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Mealey's Coronavirus

  • February 21, 2025

    Rehab Company Seeks Refund Of Employee Retention Credits For COVID-19 Downturn

    WASHINGTON, D.C. — A Chicago area business filed suit against the federal government seeking income tax refunds totaling more than $500,000 for the tax years 2020 and 2021 representing employee retention credits (ERC) provided for as part of the Coronavirus Aid, Relief and Economic Security (CARES) Act to encourage employers to keep employees on their payrolls during the COVID-19 pandemic.

  • February 21, 2025

    2nd Circuit Upholds Pension Ruling For NBA Ref Terminated Over Vaccine Requirement

    NEW YORK — Issuing a Feb. 20 summary order in favor of a former NBA Services Corp. (NSC) referee who was terminated for not being vaccinated against COVID-19, a Second Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals panel affirmed that the termination meant he qualified for a pension payment of nearly $3 million even though he has a separate pending discrimination lawsuit over the termination.

  • February 21, 2025

    Carnegie Mellon’s $4.8M Pandemic Closure Settlement Preliminarily Approved

    PITTSBURGH — A federal judge in Pennsylvania granted preliminary approval of a $4.8 million settlement between Carnegie Mellon University (CMU) and students who accuse the school of depriving them of the education and services for which they paid when it halted in-person learning in spring 2020 due to the coronavirus pandemic.

  • February 21, 2025

    Judge: Accommodating Workers’ Religious Objections To Vaccination An Undue Burden

    EUGENE, Ore. — An Oregon federal judge granted the motion for summary judgment of a dental practice and its president in a lawsuit by former employees who were terminated for refusing a COVID-19 vaccination and alleged that the defendants failed to accommodate their religious beliefs in violation of Title VII of the Civil Rights Act and state law.

  • February 20, 2025

    Washington City Employees Fired For Refusing COVID-19 Vaccination Appeal Dismissal

    SEATTLE — Several former city employees who were terminated after they refused to become vaccinated for COVID-19 filed a notice of appeal to the Ninth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals seeking review of a decision of a Washington federal court, which granted the city and mayor’s motion to dismiss, having concluded that the employees were unable to establish that they experienced a violation of any fundamental rights that would create a cause of action against the city (Michael Brock, et al. v Bellingham, et al., No. 24-850, W.D. Wash.).

  • February 19, 2025

    COVID-19 Treatment Patent Application Doesn’t Show Utility, Federal Circuit Says

    WASHINGTON, D.C. — A Federal Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals panel on Feb. 18 said the U.S. Patent Trial and Appeal Board (PTAB) did not err when it upheld an examiner’s rejection of multiple claims of a patent application for a treatment for the viral infection that causes COVID-19, but the panel partly disagreed with the PTAB and the examiner’s reasoning.

  • February 19, 2025

    Penn State’s $17 Million Pandemic Closure Class Settlement Given Final OK

    PITTSBURGH — A federal judge in Pennsylvania on Feb. 18 granted final approval of a $17 million class settlement between The Pennsylvania State University (Penn State) and students who accused the school of charging money for in-person education and on-campus access and services but failing to deliver them in spring 2020 due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

  • February 19, 2025

    Federal Judge Excludes Expert In Vaccine Mandate Case, Grants Summary Judgment

    PHILADELPHIA — An expert retained by a group of former employees at a school who were fired for refusing the COVID-19 vaccine cannot testify because the “misconstruction of the exhibits cited in his report undermine his reliability as it pertains to vaccine efficacy,” a federal judge in Pennsylvania ruled, also granting summary judgment to the school.

  • February 19, 2025

    Federal Judge Finds Investors’ Fraud Claims Fail To Meet Pleading Standards

    MILWAUKEE — A federal judge in Wisconsin granted an energy-related products company’s motion to dismiss securities fraud claims brought by two pension funds, finding that the investors’ allegations of fraudulent nondisclosure surrounding the company’s COVID-19 pandemic-related gains and subsequent drop did not identify any false statements of material fact.

  • February 18, 2025

    Federal Judge Right To Toss DNA Preservation Patent Suit, Federal Circuit Says

    WASHINGTON, D.C. — A California federal judge did not err during claim construction of the challenged phrase “reagent compartment” in a patent dispute involving COVID-19 testing products, a Federal Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals panel held, affirming the judge’s decision to dismiss the suit based on the claim construction.

  • February 18, 2025

    Survivors Appeal Qualified Immunity Ruling In COVID-19 Nursing Home Deaths Case

    CAMDEN, N.J. — The survivors of former nursing home residents who died from COVID-19 filed a notice of appeal to the Third Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals seeking review of a decision by a New Jersey federal court that New Jersey’s governor and public health commissioner are entitled to qualified immunity in their handling of the COVID-19 pandemic with respect to nursing homes and granting the officials’ motion to dismiss.

  • February 18, 2025

    Carnegie Mellon Students Seek Preliminary Approval Of $4.8M Pandemic Closure Pact

    PITTSBURGH — Students who accuse Carnegie Mellon University (CMU) of depriving them of the education and services for which they paid when the school halted in-person learning in spring 2020 due to the coronavirus pandemic filed a motion for preliminary approval of a $4.8 million settlement on Feb. 14.

  • February 13, 2025

    Vaccination Exemption Suit Parties Seek Stay Pending Settlement Of Related Cases

    DETROIT — A former employee of a health insurance company alleging that she was wrongly denied a religious exemption from the company’s mandatory COVID-19 vaccination policy and the company on Feb. 12 filed a joint request to stay and a notice from a Michigan federal judge presiding over discovery in several different but related cases ordering a 75-day stay in those cases and ordering that the parties file notifications of the stay order with all judges in the same federal district presiding over the related cases.

  • February 12, 2025

    Lab Asks Court To Reconsider Dismissal Of Some Of Its COVID Test Repayment Claims

    NEWARK, N.J. — In a lawsuit seeking reimbursement from health insurers for COVID-19 testing, a medical testing laboratory moved a New Jersey federal court for reconsideration of its order dismissing the lab’s claims based on retroactive assignments of rights by beneficiaries of plans governed by the Employee Retirement Income Security Act, distinguishing precedent the court cited and dismissing its breach of implied contract claims, arguing that it was for the jury to determine whether the insurer’s direct reimbursements early in the pandemic were sufficient to allege a course of conduct.

  • February 12, 2025

    Dismissal Of Student’s Contract Claims Over Vaccine Requirement Flip-Flop Reversed

    BOSTON — A Massachusetts appellate court panel on Feb. 11 affirmed in part and reversed in part the decision of a state trial court dismissing breach of contract and related claims of a former law school student who alleges that he attended the school on the promise that he would not be required to show proof of vaccination but was disenrolled prior to his second year for refusing to become vaccinated for COVID-19, ruling that the student plausibly pleaded a breach of contract claim.

  • February 10, 2025

    CFPB Orders Honda Finance To Pay $12.8M For COVID-19 Credit-Reporting Failures

    WASHINGTON, D.C. — Pursuant to a stipulation and consent to the issuance of a consent order executed by American Honda Finance Corp., the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) has ordered the company to pay $10.3 million to redress credit customers whom the finance company reported as being delinquent during the COVID-19 pandemic when they should have been reported as current and to pay a $2.5 million civil penalty.

  • February 07, 2025

    Survivors Of University Student Who Died In COVID-19 Isolation Renew Contract Claims

    NEWARK, N.J. — The estate and parents of a college sophomore who died from an epileptic seizure while in COVID-19 isolation during the school year filed an amended complaint against a university on Feb. 6 alleging breach of contract and of the implied covenant of good faith and fair dealing after a New Jersey federal court dismissed wrongful death and negligence claims based on the statute of limitations and a fraudulent concealment claim and their original contract claims as deficiently pleaded.

  • February 06, 2025

    Workers:1 Class Properly Certified, 3 Others Should Be Too In Vaccine Mandate Case

    NEW ORLEANS — A trial court properly certified a class of customer-facing workers who sought religious accommodations from United Airlines Inc.’s COVID-19 vaccine policy and were place on unpaid leave for an indefinite amount of time, but the court erred by leaving certain workers outside of the certified class and by denying certification of three other proposed classes, United Airlines workers argue in an appellee/cross-appellant brief filed in the Fifth Circuit U.S Court of Appeals.

  • February 05, 2025

    Debtor Claiming Dinged Credit From COVID Accommodation Seeks Remand To State Court

    RALEIGH, N.C. — One day after a credit reporting agency filed a notice in a North Carolina federal court stating that it and a borrower had reached a settlement of all of the borrower’s claims against the agency, including violations of the Fair Credit Reporting Act (FCRA), the borrower on Feb. 4 moved the court to dismiss for lack of subject matter jurisdiction and for remand to state court.

  • February 05, 2025

    City Employees Failed To Identify Fundamental Rights Violated By Vaccine Mandate

    SEATTLE — A Washington federal court granted the motion to dismiss of a city and its mayor and dismissed with prejudice a lawsuit by several employees who were terminated after they refused to become vaccinated for COVID-19, concluding that the employees were unable to establish that they experienced a violation of any fundamental rights that would create a cause of action against the city.

  • February 05, 2025

    Federal Judge Won’t Reconsider Summary Judgment Ruling In Vaccine Mandate Case

    KANSAS CITY, Mo. — A federal judge in Missouri denied an employer’s request that she reconsider a summary judgment ruling that allows two workers who were fired for refusing the COVID-19 vaccine to proceed with a religious discrimination failure-to-accommodate claim brought under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and a portion of a religious discrimination claim brought under state law, opining that questions of fact remain as to the issue of undue hardship.

  • February 04, 2025

    7th Circuit: Woman Fired Over Vaccine Owes Legal Fees After Arbitration Challenge

    CHICAGO — A Seventh Circuit panel affirmed a trial court’s referral to arbitration and dismissal of a complaint by a former employee of a health care software company who alleges that she was illegally terminated for refusing the COVID-19 vaccine and awarded sanctions for the employee’s “uniformly frivolous” objections to arbitration but also noted that the lower court should have stayed the case instead of dismissing it.

  • February 04, 2025

    Damaged Credit Suit Stemming From Alleged Misreport Of COVID Accommodation Settles

    RALEIGH, N.C. — A credit reporting agency on Feb. 3 filed a notice of settlement in a North Carolina federal court stating that it and a borrower had reached a settlement of all of the borrower’s claims against the agency, which included allegations of violations of the Fair Credit Reporting Act (FCRA) after the borrower received an accommodation on an auto loan during the COVID-19 pandemic and expected his account to be reported as current.

  • February 03, 2025

    Transit Employees Who Won $7.8M For COVID-19 Vaccine Refusal Firings Cross-Appeal

    SAN FRANCISCO — Former employees of a state transit agency on Jan. 31 filed a notice of cross-appeal to the Ninth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals seeking review of a California federal court’s grant of summary judgment in favor of the agency on the employees’ First Amendment free exercise claim, as well as the court’s final pretrial order, after a jury awarded the employees more than $1 million each for the agency’s failure to accommodate their religious objections to being vaccinated for COVID-19.

  • January 31, 2025

    California Transit Agency Seeks Stay Of $7.8M Judgment Against It Pending Appeal

    SAN FRANCISCO — A state transit agency on Jan. 30 moved a California federal court for stay of enforcement of judgment pending appeal after seeking review by the Ninth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals of the lower court’s decision denying its motion for judgment as a matter of law or, in the alternative, for a new trial in the wake of a California federal jury’s award to six former employees of more than $1 million each for failing to accommodate their religious objections to being vaccinated for COVID-19.