Good morning. Just before the U.S. Supreme Court heard the first oral arguments of its new term, it revealed what issues it will be taking up next. Plus, Yale Law students see most of their retaliation suit against the school scrapped, and the law firms reaping the most of dwindling M&A work. The high court is back, and the news won’t stop — scroll on!
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The next round of cases line up at the Supreme Court |
The U.S. Supreme Court has added a host of key cases to the new term’s docket, including a dispute over U.S. protections for internet and social media companies that free them from responsibility for material posted by users, Andrew Chung reports. On the labor and employment front, Daniel Wiessner writes on the court’s plan to dive into a dispute over employers suing a union for destruction of property. Lawyers for Turkish state-owned lender Halkbank won a chance to challenge criminal charges of money laundering, bank fraud and conspiracy, Nate Raymond reports.
The justices sought the views of the U.S. Justice Department in a variety of cases, including whether they should hear Teva’s challenge to a $235 million award for GlaxoSmithKline in a patent dispute over generic heart medication. The court also wants to hear from the DOJ on whether a state or federal court should hear a lawsuit from Colorado municipalities accusing ExxonMobil and Suncor Energy of worsening climate change.
The court declined any further review of a raft of decisions in big cases. Apple lost its latest bid to challenge Qualcomm patents, and the clock has run out on Oakland’s effort to force the NFL to pay hundreds of millions of dollars in antitrust damages over the Raiders’ move to Las Vegas. The Ukrainian government failed to convince the justices to take up its case against paying a $173 million judgment to Russian oil and gas company Tatneft.
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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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U.S. District Judge Sarah Merriam dismissed the bulk of a lawsuit brought by two Yale Law students who alleged retaliation by the school’s dean and other administrators. The court said the anti-retaliation policy at issue was not in effect when the plaintiffs declined to assist in the school’s investigation of a prominent professor. (Reuters)
Kirkland, the highest-grossing law firm in the U.S., promoted its largest class of new partners for the fifth time in as many years, elevating 193 lawyers to partner, up from 151 the previous year — a 28% increase. (Reuters)
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A team from Cooley advised reality television star and influencer Kim Kardashian in settling SEC claims that she unlawfully touted a crypto security. Kardashian, who did not admit liability, agreed to pay $1.26 million in penalties, disgorgement and interest. (Reuters)
- Midsize firm Fennemore Craig expanded in California with a new office and three lawyers from a small law firm Rynn & Janowsky focused on agriculture businesses. (Reuters)
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Chart: Disha Raychaudhuri/REUTERS |
That’s the combined value of global M&A deals through the first nine months of 2022 — but it’s down from more than $4.2 trillion for the same period last year, according to the latest figures from Refinitiv. The drop came with a corresponding slowdown in M&A advisory work for many of the world’s largest law firms. See which firms came out on top despite the drop.
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The U.S. Supreme Court agreed on Monday to take up an issue with profound consequences for lawyers who advise clients on complex issues with both legal and business implications. The 9th Circuit held last year in In re Grand Jury that privilege does not shield communications with a primary business purpose, even if the documents also contain legal advice. The unnamed law firm that lost at the 9th Circuit told the Supreme Court that the circuit’s “primary purpose” test is at odds with D.C. Circuit precedent, which says that documents are shielded by privilege as long as legal advice was a primary purpose. The Supreme Court will now have to reconcile those holdings. The issue, writes Alison Frankel, may not inspire protests on the steps of the Supreme Court – but for lawyers across a wide spectrum of practice areas, it’s actually one of the most important cases of the term.
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"The Sixth Circuit’s holding stands alone among the otherwise uniform approach courts have taken—and not in a good way." |
—The Onion, which filed an amicus brief before the U.S. Supreme Court in support of a petition from an Ohio man who created a parody Facebook page for his local police department and faced criminal charges as a result. The man, Anthony Novak, was acquitted of the charges but saw his civil suit against the police department thrown out at the Sixth Circuit, which said there was reason to believe Novak’s postings were criminal and therefore the officers who arrested him are entitled to qualified immunity. The Onion, represented by Steve van Stempvoort of Miller Johnson, defended the posts as parody, and said it was submitting the brief “to protect its continued ability to create fiction that may ultimately merge into reality.”
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The U.S. Supreme Court will hear oral arguments in Alabama's defense of a Republican-backed map of the state's U.S. congressional districts that a lower court found likely discriminates against Black voters. The resolution of the case that could limit the power of the landmark Voting Rights Act. Alabama has said that drawing a map to satisfy the plaintiffs would require it to deliberately maximize the influence of Black voters, which it argues would amount to racial discrimination.
Taylor Swift and her attorney Peter Anderson at
Davis Wright Tremaine will once again ask a Los Angeles federal court to end a copyright case over her song "Shake It Off" brought by the writers of girl group 3LW's minor hit "Playas Gon' Play." Swift says she has never heard the 3LW song and that she did not copy "the idea of combining the public domain phrases players gonna play and haters gonna hate.” A judge dismissed the lawsuit in 2018, but the
9th Circuit revived the suit after finding the 3LW songwriters had plausibly alleged the originality of their lyrics.
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Steve Bannon, a top strategist for former President Donald Trump, is slated to make a court appearance in his criminal case in New York state court. Bannon was indicted on money laundering and conspiracy charges for allegedly deceiving donors with an effort to help Trump build a wall along the U.S.-Mexico border. The allegations overlap with conduct underlying an August 2020 federal prosecution of Bannon, a case in which he pleaded not guilty. That case ended abruptly in January 2021 when Trump pardoned him in the final hours of Trump’s presidency. He has pleaded not guilty in the state case, which is not impacted by the pardon.
Court calendars are subject to last-minute docket changes. |
Conservative U.S. Supreme Court justices appeared open at oral argument to limiting the reach of the EPA’s authority to protect wetlands from pollution under a landmark environmental law in a case involving Idaho property owners seeking to build a home. (Reuters)
Former Trump-era Secretary of State Rex Tillerson testified in the criminal trial of Thomas Barrack, a onetime fundraiser for Donald Trump, that he was unaware of any role played by the Trump ally in U.S. policy toward the Middle East.
Barrack has pleaded not guilty to charges he used his influence with the Trump campaign and administration to push the United Arab Emirates' interests without notifying the U.S. attorney general, as required by law. (Reuters)
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A gun rights group's legal challenge to a San Jose, California, city ordinance requiring gun owners to purchase insurance and pay a fee to a nonprofit aimed at preventing gun violence can go forward, U.S. District Judge Beth Labson Freeman said. Freeman granted much of San Jose’s motion to toss the case, brought by the National Association for Gun Rights with counsel from Dhillon Law Group, but said the group could re-file most of the dismissed claims. (Reuters)
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American Airlines CEO Robert Isom pushed back against assertions that American and JetBlue acted as a single airline in Boston and the New York area following the creation of their Northeast Alliance in 2020. Isom testified as the DOJ, six states and the District of Columbia have challenged the alliance, calling it a "de facto merger" in which they coordinate flights and pool revenue while costing travelers $700 million in extra annual costs. (Reuters)
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Squire Patton Boggs and Mayer Brown added technology-focused partners to their European antitrust practice groups. Gorka Navea, former deputy head of the cartel division at Europe’s top antitrust watchdog, joined Squire from Wilson Sonsini. Andrea Pomana joined Mayer Brown from Advant Beiten. (Reuters)
King & Spalding hired Mark Kirsch, a former New York head of Gibson Dunn, as a New York-based partner. Kirsch previously was a co-chair of Gibson Dunn’s litigation practice. (Reuters)
- Linklaters added partner Richard Woodworth to its Asia restructuring and insolvency practice in Hong Kong from Allen & Overy. (Reuters)
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Latham said two top Biden White House lawyers joined the firm in Washington, D.C., as white-collar and investigations partners. Jonathan Su and Danielle Conley previously were deputy counsels in the Biden White House counsel’s office. Su is rejoining the firm; Conley previously was at Wilmer Hale. (Latham)
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Robert Dow Jr, a U.S. judge in Chicago, was named counselor to Chief Justice John Roberts, succeeding Jeffrey Minear, who recently retired. Dow, who has served on the trial court since 2007, will join Robert as his full-time counselor in December. (Supreme Court)
- Akin added partner Ranesh Ramanathan in New York as co-leader of the firm’s special situations and private credit group. He was previously at Kirkland. (Akin Gump)
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Amy Rubenstein left DLA Piper to join Dentons. Rubenstein, who was U.S. co-chair of the industrials sector and chemicals and toxic tort groups at DLA Piper, will be part of Dentons’ healthcare practice and advise cannabis clients. (Dentons)
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