launch investigations and pursue actions, say attorneys at Hudson Cook.

  • Opinion

    Inconsistent Injury-In-Fact Rules Hinder Federal Practice

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    A recent Third Circuit decision, contradicting a previous ruling about whether consumers of contaminated products have suffered an injury in fact, illustrates the deep confusion this U.S. Supreme Court standard creates among federal judges and practitioners, who deserve a simpler method of determining which cases have federal standing, says Eric Dwoskin at Dwoskin Wasdin.

  • In-House Counsel Pointers For Preserving Atty-Client Privilege

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    Several recent rulings illustrate the challenges in-house counsel can face when attempting to preserve attorney-client privilege, but a few best practices can help safeguard communications and effectively assert the privilege in an increasingly scrutinized corporate environment, says Daniel Garrie at Law & Forensics.

  • Disability Ruling Guides On Cases With Uncertain Causation

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    In Dime v. MetLife, a Washington federal court’s recent ruling in favor of a disability claimant instructs both claimants and insurers on the appropriate standard for establishing and making a disability determination when there is limited medical evidence explaining the disability’s cause, says Mark DeBofsky at DeBofsky Law.

  • CFPB's Message To States Takes On New Weight Under Trump

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    The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau's January guidance to state enforcers has fresh significance as the Trump administration moves to freeze the bureau's work, and industry should expect states to use this series of recommendations as an enforcement road map, say attorneys at Brownstein Hyatt.

  • Series

    Collecting Rare Books Makes Me A Better Lawyer

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    My collection of rare books includes several written or owned by prominent lawyers from early U.S. history, and immersing myself in their stories helps me feel a deeper connection to my legal practice and its purpose, says Douglas Brown at Manatt Health.

  • Opinion

    Judge Should Not Have Been Reprimanded For Alito Essay

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    Senior U.S. District Judge Michael Ponsor's New York Times essay critiquing Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito for potential ethical violations absolutely cannot be construed as conduct prejudicial to the administration of the business of the courts, says Ashley London at the Thomas R. Kline School of Law of Duquesne University.

  • Lights, Camera, Ethics? TV Lawyers Tend To Set Bad Example

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    Though fictional movies and television shows portraying lawyers are fun to watch, Hollywood’s inaccurate depictions of legal ethics can desensitize attorneys to ethics violations and lead real-life clients to believe that good lawyers take a scorched-earth approach, says Nancy Rapoport at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas.

  • Perspectives

    Accountant-Owned Law Firms Could Blur Ethical Lines

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    KPMG’s recent application to open a legal practice in Arizona represents the first overture by an accounting firm to take advantage of the state’s relaxed law firm ownership rules, but enforcing and supervising the practice of law by nonattorneys could prove particularly challenging, says Seth Laver at Goldberg Segalla.

  • AI Will Soon Transform The E-Discovery Industrial Complex

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    Todd Itami at Covington discusses how generative artificial intelligence will reshape the current e-discovery paradigm, replacing the blunt instrument of data handling with a laser scalpel of fully integrated enterprise solutions — after first making e-discovery processes technically and legally harder.

  • When Innovation Overwhelms The Rule Of Law

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    In an era where technology is rapidly evolving and artificial intelligence is seemingly everywhere, it’s worth asking if the law — both substantive precedent and procedural rules — can keep up with the light speed of innovation, says Reuben Guttman at Guttman Buschner.

  • Likely Doomed CFPB Contract Rule Still Has Industry Pointers

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    While the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau's January proposal on consumer financial contract provisions is unlikely to be finalized under the new administration, its provisions are important for industry to recognize, particularly if state attorneys general decide to take up the enforcement mantle, say attorneys at Saul Ewing.

  • Imagine The Possibilities Of Openly Autistic Lawyering

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    Andi Mazingo at Lumen Law, who was diagnosed with autism about midway through her career, discusses how the legal profession can create inclusive workplaces that empower openly autistic lawyers and enhance innovation, and how neurodivergent attorneys can navigate the challenges and opportunities that come with disclosing one’s diagnosis.

  • Series

    Documentary Filmmaking Makes Me A Better Lawyer

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    Becoming a documentary filmmaker has allowed me to merge my legal expertise with my passion for storytelling, and has helped me to hone negotiation, critical thinking and problem-solving skills that are important to both endeavors, says Robert Darwell at Sheppard Mullin.

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