Good morning. Welcome back to The Daily Docket, your go-to morning newsletter from Westlaw Today for the latest on courts, lawyers and the legal profession. Protesters are expressing anger after no police officers were charged with causing Breonna Taylor's death, hundreds line up outside the U.S. Supreme Court to mourn the death of RBG, Eric Trump will be deposed soon, and today’s court calendar is stacked with an 8th Circuit abortion case, a 9th Circuit Second Amendment case and more.
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Outrage as Louisville police officers avoid charges for Breonna Taylor's death
Three white police officers who fired into Breonna Taylor's apartment will not be prosecuted for her death, Kentucky Attorney General Daniel Cameron announced Wednesday. A grand jury indicted one police officer, former Detective Brett Hankison, on charges of endangering her neighbors.
The news sparked a night of protests against police brutality nationally. Protests in Louisville were mostly peaceful until several gunshots rang out as heavily armed police closed in on demonstrators, ordering the crowd to disperse about a half hour before a 9 p.m. curfew, Bryan Woolston and Jonathan Allen report. Two police officers were shot and wounded.
Taylor, a Black medical worker, was killed in March inside her Louisville apartment after the officers forced their way in with a search warrant. Hankison faces up to five years in prison if convicted.
Benjamin Crump, a civil rights lawyer representing the Taylor family, said it was "outrageous" that none of the officers would be criminally charged with causing Taylor's death.
Earlier this month, the city of Louisville agreed to pay a $12 million settlement to Taylor’s family in a wrongful death lawsuit.
Mourners pay their respects to Ruth Bader Ginsburg at SCOTUS
Hundreds of people lined up outside of the U.S. Supreme Court on Wednesday to pay their respects to the late Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg. Dozens of her former clerks stood at attention when the coffin arrived at the courthouse. Ginsburg’s casket was placed under the court building’s massive Corinthian columns for a public viewing on Wednesday and Thursday.
On Friday, Ginsburg’s casket will be moved to the Capitol, where the court’s liberal stalwart will become the first woman to lie in state there when her casket is placed in the National Statuary Hall, Lawrence Hurley and Andrew Chung report.
President Trump plans to announce his pick to replace Ginsburg on the Supreme Court at 5 p.m. (ET) Saturday. Trump on Wednesday said that he thinks the 2020 presidential election will end up before the Supreme Court, adding that is why it's important to have nine justices.
A private interment service for Ginsburg is planned for next week at Arlington National Cemetery. Ginsburg’s husband, Martin Ginsburg, was buried there in 2010.
Eric Trump to be deposed before the election by Oct. 7
A New York judge has ordered Eric Trump to make himself available by Oct. 7 to sit for a deposition in a state probe into financing for Trump Organization properties.
Justice Arthur Engoron of the Manhattan Supreme Court on Wednesday said Eric Trump, President Trump's son and executive vice president at the Trump Organization, offered no valid grounds for delaying his deposition by the office of New York Attorney General Letitia James until after the Nov. 3 presidential election, rejecting the argument that he is a "vital and integral part" of his father's re-election bid and is too busy to be interviewed, Jonathan Stempel reports.
James subpoenaed Eric Trump's testimony on May 26 as part of her civil probe, into whether Donald Trump and the Trump Organization had inflated some asset values to save money on loans and insurance, and deflated other asset values to reduce real estate taxes.
A July 22 deposition was canceled after Trump changed his legal team and his new lawyers, Alan Futerfas and Mukasey Frenchman & Sklaroff's Marc Mukasey, sought to delay it until Nov. 19 or later. They did not respond to requests for comment.
Coming up today
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The 8th Circuit will consider whether to uphold an injunction blocking Missouri from enforcing a ban on abortions after eight weeks of pregnancy. Paul Weiss' Claudia Hammerman represents a Planned Parenthood clinic in St. Louis challenging the ban and will face Missouri Solicitor General D. John Sauer.
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The full 9th Circuit on Thursday will consider whether the Constitution's Second Amendment protects the right to openly carry guns in self-defense. The court is revisiting a 2-1 panel decision holding that Hawaii wrongly denied Vietnam War veteran George Young a permit to openly carry a loaded gun in public.
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Mallinckrodt Plc will urge the D.C. Circuit to overturn a judge's decision that allowed the federal government to force the drugmaker to pay $640 million in retroactive rebates to state Medicaid programs after it dramatically hiked the price of its top-selling drug Acthar. The company, repped by Hogan Lovells' Catherine Stetson, has cited that ruling in saying it may soon file for bankruptcy.
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U.S. District Judge Vince Chhabria in San Francisco will review progress toward finalizing a proposed $11 billion settlement of litigation against Bayer over alleged health risks of its Roundup weedkiller. While Bayer has settled thousands of lawsuits, Chhabria has been skeptical of a proposed plan resolving future claims.
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The U.S. Judicial Panel on Multidistrict Litigation will consider whether to consolidate separate MDLs lawsuits against five insurers over their denials of coverage for COVID-19 losses. The insurers are Hartford Financial Services Group, Lloyd's of London, Travelers, Cincinnati Financial and Society Insurance.
- Dropbox's lawyers led by Wilson Sonsini's Nina Locker will urge U.S. District Judge Beth Labson Freeman in San Jose, California, to dismiss a proposed class action alleging it misled investors during its 2018 IPO about its ability to convert registered, non-paying users to subscription, paying ones. Levi & Korsinsky's Adam Apton reps the plaintiffs.
- Massachusetts accountant Richard Gaffey is expected to be sentenced by U.S. District Judge Richard Berman in Manhattan after becoming the second person to plead guilty to U.S. charges stemming from the "Panama Papers" leak of documents from Panama law firm Mossack Fonseca. Prosecutors say he helped a client hide his assets from the IRS. Hogan Lovell's William Lovett reps him.
"Before the SCOTUS fight, there might have been some common ground. But when the system is super-polarized, compromise is impossible."
Loren Thompson, chief operating officer of the Lexington Institute, a Virginia-based think tank, on how the death of Ruth Bader Ginsburg on Friday has derailed prospects of lawmakers passing an additional $25 billion in payroll aid. Read the full report from Traci Rucinski and David Shepardson here.
Photos: Ginsburg lies in repose at U.S. Supreme Court
Andrew Harnik/Pool via REUTERS
Reuters’ Jonathan Ernst and other photographers captured powerful images from the Supreme Court as Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s casket arrived for a private memorial ceremony followed by a public viewing where mourners said goodbye to the jurist who became a pop culture feminist icon. See the photos here.
Industry buzz
- In the latest defeat for diploma privilege, the Supreme Court of California rejected a petition by recent law school grads urging the state to grant the measure that would allow them to become licensed attorneys without taking the bar exam. (Reuters)
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London-based Freshfields jumped into the fall bonus flurry saying it will give U.S. associates up to $40,000 this fall, matching a bonus scale set earlier this month by Davis Polk & Wardwell. (Reuters)
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Gibson Dunn's Andrea Lucas was confirmed to the EEOC; Barnes & Thornburg, Dentons and Orrick added new partners; Eversheds Sutherland has a new leadership team for its international arbitration practice; that and more in Career Tracker. (Reuters)
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Crowell & Moring picked up Vassilis Akritidis, the head of DWF's World Trade Organization and international trade practice in Brussels. (Reuters)
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Which law school will set you up with the best chance of a post-graduation job? Above the Law's Top 50 Law School rankings are out and Duke has moved into the top slot. (Above The Law)
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Steven Donziger, the lawyer at the center of a 27-year fight with Chevron, filed legal papers asking the New York State Supreme Court to review his disbarment. (New York Law Journal)
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Sheila Harvey and Mona Dajani will lead Pillsbury's new hydrogen practice group. (Reuters)
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Holland & Knight joined the ranks of firms strengthening their Latin America practices, hiring Steven Sandretto away from Paul Hastings. (Reuters)
In the courts
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TikTok asked a federal judge to block a Trump administration order requiring Apple and Google to remove the short video-sharing app for new downloads starting Sunday. (Reuters)
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Four former eBay workers agreed to plead guilty to participating in a cyberstalking campaign against a Massachusetts couple whose online newsletter they thought was critical of the company. (Reuters)
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JPMorgan will pay nearly $1 billion to settle spoofing investigations by U.S. authorities into the bank’s trading of metals futures and Treasury securities, according to a person familiar with the situation. (Reuters)
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Gilead will pay $97 million to settle claims it used a purportedly independent charity to pay illegal kickbacks to cover Medicare patients’ out-of-pocket costs for its drug Letairis. Quinn Emanuel’s John Potter and Diane Doolittle repped Gilead. (Reuters)
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Texas Republicans sued the state's Republican Governor Greg Abbott over his order extending early voting for the presidential election by a week. (AP)
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In a hearing before U.S. District Judge Laura Taylor Swain, Puerto Rico oversight board attorney Martin Bienenstock of Proskauer Rose argued that the judge should reject claims brought by holders of bond debt issued by three Puerto Rico instrumentalities because they do not have security or ownership interests in the commonwealth’s funds. (Reuters)
Columnist spotlight: How Dems can curb conservative SCOTUS without court-packing
Trump and Republicans in the U.S. Senate are pushing ahead to move through a nominee to replace Ruth Bader Ginsburg, and Democrats are fast losing hope of averting a Supreme Court composed of six Republican-appointed justices and three Democratic appointees. But if Democrats gain control of the Senate and the White House in the election, there is a simple way they can blunt the impact of a conservative Supreme Court. Alison Frankel spoke with Stanford lecturer Andrew Jennings and BraugHagey & Borden associate and former federal appellate clerk Athul Acharya, authors of an upcoming California Law Review article titled “The Supreme Court and the 117th Congress,” about how Congress can home in on how the court decides which cases to hear simply by enacting a law to require at least six justices to agree to take a case. Read Frankel's full column here.
Check out other recent pieces from all our columnists: Alison Frankel, Jenna Greene and Hassan Kanu.
Lawyer speak: A fund manager's guide to maximizing insurance coverage
As COVID-19 continues to have a massive impact on the economy, there is an increased risk of claims being asserted against private fund managers, their funds and portfolio companies, as well as key individuals. Proskauer lawyers John Failla and Nathan Lander discuss how fund managers navigating the current economic climate can best negotiate for and obtain strong insurance protection and maximize recovery when claims arise.
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