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October 09, 2025
NEW YORK — A lawyer’s error-riddled filings and initial failure to admit how they came to be add the latest “unfortunate chapter to the story of artificial intelligence misuse in the legal profession,” a New York justice said in awarding attorney fees and costs as a sanction.
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October 09, 2025
NEW YORK — A Second Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals majority ruled that New York City is entitled to attorney fees and costs that incurred litigating consumer protection claims brought against oil and gas companies that allegedly lied to consumers about the effects of fossil fuel products in affirming a New York federal judge’s ruling that was issued along with an order remanding the case to state court.
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October 08, 2025
NEW YORK — Honeywell International Inc. and its subsidiary filed a cross-motion in New York federal court to confirm an International Chamber of Commerce (ICC) award worth more than $53 million including $20.9 million in attorney fees and costs against a Mexican construction company that has petitioned for vacatur, arguing that the award “is more than adequately reasoned” and that no grounds for vacatur apply.
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October 08, 2025
PORTLAND, Ore. — The Ninth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals on Oct. 7 reduced by around $200,000 an award for attorney fees given to a police officer who sued Vancouver, Wash., for sex discrimination and retaliation after finding that a district court, though it properly reduced the award for the officer’s limited success at trial, was wrong to include work done on an unrelated case and erred in granting a request for a contingency award.
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October 08, 2025
ABERDEEN, Miss. — A Mississippi federal judge on Oct. 7 dismissed without prejudice a copyright infringement suit alleging that a company that maintains Facebook fan pages for U.S. professional and college sports violated the intellectual property rights of a Mississippi State University internet fansite, finding that the court lacks personal jurisdiction over the suit because the fansite failed to show that the fan page company is “subject to personal jurisdiction” in Mississippi.
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October 08, 2025
PHOENIX — An Arizona federal judge denied preliminary approval of a proposed class settlement to resolve claims over a mental health provider’s alleged use of Meta’s Pixel to share patient data, holding that the agreement lacked evidence to establish its overall value and contained an attorney fee structure that was disproportionate to class recovery.
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October 07, 2025
WASHINGTON, D.C. — Ousted Judicial Watch Founder Larry Klayman, who has been engaged in litigation with the public interest group for more than 19 years, filed a notice in the U.S. Supreme Court on Oct. 6 that he intends to seek rehearing after his petition challenging an attorney fees award was denied that day.
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October 06, 2025
ORLANDO, Fla. — A federal judge in Florida on Oct. 3 granted a homebuilder’s motion to clarify an order that adopted a magistrate judge’s report and recommendation granting the homebuilder’s and general contractor’s motions for entitlement to attorney fees following a summary judgment ruling in their favor in a commercial liability insurer’s lawsuit seeking a declaration as to coverage for construction-related damages at a condominium development, clarifying the deadline for the parties to move for determination of amounts owed.
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October 03, 2025
SAN FRANCISCO — Citing a U.S. Supreme Court opinion, a Ninth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals panel found that a federal court in California “abused its discretion when it failed to provide a ‘concise but clear’ explanation for” an award of attorney fees to a Sam’s Club employee after she settled her claims that she was overworked and undercompensated while working for a six-week period in 2019.
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October 02, 2025
PHOENIX — An employee stock ownership plan (ESOP) participant who filed a putative class complaint but was forced into individual arbitration asked an Arizona federal court on Oct. 1 to confirm an $11,029.50 arbitration award and to confirm an order directing the defendants to pay $2,359,909 in attorney fees incurred during the arbitration proceedings and $132,310.97 in arbitration costs.
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October 01, 2025
WASHINGTON, D.C. — A Federal Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals panel issued a mixed opinion Sept. 30 in a long-running intellectual property dispute over hookless shower curtains, affirming a New York federal judge’s findings that one appellant company infringed multiple patents but vacating or reversing findings that another appellant company infringed the patents; the panel also vacated trademark and trade dress infringement findings against the appellant companies and set aside attorney fees.
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October 01, 2025
ATLANTA — Considering an appeal related to the case for the fifth time, an 11th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals panel upheld a Florida federal judge’s decision to award attorney fees in “protracted litigation” involving trademarks related to the funk band The Commodores against one of its founding members who formed groups with similar names after departing from the group.
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October 01, 2025
INDIANAPOLIS — The Indiana Supreme Court issued a 60-day suspension from the practice of law for an attorney it found to have “engaged in professional misconduct” involving unreasonable attorney fees.
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September 30, 2025
WASHINGTON, D.C. — A District of Columbia federal judge granted a nonprofit health group’s motion to remand its lawsuit accusing two companies that sell Zyn nicotine pouches of false marketing to the District of Columbia Superior Court after finding that federal jurisdiction does not exist over the case and denied the nonprofit’s motion for attorney fees.
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September 30, 2025
HONOLULU — Handing down “a question of first impression” ruling it said is in accord with “the unanimous position of other states that have considered the issue,” the Hawaii Supreme Court upheld denial of attorney fees in an inverse condemnation case based on sovereign immunity.
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September 29, 2025
SEATTLE — The Ninth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals affirmed a lower federal court’s denial of an insured’s motion for attorney fees and costs after the court granted the insured’s motion to remand a coverage dispute arising from a shooting at the insured’s apartment complexes, finding that the insured’s characterization of the insurer’s “notice of removal as a fabrication and a misrepresentation of fact is a bridge too far.”
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September 29, 2025
DENVER — A federal judge in Colorado granted the last remaining defendant insurer’s motion for summary judgment in a plaintiff insurer’s breach of contract and bad faith lawsuit seeking recovery of the defense and settlement costs that it paid on behalf of its general contractor insured in an underlying construction defects lawsuit but denied the defendant insurer’s request for attorney fees because the lawsuit was not frivolous.
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September 26, 2025
NEW YORK — A New York federal judge has approved a stipulation under which New York City will pay an additional $750,000 in class counsel fees and costs as part of a previously approved $13.73 million settlement between the city and a class of approximately 1,380 individuals who were arrested or arrested and subjected to force by the New York City Police Department (NYPD) during protests in 2020 following the murder of George Floyd.
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September 26, 2025
SAN FRANCISCO — Writing that consumers would need to incur $4.3 billion in attorney fees to meet the jurisdictional amount in controversy requirement, a Ninth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals panel vacated a lower court’s dismissal on the merits of the consumers’ putative class action against the maker of Kleenex-brand “Wet Wipes” for violation of California’s unfair competition law (UCL) and on remand directed dismissal for lack of jurisdiction.
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September 26, 2025
PHILADELPHIA — A Pennsylvania university will pay $169,500 to end a student’s class suit alleging that the school was unjustly enriched after it failed to issue prorated refunds for tuition and fees after the campus closed during the coronavirus pandemic.
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September 26, 2025
BOSTON — Following last-minute adjustments suggested by the U.S. Department of Labor (DOL) and an independent fiduciary, a Massachusetts federal judge on Sept. 25 granted final approval to an $8.25 million class settlement that resolved an Employee Retirement Income Security Act suit over a retirement plan’s allegedly excessive recordkeeping fees.
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September 25, 2025
NEW YORK — After a second bench trial on the stipulated record in a case challenging termination of long-term disability (LTD) benefits, a New York federal judge resolved calculation issues largely in favor of the insurer and resolved an attorney fee dispute in favor of the claimant.
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September 25, 2025
SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico — A federal judge partially granted motions seeking attorney fees and expenses incurred responding to more than 50 fake citations in briefing he believed shows the use of artificial intelligence, saying he hoped the $24,492.10 he imposed as a sanction would act as a deterrent.
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September 25, 2025
SPRINGFIELD, Ill. — Reversing a judgment that required an Illinois state agency to pay $10,639.21 in attorney fees and costs under the Illinois Mental Health and Developmental Disabilities Confidentiality Act (Confidentiality Act), the full Illinois Supreme Court issued a unanimous opinion finding that the lower court lacked subject matter jurisdiction because there was no “express statutory waiver of sovereign immunity in” the Confidentiality Act.
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September 24, 2025
BROOKLYN, N.Y. — A federal judge in New York granted final approval of a $300,000 settlement in a securities class action brought by investors against an aerospace-based communication network product company and two of its executives that alleged that the company provided materially false and misleading statements about its production yields and their impact on the company’s revenue growth.