Good morning. Insurers for Boy Scouts of America are preparing to appeal the youth group’s $2.3 billon sexual abuse settlement, adding more obstacles to the deal. Plus, a former BakerHostetler lawyer is opening his own practice after a dustup over his effort as a Texas lawmaker to penalize another big firm for its abortion travel aid plan. The DOJ’s facing court pressure to release more documents justifying the Mar-a-Lago raid, and a Florida law curbing “woke” workplace bias training is blocked. It’s Friday, we made it!
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REUTERS/Shannon Stapleton |
The Boy Scouts of America’s $2.3 billion sexual abuse settlement is likely to face appeals from a group of the organization’s insurers after it is approved in bankruptcy court, reports Dietrich Knauth.
The group, which includes AIG and Liberty Mutual, has objected to the settlement, claiming the Boy Scouts colluded with men who claimed they were abused by troop leaders to make the insurers liable. The objecting insurers are represented by James Hallowell of Gibson Dunn & Crutcher and David Christian of David Christian Attorneys.
The Boy Scouts will seek court approval next month for its revised bankruptcy plan, which would provide at least $2.3 billion to compensate more than 80,000 men who have made abuse claims. U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Laurie Selber Silverstein has partially approved the deal, but the Boy Scouts made some revisions to address pieces of the agreement still awaiting her sign off. But the insurers said Thursday they continue to object to the plan, despite Silverstein’s initial approval and the revisions. |
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| 2022 State of Corporate Law Departments Report
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Based on data driven and reliable insights: -2,000+ telephone interviews with in-house counsel -1,000+ survey responses -Detailed spend data from the Legal Department Operations (LDO) Index |
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2022 State of Corporate Law Departments Report
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Based on data driven and reliable insights: - 2,000+ telephone interviews with in-house counsel
- 1,000+ survey responses
- Detailed spend data from the Legal Department Operations (LDO) Index
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A BakerHostetler attorney and member of the Texas House of Representatives who threatened to take legal action against Sidley Austin after the firm said it would cover the cost of travel for employees seeking abortions has left to form his own law practice, reports Jacqueline Thomsen.
Cody Vasut, a member of the Texas Freedom Caucus, filed paperwork to form his own firm in Houston called Vasut Law. His profile was removed from the BakerHostetler website after Reuters first reported he was a member of the firm.
Vasut and a BakerHostetler spokesperson did not immediately respond to requests for comment Thursday.
Sidley, one of several law firms to announce it was providing staffers with abortion access support, was the target of a letter from the Texas Freedom Caucus that said it believes the firm “has been complicit in illegal abortions” performed in the state.
Read more about Vasut’s move. |
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WilmerHale lawyers for Facebook owner Meta want a California federal judge to award more than $2.73 million in legal fees for their work on a lawsuit accusing an Israeli company of unlawfully scraping user and advertising information from the popular social media site. BrandTotal’s attorneys at Husch Blackwell said they would fight the fee bid. (Reuters)
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A new advisory opinion from the Ohio Board of Professional Conduct says a “lawyer may accept and hold cryptocurrency in escrow when related to the representation of a client or for a third party through a law-related business.” The non-binding opinion only discusses crypto held in escrow and not for the payment of legal fees. (Law.com)
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That’s the number of charges former Trump Organization senior executive Allen Weisselberg pleaded guilty to in Manhattan state court, where he was accused of helping the company engineer a 15-year tax fraud. Weisselberg's plea agreement calls for him to serve five months at New York’s Rikers Island jail, though he could be released after 100 days. Cadwalader litigation co-chair Nicholas Gravante said Weisselberg “decided to enter a plea of guilty today to put an end to this case and the years-long legal and personal nightmares it has caused for him and his family." The deal also will require him to testify about the Trump Organization’s business practices at an upcoming trial. The company has pleaded not guilty. Jury selection is scheduled to begin on Oct. 24.
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What was already one of the weirdest sagas in the annals of shareholder litigation has taken yet another unexpected turn, snagging Boies Schiller Flexner in what appears to be a conflicts mishap. Boies represented a former FirstEnergy vice-president who joined a global settlement in March to resolve derivative claims. A Boies partner even signed the settlement agreement. But then a few months later, Boies applied for an appointment to serve as shareholder counsel in restarting discovery against the FirstEnergy defendants in a parallel suit. Boies eventually withdrew that application but Alison Frankel has the details of the latest peculiarity in the notorious FirstEnergy case.
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Legal experts Norman Kinel of Squire Patton Boggs, Jeffrey Gleit of ArentFox Schiff, and torts attorney Jon Ruckdeschel weigh in on the merits of a particular use of Chapter 11 to address mass tort liability, as one case heads for appellate review. |
"Now, like the heroine in Stranger Things, this Court is once again asked to pull Florida back from the upside down." |
—U.S. District Judge Mark Walker in Tallahassee, who blocked a Florida law that prohibits employers from promoting various progressive concepts in workplace anti-bias trainings after finding that the law’s broad ban on speech is unconstitutional. Walker said in his decision that Florida's Individual Freedom Act, also known as the Stop WOKE Act, violates employers' free-speech rights because it attacks ideas instead of conduct.
Read to find out what happens to the Florida law now. |
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State judges in North Dakota and Arizona will take up abortion-rights disputes, as state courts grapple with the impact of the fall of the landmark abortion rights ruling Roe v. Wade. The North Dakota court will hear a challenge to the state’s “trigger ban” that would block most abortions in the state in the aftermath of the U.S. Supreme Court’s divided ruling in June striking down Roe. The Arizona state court judge is set to take up whether it can enforce a pre-Roe law banning abortions after 15 weeks of pregnancy.
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Closing arguments are set in the U.S. Justice Department bench trial in Washington, D.C., federal court over the government’s bid to block Penguin Random House’s $2.2 billion merger with rival Simon & Schuster. Witnesses for the government have included acclaimed author Stephen King, who said writers will have fewer places to shop their books if the merger goes through. Penguin, represented by O’Melveny’s Daniel Petrocelli, and Simon & Schuster have said the merger is “pro-consumer, pro-author and pro-book seller.” U.S. District Judge Florence Pan, who has been nominated to the D.C. Circuit, is presiding at the trial.
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The U.S. Justice Department is due to respond in the U.S. Supreme Court to a petition from the Florida attorney general’s office challenging the authority of the federal government to bring certain actions under the Americans With Disabilities Act. Florida is appealing a divided 11th Circuit decision. The state contends Title II of the ADA gives enforcement to “person[s] alleging discrimination, which under longstanding interpretive principles presumptively excludes the United States.”
Court calendars are subject to last-minute docket changes.
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What to catch up on this weekend |
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GenBioPro, which makes the drug used in medication abortions, dropped its bid to sell mifepristone in Mississippi despite the state's recently enacted abortion ban. The company, which didn’t say why it was dismissing the lawsuit, had argued that federal regulators' approval of mifepristone to induce abortion at up to 10 weeks overrode the state's prohibition on nearly all abortions. The dismissal did leave the door open for refiling. (Reuters)
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The U.S. Justice Department has until Aug. 25 to propose a redacted version of the Mar-a-Lago search warrant affidavit that might be released to the public. U.S. Magistrate Judge Bruce Reinhart indicated at a hearing over access to the affidavit, which provided the basis for the search of Donald Trump’s Florida estate, that he was inclined toward releasing some evidence. (Reuters)
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A 5-2 majority of Kentucky's Supreme Court refused to stop the state from enforcing two laws banning most abortions while it considers a legal challenge by abortion clinics. The court said that the clinics had not shown that there was "extraordinary cause" for a temporary order blocking the two laws, a ruling the state’s attorney general, Daniel Cameron, called a “victory for life and the rule of law.” (Reuters)
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Endo International's Par Pharmaceutical failed to persuade the Federal Circuit to revive its lawsuit seeking to block Eagle Pharmaceuticals from selling a generic version of Par's best-selling blood-pressure drug Vasostrict. The court held that the generic made by Eagle, represented in the case by John O'Quinn of Kirkland & Ellis, would not infringe patents owned by Par because the pH range of the generic drug was lower than the range outlined in the patents. (Reuters)
A Canadian musician who sued singer Post Malone over his No.1 hit single "Circles" should be sanctioned because he hid text messages that show he does not deserve credit for the song, according to a court filing. Malone said Tyler Armes’ case should be terminated as a sanction because Armes hid messages that showed he was not invited to write with Post and not legally a co-writer of the song. (Reuters)
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Kirkland hired two investment funds partners — Louisa Cobbe from Bryan Cave and Catherine Gokah from Ashurst — for the firm’s London office. (Reuters)
- Saul Ewing Arnstein & Lehr added Michael Metz-Topodas as a new construction practice partner, working out of its Philadelphia office. Metz-Topodas was previously with Cohen Seglias. (Saul Ewing)
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Raines Feldman has named Simon Miller as managing partner of its New York office. Miller, a commercial litigator, formerly had the same role at Eisner LLP’s New York office. (Raines Feldman)
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It’s getting easier for customers to establish bad faith claims against their insurers in court, write Michael Zigelman and Kevin Yombor of Kaufman Dolowich & Voluck. That means it's more important than ever that insurance companies stay on top of relevant court rulings in the jurisdictions where they work, Zigelman and Yombor write. Here are some important rulings insurers should know about.
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