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SAN FRANCISCO — The Ninth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals on March 23 held that an insured failed to raise a genuine dispute of material fact regarding whether she timely filed her lawsuit seeking coverage for her alleged loss of hundreds of thousands of dollars in personal belongings that were destroyed by the Tubbs Fire in October 2017, affirming a lower federal court’s grant of summary judgment in favor of the insurers in her five-year-old pro se lawsuit alleging claims for breach of contract, breach of the implied covenant of good faith and fair dealing, misrepresentation, emotional distress and violations of the Unruh Act, the Americans with Disabilities Act and California Business and Professions Code Section 17200.
NEW ORLEANS — The Fifth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals granted a petition filed by Intuit Inc., the seller of online tax preparation product TurboTax, and vacated a 20-year cease-and-desist order issued by the Federal Trade Commission preventing Intuit from advertising any services as free, finding that the administrative law judge proceeding resulting in the order violated the separation of powers under Article III of the U.S. Constitution because deceptive advertising suits involve private rights requiring adjudication in federal court.
CINCINNATI — A Sixth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals panel ruled that a Michigan federal judge did not abuse his discretion in largely denying a pet care services company’s request for a preliminary injunction against former franchisees the company said misappropriated proprietary methods, client data and trademarks; the panel saw no error in the district court’s application of the unclean hands doctrine.
LOUISVILLE, Ky. — A duty exists under Kentucky negligence and product liability law to prevent foreseeable household exposures to asbestos that are “regular and repeated,” the Kentucky Supreme Court said in affirming a ruling reversing summary judgment for two defendants in an asbestos case and in finding that a summer job didn’t trigger workers’ compensation system exclusivity.
WASHINGTON, D.C. — The U.S. Supreme Court on March 23 heard arguments as to whether a COVID-era Mississippi state law providing that mail-in ballots postmarked by Election Day may be received by the registrar within five days of Election Day and still be valid is, as the Fifth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals found, preempted by federal law governing elections and the definition of Election Day (Michael Watson v. Republican National Committee, et al., No. 24-1260, U.S. Sup.).
WASHINGTON, D.C. — Two news publishers are not in the general search services marketplace and have not established that general Google LLC search and its artificial intelligence products AI Overviews or Gemini chatbot are separate products for antitrust tying purposes, a federal judge in the District of Columbia said March 20 in dismissing antitrust claims.
PHILADELPHIA — A panel of the Third Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals has issued a nonprecedential per curiam opinion vacating an order of a district court, which had denied a motion for a preliminary injunction sought by residents in a dispute with hydraulic fracturing companies related to alleged contamination of their drinking water. The Third Circuit panel ruled that without a facial showing of jurisdiction pursuant to the Class Action Fairness Act (CAFA), it was not error for the district court to deny the injunction motion.
WASHINGTON, D.C. — The U.S. Supreme Court on March 23 granted the U.S. government’s motion to participate in oral arguments when it considers the standard for the inducement of infringement to be applied in medical patent cases, including in “skinny label cases” involving allegedly noninfringing use; on March 20, the patent-holding biopharmaceutical entities filed their merits brief, arguing that statements made by a bioequivalent maker plausibly allege induced infringement.
WASHINGTON, D.C. — The U.S. Supreme Court announced on March 23 that it will not consider a petition for a writ of certiorari filed by two drug companies that argued the Ninth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals erred in certifying a national third-party payer (TPP) class of entities that paid for the diabetes drug Actos.
WASHINGTON, D.C. — The Federal Communications Commission and the U.S. government on March 20 filed their response in the U.S. Supreme Court in consolidated cases where Verizon Communications Inc. and AT&T Inc. assert constitutional challenges to the FCC’s enforcement of monetary forfeitures under the Communications Act.
WASHINGTON, D.C. — The U.S. Supreme Court on March 23 denied a petition for a writ of certiorari filed by a professional certification school seeking review of the Ninth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals’ affirmance of a lower court’s ruling compelling arbitration and dismissing a class action antitrust suit alleging that Google and Apple violated state and federal antitrust laws by unlawfully agreeing to divide online search and search advertising markets.