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An anti-abortion activist may have short-lived success against the University of Washington’s Birth Defects Research Laboratory following an appeals court decision. David Daleiden, notoriously famous for releasing undercover videos of Planned Parenthood facilities, demanded the university produce documents about the purchase of fetal tissue, organs, and cells. A trial judge blocked his request after anonymous plaintiffs sued to protect their identifying information. The U.S. Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals reversed that order in Doe v....

Love it or hate it, Microsoft Outlook is here for the long haul. Like cockroaches, Twinkies, and the leather jacket, it was here before we got here and it will keep going long after we’re gone. Rather than rage, rage against the Outlook, embrace it. Sure, it’s part of a somewhat clunky suite of giant enterprise-level software, but you can bend it to your productivity will – with the right tools, of course....

There’s some strange alchemy involved in setting the proper billing rate. You don’t want to be so high that clients can’t afford you, nor so low that you come off looking cheap. You could follow the market rate, but you also want to set yourself apart. What’s an attorney to do? Setting your rate is one of the most important calculations you can make. It can help determine what clients you get and how successful your firm is....

In a class action lawsuit against defendants brought by their franchisees, defendants’ interlocutory appeal seeking review of a discovery-related order by the district court is dismissed for want of a final judgment. Read Awuah v. Coverall N. Am, Inc., No. 09-1284 Appellate Information Appeal from the United States District Court for the District of Massachusetts Decided October 27, 2009 Judges Before: Stahl, Boudin, and Lipez, Circuit Judges Opinion by Boudin, Circuit Judge...

Vicki and Danny Weeks sued five drug companies in federal court over injuries Danny Weeks suffered after years of taking metoclopramide, the generic version of Reglan. The U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Alabama, in turn, certified to the Alabama Supreme Court the question of whether brand-name manufacturers can be held liable for fraudulent misrepresentation due to injuries sustained from generics. Last week, in an opinion following a rehearing of this case, the court ruled 6-3 that they can....

It’s another Monday, and that means one thing: we’re talking about liens (we know, as if it wasn’t bad enough that it’s Monday)! This week, we’re letting you in on some negotiating tips for health insurance liens in personal injury cases. As with all liens, you’ll want to make sure that you negotiate all liens prior to finalizing the settlement with the third party so that you have more leverage. Once the settlement is finalized, you have very little wiggle room....

‘Tis the season, as they say. The halls are decked, gay apparel is donned, and chestnuts are roasting. But for all the winter mirth and merriment, the season can also be a contentious one. Think, for example, of the annual fights over saying “Happy Holidays” rather than “Merry Kwanza,” and the yearly fury that surrounds Starbucks holiday cups. That doesn’t mean you shouldn’t bring some holiday cheer into your law office....

Can we finally just say it? The Fourth Amendment is on life support. It is 2013 and two out of three Americans live an in area that the American Civil Liberties Union have labeled the “Constitution free” zone. This zone is 100 miles from the edge of our nation’s borders and is the area that the Department of Homeland Security considers a “reasonable distance” from the border. It is also the area in which the DHS apparently has the right to perform a search without warrants, without probable cause, without reasonable suspicion, and without any stated justification whatsoever, under the border search exception....

Fitbit said it will join Google’s cloud for sharing health care information, as if that were a good thing. No doubt, it will promote data sharing among health care providers. Imagine, for example, how easily your doctor could use the cloud to access your Fitbit vitals. But image, too, how somebody else could get your most personal information with a mouse-click. That might not be a good thing. “No-Brainer” Reporting on the Fitbit plan, TechCrunch said it’s “a no-brainer as far as partnerships go....

Yesterday, we talked about marketing your law firm on Facebook in the new “pay to play” age. But Facebook isn’t the only social network out there, and if you are disillusioned by the company’s move away from “organic” (natural) news feed placement and towards paid advertising, you might wonder how the other social networks will come into play in 2014. That’s a good question. There are a lot of jokes out there about how the different networks compare (Facebook is “I like bacon,” Twitter is “I’m eating #bacon,” Foursquare is “This is where I eat bacon,” etc....

The end of summer is near, and the fall semester of law school is approaching. As your summer associate season comes to a close, there’s one big question looming: will you extend the summer associates offers? These days, having a summer associate job doesn’t guarantee an offer, so summer associates may have lower expectations. That said, rather than taking advantage of cheap summer labor, you should really put some thought into whether you should extend offers to any of your summer associates....

In April, we brought you the news that the plaintiffs in the lawsuit involving a mural in Maine filed a notice of appeal with the First Circuit Court of Appeals. Now, the case has officially been appealed. Here’s the backstory: In March 2011, Maine’s Governor Paul LePage had the controversial mural removed from the waiting area of the Department of Labor in Augusta, Maine. The mural depicted the history of Maine’s labor, including visual depictions of a strike....

Jack Daniel’s deals with trademark infringement just like any large company and when they do, the first step is generally a cease-and-desist letter. It’s just that practice that has people talking about the company in a positive way. Independent book publisher Lazy Fascist Press and author Patrick Wensink published a book that uses a design similar to that on the Jack Daniel’s label on its cover. The company noticed the similarity and sent Wensink a letter asking him to change the cover design the next time the book was printed....

Defense attorney John Shely reportedly lost the largest verdict in an individual “bad faith” insurance case in Oklahoma history. But the $25.5 million verdict did not make him the biggest loser. After all, attorneys don’t really lose anything in court – their clients do. Shely lost big time, however, when he opened his mouth. This is why lawyers should never count their chickens before they hatch. Laying an Egg After laying an egg in the case, Shely reportedly walked up to the plaintiff and said he would lose on appeal....

We knew it was coming – computers are replacing lawyers. With $65 million in new money, legal tech startup Atrium is developing smart machines to take over more legal tasks. The year-old company already has applications for smart contracts, but machine learning is changing everything. We just didn’t expect it to happen so soon. If we’re honest about it, however, we knew clients would have replaced us a long time ago if they had the technology....

Indian tribes are required by law to deduct and withhold income taxes from gambling revenues paid to Indian tribe members. They’re also subject to backup withholding and reporting requirements. This week, the Eleventh Circuit Court of Appeals held that tribes cannot use tribal sovereign immunity to avoid a federal investigation into whether they complied with those tax obligations. In 2005, the Commissioner of the Internal Revenue Service began to investigate the Miccosukee Tribe to determine whether the Tribe had complied with its reporting and withholding requirements....

Important Affordable Care Act employer deadlines are fast approaching. With those deadlines comes the threat of significant penalties, should required information be improperly filed, or not filed at all. If your company is an “applicable large employer,” and odds are it is, you’ve got some work to do. Thankfully, you don’t have to do it all alone. A new special report from Thomson Reuters Checkpoint can get you up to speed with employer information reporting requirements....

The Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals clarified on Thursday that a bad haircut can form the basis for a lawsuit. While we’d like to see the courts recognize that torturing tresses warrants an intentional (or negligent) infliction of emotional distress claim, the judicial branch isn’t quite there yet. However, the courts are open to claims that unsanitary barbering procedures can pose a health threat. In the complaint, Johnson alleged that prison officials forced inmates to work as unlicensed barbers and that the barbers routinely used clippers and razors without sanitizing them after each use....

TiVo, a champion steer in the local county fair, had no idea what was going on. He had been purchased for $10,000, then was donated right back. TiVo, the digital recording company, had done it for marketing purposes. Two weeks later, a local jury awarded the company $74 million in a patent dispute. Wait, can you run that back again? Litigation Advertising TiVo’s lawyer said the marketing steer had nothing to do with the jury’s decision....

With the price of Bitcoin going absolutely bonkers, law firms, like many other businesses, are wondering whether they should accept, or even invest in, new, and even old, cryptocurrencies. However, few cryptocurrencies will ever make it off the ground, and there are quite a few different ones out there. Choosing to accept one as payment for services has been okayed by at least one state bar, whose guidance seems to be good for just about every jurisdiction....