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NEW ORLEANS — A Fifth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals panel ruled that it lacks subject matter jurisdiction over an appeal brought by domestic insurers against a Louisiana political subdivision that brought claims for hurricane insurance coverage, citing a Louisiana Supreme Court ruling arising out of certified questions from the same case and recent Fifth Circuit precedents holding that state law prohibits arbitration of such disputes.
LAFAYETTE, La. — The government on Jan. 27 asked a Louisiana federal court to stay all proceedings in a case brought by the state that challenges the validity of the U.S. Food and Drug Administration’s 2023 decision to remove the in-person dispensing requirement for mifepristone, one of two drugs used to induce early termination of pregnancy, while it conducts a review of the agency’s previous rulings.
OLYMPIA, Wash. — The Washington Supreme Court on Jan. 27 posted a note to the docket of a case in which it previously reinstated a $185 million verdict against Monsanto Co. for injuries stemming from exposure to polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs), amending the opinion and mandating that the case be remanded to a state superior court. The Supreme Court’s decision comes after the plaintiffs recommended that it grant Monsanto’s request for reconsideration of the majority opinion in light of the fact that the parties “have now reached an agreement to settle this case.”
WILMINGTON, Del. — A majority of the Delaware Supreme Court on Jan. 27 held that an insurance policy’s bump-up exclusion does not bar directors and officers coverage for an underlying securities class action brought against the insured, holding that the insurers failed to satisfy both requirements of the exclusion.
SAN FRANCISCO — In a 2-1 unpublished memorandum disposition issued Jan. 27, the Ninth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals affirmed denial of a claim for a minor dependent’s stay at a residential mental health treatment center that a health insurer said was not medically necessary.
WASHINGTON, D.C. — A Federal Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals panel denied a sports-based nonprofit organization’s petition to reconsider a December opinion affirming the Trademark Trial and Appeal Board’s (TTAB’s) decision to cancel trademarks containing the phrase “more than an athlete,” rejecting the petitioner’s contention that the panel had erred in multiple ways.
ATLANTA — Agreeing to en banc rehearing concerning a 40-year-old circuit precedent that two panel members had said “imposed a judicially-created and atextual administrative exhaustion requirement for fiduciary-breach and statutory claims under” the Employee Retirement Income Security Act, the 11th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals on Jan. 27 vacated a ruling affirming dismissal of an employee stock ownership plan (ESOP) valuation case.
BOSTON — On the heels of a request to amend their complaint a fourth time in response to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s Jan. 5 reduction of its recommended childhood vaccinations from 17 to 11, physicians’ professional groups and others moved for a preliminary injunction to block the CDC from implementing or enforcing those changes, as well as its earlier announced changes to COVID-19 vaccine recommendations for children and pregnant women, the hepatitis B vaccine for newborns and other changes to established vaccine recommendations.
SAN FRANCISCO — A grant of class certification in an Employee Retirement Income Security Act suit over alleged underpayment for out-of-network behavioral health treatment will stand after the Ninth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals on Jan. 26 denied a petition for leave to file an interlocutory appeal that involves the question of whether underpayment of benefits for an ERISA plan is an injury sufficient for standing purposes.
RICHMOND, Va. — Resolving “two important questions” that both “concern what happens when a multiemployer pension plan submits a proof of claim for withdrawal liability in the bankruptcy of a contributing employer,” the Fourth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals on Jan. 26 affirmed summary judgment against an employer that withdrew from the multiemployer fund and its control group.
PHILADELPHIA — A federal judge in Pennsylvania on Jan. 26 imposed a $4,000 sanction on an attorney for submitting a motion with eight fake citations created by one of the “most premier and frequently utilized legal research tools” and ordered the attorney and local counsel to submit the ruling to various interested parties.