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July 24, 2026
NEW YORK — A Second Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals panel affirmed a New York federal court’s dismissal of claims brought by a reinsurer and a management general agency under the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations (RICO) over an alleged workers’ compensation fraud scheme at the center of several lawsuits, concurring with the district court that they failed to establish proximate causation in either their first amended complaint or their rejected second amended complaint.
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July 23, 2026
NEW YORK — A New York federal judge on July 22 found that opinions offered by an expert retained by one of the few plaintiffs remaining in the M/L Taper hip multidistrict litigation are unreliable and that he could not establish what caused the man’s device to fracture; the judge also granted summary judgment to the manufacturer because of the exclusion of the expert testimony.
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July 21, 2026
SAN JOSE, Calif. — Two consumers filed a nationwide putative class complaint in California federal court accusing an agriculture and produce company worth $8 billion of liability for the “entirely avoidable” contamination of shredded lettuce and leafy greens distributed nationwide with cyclospora, accusing it of negligence, violation of California and New York consumer protection laws and other claims.
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July 21, 2026
ST. LOUIS — A Missouri gun owner lacks standing to sue over a pistol’s alleged defective features that can cause it to be inadvertently discharged because he admitted he has never experienced that or any other issues, an Eighth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals panel ruled, vacating a trial court’s class certification order and remanding with instructions to dismiss the case.
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July 21, 2026
HARRISBURG, Pa. — No coverage is owed for an underlying bodily injury suit arising out of toxic mold exposure in an insured apartment because a policy’s fungi and bacteria exclusion and pollution exclusion bar coverage for the suit filed against the insureds who operated an apartment complex where the underlying plaintiffs were allegedly exposed, an insurer says in a complaint filed in Pennsylvania federal court.
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July 20, 2026
TALLAHASSEE, Fla. — In reversing and remanding a split appellate majority’s decision for reconsideration under the proper legal standard pursuant to Florida’s workers’ compensation law, the state Supreme Court held that injuries sustained by a general manager of an Orlando car rental business who was shot while performing job duties late at night could be compensable, even though the motive of the shooter was unknown.
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July 17, 2026
DETROIT — A Michigan appellate panel affirmed a lower court’s ruling granting summary disposition for a hospital and physician in a man’s suit alleging gross negligence, medical malpractice and violations of his civil rights over a hospital’s alleged failure to admit him for his purported COVID-19 symptoms, finding that the hospital and physician were entitled to immunity under the Pandemic Health Care Immunity Act (PHCIA) for medical malpractice because the claims involved negligence rather than gross negligence and because the gross negligence “claim sounded in medical malpractice such that it was also barred by immunity.”
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July 14, 2026
NEW YORK — The Second Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals on July 13 vacated rulings excluding the testimony of four general causation experts retained by parents who allege that prenatal exposure to acetaminophen causes autism or attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) and the resulting judgments, remanding to the multidistrict litigation judge, who had dismissed the cases for lack of causation.
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July 13, 2026
DENVER — Issuing an unpublished order and judgment affirming the exclusion of an expert witness in a medical malpractice case as a sanction for discovery violations, refusal to allow untimely substitution of that expert and the resulting grant of summary judgment for the defendants, the 10th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals said in part that the trial court had “ample reason to conclude Plaintiffs’ missteps actually interfered with the judicial process.”
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July 09, 2026
BROOKLYN, N.Y. — A New York state appeals court reversed a lower court ruling denying dismissal of a claim for gross negligence against a nursing home by the estate of a decedent alleging that he contracted COVID-19 while residing at the nursing home, resulting in his death, finding that the allegations failed to establish gross negligence or intentional harm needed to overcome immunity under New York’s Emergency or Disaster Treatment Protection Act (EDTPA).
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July 06, 2026
TALLAHASSEE, Fla. — ChatGPT spent nearly a year actively aiding a 20-year-old student in planning a shooting at Florida State University, including providing guidance on the best times to do the shooting and how to ensure the most media coverage, a female student who was wounded in the shooting says in a complaint filed in a Florida court.
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July 02, 2026
WASHINGTON, D.C. — Individuals who allege that they were injured by defective spinal cord stimulators manufactured by Abbott Laboratories ask the U.S. Judicial Panel on Multidistrict Litigation (JPMDL) to centralize all pending cases against the manufacturer after the panel previously created an MDL that included only cases against Boston Scientific Corp.
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July 02, 2026
OKLAHOMA CITY — An Oklahoma jury returned a defense verdict on negligence and products liability claims in which the plaintiffs alleged that exposure to asbestos in Johnson & Johnson entities’ talc products caused a woman’s mesothelioma.
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July 01, 2026
WASHINGTON, D.C. — The U.S. Supreme Court on June 30 granted petitions for a writ of certiorari in three cases alleging injuries related to the herbicide Roundup and remanded all three for further consideration in light of the recent ruling in Monsanto Co. v. Durnell.
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June 29, 2026
WASHINGTON, D.C. — The U.S. Supreme Court on June 29 denied two separate petitions for writs of certiorari seeking review of cases in which conflicting jurisdictional decisions were reached: a petition brought by a man who argued that the Fifth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals wrongly found no jurisdiction over Samsung SDI Co. Ltd. for injuries he suffered from a vape explosion, and a petition brought by Samsung arguing that Minnesota state courts incorrectly found personal jurisdiction over a separate personal injury claim against it for burns from a vape explosion.
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June 29, 2026
BOSTON — A smoker’s widower filed an appellee brief urging the Massachusetts Appeals Court to affirm most of a judgment in his favor worth more than $86.6 million on wrongful death claims against a tobacco company for causing his wife’s addiction to cigarettes and death from lung cancer, defending the judgment based on both a jury verdict and a judge’s award of additional damages for unfair and deceptive acts, but agreeing that $4.1 million in compensatory damages should be vacated as duplicative.
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June 26, 2026
TAMPA, Fla. — A Florida state court jury returned a verdict in favor of the estate of a smoker in an Engle case against a tobacco company for causing the smoker’s laryngeal cancer, her later diagnosis of lung cancer and death and awarded her estate $220,000 in compensatory damages but assigned the tobacco company only 15% responsibility for legally causing the smoker’s death at age 63.
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June 25, 2026
WASHINGTON, D.C. — In a divided opinion, the U.S. Supreme Court on June 25 found that the Federal Insecticide, Fungicide, and Rodenticide Act (FIFRA) expressly preempts a state law labeling requirement that differs from the federal labeling requirements imposed under FIFRA for the herbicide Roundup, reversing a Missouri appellate court’s decision and remanding the case.
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June 24, 2026
BROOKLYN, N.Y. — A New York state court justice dismissed with prejudice medical malpractice claims against a hospital and four physicians sued over alleged inadequate treatment of a patient’s pressure ulcers, finding that the physicians and hospital were immune under the New York Emergency or Disaster Treatment Protection Act (EDTPA) enacted during the COVID-19 pandemic because the complaint failed to allege facts showing wanton or willful misconduct, which would support an exception to immunity under the act.
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June 23, 2026
WASHINGTON, D.C. — The U.S. Supreme Court on June 22 agreed to decide whether the Ninth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals erred in recognizing a cause of action for damages under Bivens v. Six Unknown Named Agents of Federal Bureau of Narcotics for an inmate who was injured in a prison gang fight but was not sent to a hospital.
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June 23, 2026
MILWAUKEE — After finding that most of the opinions of a mechanical engineer retained to offer expert testimony are irrelevant to a woman's defective design claims and that the opinion that meets admissibility standards does not relate to the woman’s allegations, a Wisconsin federal judge awarded the seller of a pressure cooker summary judgment and dismissed the case with prejudice.
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June 23, 2026
ST. PAUL, Minn. — A Minnesota judge entered a $1.78 million judgment against store-brand talc manufacturer Vi-Jon LLC after a jury awarded a couple $10.2 million after the husband was diagnosed with mesothelioma in his forties after decades-long exposure to asbestos in consumer talc products.
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June 23, 2026
LOS ANGELES — A California jury awarded three adult children $32 million for their mother’s death from mesothelioma, rejecting last remaining defendant Johnson & Johnson’s arguments that asbestos in automotive parts, cosmetics or exposures while living in Mexico City were the more likely cause of the disease.
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June 22, 2026
CHICAGO — A federal prisoner’s medical expert, who opines that health care workers at the prison failed to take appropriate steps to address his medical concerns, can testify, an Illinois federal judge held, finding that the expert meets the admissibility standards of Daubert v. Merrell Dow Pharmaceuticals Inc.
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June 22, 2026
TRENTON, N.J. — A New Jersey court erred in excluding an expert in a medical malpractice case without holding a hearing to determine the admissibility of the testimony under New Jersey Rule of Evidence 104, a New Jersey appeals court held in reversing a summary judgment ruling and remanding.