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When Is “Yours” Not Yours? Pennsylvania Superior Court Interprets “Your Computer” Definition in Commercial Property Policy

Sometimes defining the simplest phrases proves anything but simple. So learned the insurer in a property loss and bad faith case brought by its insured and decided earlier this year by the Pennsylvania Superior Court...more

Court Holds That Contractor Has Duty to Disclose Information Related to the Viability of Pass-Through Claims When Negotiating...

A Utah federal court recently held that when negotiating a pass-through settlement agreement, a contractor has a duty to disclose information to its subcontractor regarding the viability of the claims to be passed through....more

Contractor’s Refusal to Sign Broad Lien Waiver Does Not Defeat Mechanics Lien

Recently, the Oregon Court of Appeals reinstated a contractor’s mechanics lien claim notwithstanding the owner’s offer of payment because the offer was conditioned on the contractor signing a broad lien waiver that would have...more

Court Rejects Contractor’s Claim That COVID-19 Rendered Performance Impossible

A fundamental premise of contract law is that promises must be kept. If legally enforceable promises or “contracts” are not kept, courts may step in to enforce them by ordering performance, awarding damages, or granting some...more

The American Rule Stands: Court Rejects Fee-Shifting Under Indemnity Clause

The “American Rule” on attorneys’ fees is that each party pays its own lawyers, even if you win. As with almost any rule, there are exceptions. Sometimes there is a statute that requires the losing party to pay the prevailing...more

No Written Change Order? No Problem! Court Sides with Subcontractor in Payment Dispute

Many contracts contain provisions requiring that changes to a contract be in writing and signed by a particular authorized person. Under such provisions, work done without proper written authorization will not be...more

Everything You Need to Know (And Probably Don’t) About Covenants Not to Compete - Alabama

The next state in our series exploring non-compete agreements is Alabama. The Yellowhammer State has a fulsome history of litigation (resulting in many reported decisions) involving non-competes and other post-employment...more

“I told you never to call me here”: Eleventh Circuit Decertifies TCPA Class Containing Absent Class Members Without Article III...

The Eleventh Circuit last month issued a significant class action opinion in Cordoba v. DirectTV, LLC, vacating a class certified in a TCPA class action and remanding the case. The issue underlying the court’s decision was...more

It’s None of Your Business: Sixth Circuit Says Arizona Lacks Article III Standing to Intervene to Challenge a Class Settlement

Does a state, whose citizens are among the absent class members in a class action settlement, have Article III standing to challenge the supposed unfairness of the settlement? In Chapman v. Tristar Products, Inc., the Sixth...more

Spam or Class Action Refund? Consumers Can’t Tell

Two recent studies by the FTC show that some methods for notifying potential class members of class action settlements are not as effective as courts and counsel might believe. In September, the FTC published a report on two...more

“Who’s Gonna Pay for All This?” Can Prevailing Litigants Have Their E-discovery Charges Taxed as Costs Against Their Losing...

Parties in today’s complex litigation world, and their counsel, need no reminder of the ubiquity of electronic discovery and the tremendous expense it occasions. Even before 2006, when “electronically stored information”...more

A Quick Study in Doxing and Personal Jurisdiction: Vangheluwe v. GotNews

In the digital age, the internet not infrequently stretches the bounds of traditional jurisprudence and raises tricky new questions. An example from earlier this year is Vangheluwe v. GotNews, LLC, where a federal court in...more

Yes, But Were You Hurt? Another Data Breach Case Dismissed for Lack of Damages

While a war rages on the issue of standing in data breach cases, the need to prove damages is presenting an even greater hurdle for plaintiffs, as we have noted previously. One clear illustration of this trend is Attias v....more

“Sorry, Wrong Number”: Northern District of California Denies Certification in TCPA Class Action

As we have noted before, whether a claimant under the Telephone Consumer Protection Act (TCPA) gave “prior express consent” to receiving communications from the defendant is frequently a critical issue (and often the only...more

The Eleventh Circuit Finds Class Rep Has Standing to Settle a FACTA Class Action

Bucking a recent trend and departing from both the Second Circuit’s Katz decision and the Third Circuit’s Kamal decision, the Eleventh Circuit found that a plaintiff had standing to settle a FACTA claim on behalf of a class....more

Frank v. Gaos: Remand, but Little Guidance.

Yesterday, the Supreme Court sent Frank v. Gaos back to the Ninth Circuit to address the issue of standing under Spokeo. Frank involved allegations of privacy violations. Plaintiffs brought class action claims against...more

Bristol-Myers Squibb Continues to Be a Mixed Bag in the Class Action Context

Courts are still going both ways on applying Bristol-Myers Squibb to class actions. Two recent decisions highlight this split. The first—and we’ll always start with the good news—comes out of the District of Massachusetts...more

American Pipe? No Cigar: Third Circuit Rejects Tolling for Claims of Named Plaintiffs

Earlier this year, the Supreme Court in China Agritech Inc. v. Resh conclusively established that equitable tolling of the statute of limitations for putative class members – known as American Pipe tolling – applies only to...more

They Don’t Call It the Wild West for Nothing: The Ninth Circuit Reverses Denial of Class Certification Because Trial Court Kept...

The Ninth Circuit’s decision not to grant en banc rehearing in Sali v. Corona Regional Medical Center should all but guarantee that the issue of expert testimony at the class certification stage is heading to the Supreme...more

Supreme Court to Review Whether Third-Party Defendants May Remove Class Action Counterclaims under CAFA

These are interesting times at the Supreme Court for class certification defendants—and we aren’t talking about the Kavanaugh confirmation process. No, late last week, in Home Depot USA Inc. v. George Jackson, the Supreme...more

Irrevocable Consent Comes to the Eleventh Circuit: Two District Courts Apply Reyes to Boot TCPA Cases

A critical question in Telephone Consumer Protection Act (TCPA) cases is whether the plaintiff gave consent to receive communications from the defendant, and whether that consent had been revoked by the time of the...more

Be Careful What You Ask For: Eleventh Circuit Holds That Arbitrator – Not Court – Decides Whether Arbitration Agreement...

The Eleventh Circuit has held that, absent express language to the contrary in the arbitration agreement itself, whether class arbitration is permitted under an arbitration agreement selecting American Arbitration Association...more

Defeating Class Certification in Consumer Data Breach Class Actions Begins with Understanding How They Occur

Consumer data breach class actions, for all of their popularity on dockets and especially in headlines, can make difficult cases for plaintiffs. Issues like standing and damages often keep these cases from getting off the...more

A Brief Look at Justice Kennedy’s Rule 23 Record

While he often kept us guessing about how he might vote in politically significant cases, retiring Justice Anthony Kennedy was far more predictable on class action issues over the course of his 30-year tenure on the Supreme...more

The Standing Trap: Will a Spokeo Challenge Lock a Class Action Defendant into a State Court Forum?

Spokeo v. Robins – which confirmed that a plaintiff’s allegation of a defendant’s statutory violation without accompanying concrete harm fails to satisfy Article III’s “case or controversy” requirement – has brought the issue...more

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