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BOSTON — The First Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals on Nov. 20 affirmed a lower federal court’s summary judgment ruling in favor of a cybersecurity company in a lawsuit arising from a 2018 health data breach, rejecting an insurer’s argument that the lower court erred in denying it equitable indemnification from the cybersecurity company.
WASHINGTON, D.C. — A Federal Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals panel on Nov. 20 held that the U.S. Patent Trial and Appeal Board (PTAB) wrongly construed the claim term “acquiring interest data” when considering the patentability of a claim phrase in a patent describing a system to determine if a computer is being used by a human or a “bot”; under the correct construction, the panel held that the claim is anticipated by a prior art reference.
AUSTIN, Texas — The Texas Supreme Court on Nov. 21 denied a motion for rehearing filed by a group of pharmacies, letting stand its decision to refuse to review a lower court’s ruling that allowed a case filed against them by Texas counties for their role in the opioid epidemic to proceed, rejecting arguments by the pharmacies that the case will leave those counties “emboldened to find another set of businesses to target” and “could cause serious harm to people across this State.”
WASHINGTON, D.C. — The District of Columbia Court of Appeals on Nov. 20 reversed a man’s convictions for first-degree murder after finding that the trial court erred in failing to conduct a proper analysis under Motorola Inc. v. Murray and Federal Rule of Evidence 702 of the government’s cell site location information (CSLI) expert.
ATLANTA — Upholding termination of long-term disability (LTD) benefits in a case that turned on a therapist’s notes, the 11th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals said in an unpublished Nov. 20 opinion that although some of the notes are “troubling” because they report passive suicidal ideation, as a whole they do not show that the claimant “was unable to perform her duties as a commercial litigator.”
TALLAHASSEE, Fla. — A Florida appellate court on Nov. 19 affirmed a lower court ruling granting judgment on the pleadings for an insurer in a putative class action over the alleged failure by Citizens Property Insurance Corp., which describes itself on its website as Florida’s “insurer of last resort,” to pay statutory interest with a settlement payment, finding that the insured failed to assert a breach of the settlement agreement.
BOSTON — A panel of the First Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals on Nov. 19 reversed and remanded to Maine federal court the state’s lawsuit against the 3M Co. Inc. alleging injury from water contamination caused by the firefighting agent aqueous film forming foam (AFFF), ruling that 3M is entitled to federal jurisdiction because it has a “colorable” federal contractor defense.
WASHINGTON, D.C. — An Oregon federal magistrate judge properly granted summary judgment of noninfringement in favor of defendant railcar manufacturers in a dispute over patents related to railroad gondola cars because the accused cars lacked a required “floor panel extension” as defined by the patents, a Federal Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals panel held Nov. 19.
SAN FRANCISCO — A Ninth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals panel denied a property owner and construction company’s petition for panel rehearing of the split panel’s holding that the construction company’s insurer does not owe coverage for an underlying suit over damage caused by improperly constructed retaining walls because the policy’s impaired property exclusion bars coverage and the “sudden and accidental injury” exception to the exclusion does not apply.
RICHMOND, Va. — A Fourth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals panel on Nov. 18 agreed with a Virginia federal judge’s finding that a contractor is not owed reimbursement from excess insurers for expenses it sustained while repairing damage to walls at a school it was building for the U.S. Marine Corps caused by a subcontractor; the panel found no reversable error in the judge’s dismissal or subsequent ruling.
WASHINGTON, D.C. — A Federal Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals panel said on Nov. 18 that a generic drug maker “has overcome the doubly high burden of persuading us to overturn a jury verdict of no invalidity” in a dispute over a patent relating to a medication for eyelash growth, reversing a Colorado federal jury’s infringement finding and $39 million in damages.