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CHICAGO — Three settlements totaling more than $5 million between turkey processors and commercial and institutional indirect purchasers (CIIPPs) were granted final approval by a federal judge in Illinois in a multiyear antitrust case, bringing the total approved settlements between purchasers and processors to more than $45 million.
WASHINGTON, D.C. — Arguing in part that the decision at issue “will likely result in the payment of hundreds of millions of dollars in taxpayer funds to terminated pension plans that Congress intentionally excluded from” a special financial assistance (SFA) program, the U.S. solicitor general filed a certiorari petition on behalf of the Pension Benefit Guaranty Corp. (PBGC) urging the U.S. Supreme Court to “grant review without awaiting the development of a circuit conflict.”
GULFPORT, Miss. — A Mississippi federal judge dismissed a complaint brought by industry associations, a distributor and retailers claiming that a new Mississippi vape directory law that will ban the sale of e-cigarettes containing synthetic nicotine is unconstitutional, finding that the plaintiffs lack standing because the products they wish to sell are not authorized by the Food and Drug Administration and “there is no legally protected interest to commit a crime.”
JACKSONVILLE, Fla. — On Dec. 16, a federal judge in Florida adopted the report and recommendations of a magistrate judge that an insurer’s action against its insured subcontractor seeking a declaration that it owed no coverage to the subcontractor in an underlying construction-defect lawsuit be dismissed for lack of Article III jurisdiction.
ST. LOUIS — The Eighth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals on Dec. 16 affirmed a lower court ruling granting summary judgment in favor of an insurer in a dispute over the insurer’s rescission of a homeowner’s policy due to “fraud” and misrepresentations regarding questions in the policy application, finding that the lower court ruled correctly in finding that the insurer “properly rescinded” the policy due to misrepresentations about a foreclosed property.
ATLANTA — Saying, “No circuit has reached a contrary conclusion,” the 11th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals became the seventh circuit court to rule that an arbitration provision is unenforceable because it barred “effective vindication” of statutory Employee Retirement Income Security Act rights; the putative class action at hand concerns an employee stock ownership plan (ESOP), and the U.S. Department of Labor (DOL) and an advocacy organization filed October 2024 amicus curiae briefs supporting application of the effective vindication doctrine.
WASHINGTON, D.C. — A Federal Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals panel on Dec. 16 affirmed a California federal judge’s dismissal of a technology company’s patent infringement suit against a competitor, agreeing that the plaintiff-appellant failed to show that the accused peer-to-peer (P2P) video streaming product met a required claim limitation.
NEW ORLEANS — A Fifth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals panel on Dec. 15 granted a South Korean battery-maker’s petition for rehearing, withdrew its opinion finding jurisdiction over personal injury claims against the company for injuries caused by a vape explosion, and issued a new opinion finding no jurisdiction after a Seventh Circuit opinion in a similar case led it to go “hunting” for previously unreviewed jurisdictional facts.
WASHINGTON, D.C. — A Federal Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals panel on Dec. 15 affirmed a Delaware federal judge’s decision to grant judgment as a matter of law (JMOL) to a defendant entity in a dispute over patents describing a vascular access port product, finding that the judge properly determined that the claims at issue were anticipated by prior art references.
WASHINGTON, D.C. — A man who won a $1.25 million damages award for injuries from exposure to the herbicide Roundup filed a supplemental brief in the U.S. Supreme Court on Dec. 16 contending that the U.S. government’s amicus curiae brief in support of Monsanto’s petition for review is “incomplete and unpersuasive” because there is no circuit split over whether the Federal Insecticide, Fungicide and Rodenticide Act (FIFRA) forbids Monsanto from warning consumers that exposure to Roundup can cause deadly cancer.
DOVER, Del. — The Delaware Supreme Court on Dec. 15 affirmed a Chancery Court judgment awarding Reynolds American Inc. and R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Co. (collectively RJR) approximately $276 million against ITG Brands LLC in a long-running dispute over liabilities to the state of Florida under a tobacco company settlement for the number of cigarettes sold in the state under brands that RJR sold to ITG.