For those in the dating world, the decision to use a particular dating app likely has less to do with litigation than how the app actually works, or more importantly, whether it works at all. However, for the makers of the online matchmaking apps, the litigation matters, and it’s personal. Earlier this year, Match.com (the Goliath of the dating world) filed a lawsuit against Bumble, the latest rising star in the dating app scene (and the David in this matchup)....
If the U.S. Eleventh Circuit Court of Appeals had its way, abortion would be illegal. At least that’s what three judges of the appeals court seemed to say in West Alabama Women’s Center v. Williamson. They affirmed a decision that gutted Alabama’s ban on second-trimester abortions, but it wasn’t easy for them. They called the banned procedure “dismemberment abortion” because “it involves tearing apart and extracting piece-by-piece” the unborn fetus. Judge Joel Frederick Dubina, in a concurring opinion, said what the judges were really thinking: “Roe v....
The way the appeals court tells it, the Gentleman’s Playhouse decision is just a license case. In American Entertainer, LLC v. City of Rocky Mount, the U.S. Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals describes a dispute over the city’s licensing requirements for adult entertainment. The strip club said the local ordinance gave the police chief too much discretion to deny licenses. The club also complained about First Amendment violations, age restrictions and other concerns, but the appeals court wouldn’t have it....
FedEx is quickly becoming the go-to company when a labor law complaint absolutely, positively has to be written about overnight. Great for those of us who have to write about it, not so good for FedEx. This time, the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission is going after FedEx for “discriminating against a large class of deaf and hard-of-hearing package handlers and job applicants for years,” according to an EEOC press release....
In a Privacy Act action by veterans based on the Department of Veterans Affairs’ loss of private information regarding the veterans, summary judgment for Defendant is affirmed in part, where Plaintiffs offered insufficient evidence of monetary damages; but reversed in part, where declaratory and injunctive relief was nonetheless available under the Administrative Procedure Act. Read the full decision in Fanin v. U.S. Dep’t of Veterans Affairs, No. 08-11102. Appellate Information:...
The Eleventh Circuit ruled that a district court judge did not err in sentencing a defendant by applying the modified categorical approach in determining his prior crime committed was violent. By finding his crime violent, the court upheld the district court using a higher sentencing guideline under the federal statutory scheme for an illegal reentry of a deported alien. Diaz-Calederone’s prior convictions were for committing aggravated battery against a pregnant woman in Florida....
Is Google Street View wiretapping? A Google Wi-Fi lawsuit says so. A federal judge has recently decided to proceed with a Google wiretapping class-action case, refusing Google’s request to dismiss the lawsuits. The lawsuits allege the Internet giant was illegally collecting online data from unsecured Wi-Fi networks. The main feature in question is once again Google Street View. Hounded by privacy advocates, many have thought Google Street View is more than a little intrusive, since it snaps up photos of homes and residences without approval....
Those who are so bad at test-taking that they cannot break the median LSAT score probably shouldn’t go to law school. And yet, there are scores of subprime schools, places that charge $50,000 a year for a degree that carries no reputational value, and which push thousands of grads with little to no hope of passing the bar into the post-J.D. world. $200,000 in debt and no career prospects. This is why many call law school a scam....
An iconic American bakery brand, Hostess, is bankrupt again, and the company is blaming costly labor agreements for eating away at its bottom line. Hostess Brands Inc. filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection Wednesday, and retained BigLaw firm Jones Day as counsel for bankruptcy proceedings, The Wall Street Journal reports. Rising pension and medical-benefits costs are the main reasons for Hostess’ bankruptcy, the company said in court papers. To address those issues, Hostess plans to continue talks with 12 employee unions that represent 83% of the company’s workers, the Journal reports....
The next few weeks are going to be hell for your health. There’s stress. Holidays can be stressful, especially if you have “that uncle” who is now unwelcome at family events, or if your arrangements are complicated by joint custody and a bitter ex-spouse. Plus you have clients who get holiday party DUIs, or have their own custody disputes. And year-end deadlines, and balancing case loads with family obligations. And of course, there’s the eating and drinking....
The key to a strong in-house email policy is one that takes out the legal liability guesswork for both employers and employees — and the in-house counsel. A solid in-house email policy should involve input from legal, technical and human resource managers. If you need to revamp (or craft) your in-house email policy, keep these questions in mind while drafting: When can employees consider their work email to be “private”? Can employees use office property to send email to outside third parties?...
If you were quick enough to get on the court’s site before the servers were overwhelmed, then you already know why Judge Vaughn Walker denied the motion to stay his decision in Perry v. Schwarzenegger. Judge Walker found that the proponents of Proposition 8, California’s ban on gay marriage, did not meet any of the four requirements necessary for the court to grant their motion for a stay. In the Order, the court dealt in detail with each of the four requirements necessary to allow it to grant a stay: will the parties seeking a stay be likely to win on appeal; will parties seeking a stay be irreparably harmed if the stay were denied; will a stay harm any other interested party and will the stay, if granted, be in the public interest....
Even as the legal market begins to improve, law firms are losing out to in-house legal departments, a recent survey has found. The legal consulting company Altman Weil surveyed chairs and partners at more than 300 U.S. firms with over 50 lawyers. Their report found that almost all firms acknowledge that competition from non-traditional sources is here to stay. But the biggest competition is coming from clients themselves, as businesses in-source legal work....
Petition for review of a decision by the BIA denying Indonesian petitioner’s application for asylum and related relief is granted and remanded where the IJ and BIA committed prejudicial legal error in faulting the petitioner for untimely filing without recognizing either the absence of a filing deadline for the first few years of the period or the undisputed record fact of petitioner’s inclusion in his wife’s January 2003 asylum application, and as such, it cannot be concluded that the legal errors were harmless....
With the start of hurricane season less than a month away, the Gulf Coast is once again preparing to dance with Mother Nature. Residents are hopeful that this season will be known for respectful do-si-dos, rather than the high-velocity mosh pits that residents endured with Hurricanes Katrina, Rita, and Gustav, but gale force winds aren’t the area’s only foe in a storm. Lawyers and their clients inevitably end up battling insurance companies after every major hurricane....
When drafting a pleading, most practitioners focus on proving their case to a judge, and never give a second thought about the general public as an audience. This may seem like the right strategy, but there are certainly some advantages to simplifying your legal writing so that the general public can understand your case, too. For starters, judges might not be as smart as you think you are. If you are unsure about the definition of a word, they might be as well....
The ABA’s Techshow took place in Chicago last week, gathering lawyers and tech vendors from around the world to look at the potential future of technology in the legal world. (As an aside, the ABA would like us to refer to the conference as the TECHSHOW, but we will politely decline.) From exhortations to test lawyers’ tech skills, to warnings that computers could dumb us all down, the program presented a nice mix of the useful and trivial, the inspiring and worrisome....
You can hold depositions in three states, in a single day, all from your office. You can interview potential associates without flying them into town. You can see what your cat does while you’re at work all day. The future is here – if you’ve got the right video conferencing software. And no, not all video conferencing platforms at the same. You can’t share your screen while streaming in Facetime, for example, and you’re not going to get much in the way of customer service if you’re getting face-to-face on Gchat....
Free Wi-Fi is awesome, especially when you need to need to handle a last minute or emergency client matter and you don’t have your own free hotspot available. But like most free things, there is a catch: you’re sharing an Internet pipeline with strangers, some of whom may be eavesdropping on your communications. There are general precautions you can take (which we’ll save for a separate post), but suffice it to say: public Wi-Fi is risky, more so when websites haven’t implemented best practices for security....
‘I just need some quick advice’ – famous first words from that time-wasting, non-paying client. Not to be harsh, but if someone starts with that line, your “no-pay-radar” should beep or something. Sure, you should give “quick advice” when appropriate, but if you make it a habit you will not make money. These are lessons from the trenches of law practice, where you can get dirty sometimes. Here are three things you can learn from the bad clients you may find there....
