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After several days of jury deliberation, Kyle Rittenhouse was found not guilty last week of murdering two people and injuring another during racial justice protests last summer in Kenosha, Wisconsin. Activists on both sides of the political spectrum were quick to spin what the verdict meant for their movements or what the judge’s and jury’s motivations were. This post attempts to cut through the noise and answer the question of why the jury found Rittenhouse not guilty....

Content providers are still struggling to figure out how to make money in the digital age. Music publishers, in particular, were much more comfortable with selling CDs from physical stores than they were selling digital copies, and even those, it seems, are giving way to streaming services. This case from the Second Circuit pits stream music powerhouse Pandora against an association of music publishers. The publishers resisted allowing “new media” companies to license their works, but both a federal district court and the Second Circuit said the language of their agreements was clear: You can’t choose to license to one group, but not to others....

Unless you’re one of those lucky folks who have a job find them, you’re charged with leading the search party for a new position. And “party” may be a bit of a euphemism. The peaks and troughs of being in the job search are enough to make you question, well, just about everything. Did you choose the right major in college, was your decision to go to law school solid, should you have done a different internship after 1L, is it okay to do something completely unrelated to law?...

In a trademark dispute involving Austrian liquor, district court order granting defendants motion to dismiss for improper venue is reversed and remanded where the subject matter of plaintiff’s claims is not covered by the forum selection clauses contained in the licensing agreement as plaintiff’s claims do not sound in contract and are not based on rights originating from the licensing agreement. Read Altvater Gessler-J.A. Baczewski Int’l Inc. v. Sobieski Destylarnia S....

Call it a case of “I fought the lawn and the lawn won.” A homeowner in Howell, Michigan, has been fined after he refused to mow the grass on the curb strip in front of his house – and the Sixth Circuit is on board with that. David Shoemaker had refused to maintain the area between the sidewalk and street in front of his house after the city cut down a tree over his objections....

Interworks Sys. Inc. v. Merchant Fin. Corp., No. 08-1425, concerned a complaint-in-intervention by the U.S. seeking unpaid employment taxes from defendant, under New York Lien Law sections 70-79a (Article 3-A). The court of appeals affirmed the dismissal of the complaint, on the ground that Article 3-A’s requirement that there be no prior pending Article 3-A action applied to the U.S. when it brought an action under Article 3-A, and the existence of a pending Article 3-A action required dismissal....

Action Concerning Insurance Coverage In Council Tower Assn. v. Axis Specialty Ins. Co., No. 09-3900, an action against an insurer, asserting insurance coverage and related claims for losses incurred when a portion of the brick veneer covering the east wall of plaintiff’s apartment building fell to the ground, the court affirmed summary judgment for defendant where the falling of less than one-third of plaintiff’s decorative brick veneer was not a collapse of a part of the building within the meaning of the Additional Coverage for Collapse provision of the policy....

Student interns don’t usually expect to get paid, but Patrick Velarde wasn’t that kind of intern. Velarde attended a beauty school, and performed cosmetology services at the student salon as part of his training. But he thought he should be paid for his services, so he sued. In Velarde v. GW GJ, Inc., the U.S. Second Circuit Court of Appeals disagreed. Basically, a vocational school doesn’t have to pay students to work for their education....

Denial of Petition for Review of BIA Order In Dallakoti v. Holder, No. 09-9565, a petition for review of a decision of the Board of Immigration Appeals (BIA), which upheld an immigration judge’s (IJ) denial of petitioner’s application for asylum, restriction on removal, and protection under the Convention Against Torture (CAT), the court denied the petition where a reasonable adjudicator would not be compelled to conclude that one of the central reasons the Maoists in petitioner’s native country targeted petitioner was because of his family’s or his own political beliefs....

The Seventh Circuit decided an employment matter, a case involving breach of an insurance contract, and Tax Court’s determination of settlement payments and incurred litigation costs for deduction purposes. In Luster v. Allstate Ins. Co., No. 09-2483, the court faced a challenge to the district court’s grant of summary judgment in favor of an insurance company in an attorney’s action for breach arising from the insurer’s refusal to cover extensive fire damage to the attorney’s deceased client, that had occurred while the home was unoccupied for more than four years, and had remained unoccupied until the client’s death....

In an employment and sex discrimination case under Title VII, district court’s judgment is reversed in part and remanded where: 1) district court erred in not submitting plaintiff’s claim for punitive damages to the jury and granting defendant judgment as a matter of law on that claim as under Title VII, punitive damages are available if a plaintiff shows that the employer engaged in intentional discrimination with malice or with reckless indifference to the federally protected rights, and evidence presented by the EEOC at trial was sufficient for a jury to find that defendant acted in the face of a perceived risk that it was violating plaintiffs’ Title VII rights; 2) district court did not abuse its discretion in denying EEOC’s request for injunctive relief to enjoin defendant from discriminating on the basis of pregnancy or retaliating against any employee who complains of unlawful discrimination as, in light of the two isolated instances of discrimination, there was not a consistent practice of discrimination suggesting further discrimination was likely; 3) court declined to address the district court’s award of attorney’s fees at this time as further proceedings are necessary on the issue of punitive damages....

Arizona elects its judges in counties with fewer than 250,000 people (everywhere but Maricopa, Pima, and Pinal counties). It also has a Code of Judicial Conduct that restricts how both incumbent and prospective judges campaign for office. What’s prohibited? Try everything, as long as its campaign-related. More specifically, that’d be: giving speeches on behalf of others, endorsing others, soliciting money for others, campaigning for others, and a ban on solicitation of funds for your own campaign....

Dismissal of a vessel carrier’s suit for attorney’s fees, costs, and expenses incurred in defending suit for damaged steel in transit Fednev Int’l Ltd v. Cont’l Ins. Co., 08-2650, concerned a challenge to the district court’s dismissal of plaintiff’s suit for failure to state a claim upon which relief can be granted, in plaintiff vessel carrier’s suit for attorney’s fees, costs, and expenses incurred in earlier litigation, involving damaged steel in transit from Belgium to Indiana....

In US v. Ford, No. 09-2244, the court of appeals affirmed defendant’s sentence for being a felon in possession of firearms and ammunition, being a fugitive in possession of firearms and ammunition, and possession of stolen firearms, on the grounds that 1) the evidence of defendant’s prior Kansas escape was undoubtedly res gestae–intrinsic evidence inextricably connected to the charged crimes; 2) the district court had enough evidence to find that firing a gun 100 feet from officers in the middle of the night creates a substantial risk of serious bodily injury; and 3) criminal discharge of a firearm at an occupied building or vehicle was at least as risky as burglary or arson....

Some day, job applicants will sit down across a desk from a robot – a real robot, not a humorless person who just acts like one. In some ways, it is already happening. Artificial intelligence is working on job applications, screening candidates, and even matching personality profiles. Smart robots are so good it can stun hiring managers. That’s why more companies are turning to talent-acquisition technology. Job recruiters are already using AI, they just don’t want the robots to take their jobs....

If you are purchasing a gift for a graduating law student, think twice before you buy. Some lawyer gifts are passe, like hardcase brief cases. Others will be obsolete as soon as they come out of the box, like so many gadgets. What you need is something in between, that Goldilocks gift that is just right for someone who will soon take the bar exam. No, we’re not talking about prescription drugs like Adderall....

Not everyone can transition between politics and the silver screen as easily as Arnold Schwarzenegger – or even Al Franken. Former Arkansas governor and perennial presidential candidate Mike Huckabee hasn’t had an easy go of it. In a case of “I Don’t Heart Huckabee,” the politician is facing a $5 million class action lawsuit alleging that he violated telemarketing laws by sending millions of prerecorded robocalls promoting the 2012 flop “Last Ounce of Courage....

Much like the hog farms that once populated Tazewell County, local political battles really stink. But even when a local board’s actions look — and smell — like retaliation, a plaintiff can still lose a retaliation lawsuit. Alice Guth owns five properties in a mixed rural/suburban area in central Illinois, three miles from the Village of Morton. She lives in a house that’s on one of the parcels. The other four parcels, totaling about 190 acres and very near the house, were (until recently) zoned agricultural....

The Second Circuit ruled today that a prisoner who sued under the Prison Litigation Reform Act (“PLRA”) was not entitled to a jury trial on disputed factual issues relating to his exhaustion of administrative remedies. In other words, a court will not empanel a jury to evaluate a plaintiff’s claim that the dog ate his homework. Plaintiff Rafael Messa, an inmate of the New York State Department of Correctional Services (“DOCS”), was injured during a prison yard fight with the defendants, a group of correctional officers, and was hospitalized in the prison infirmary....

In US v. Stevens, No. 08-769, the Supreme Court affirmed the Third Circuit’s reversal of defendant’s conviction under 18 U.S.C. section 48 for selling videos depicting dogfighting, on the ground that section 48 was substantially overbroad, and therefore invalid under the First Amendment, because section 48 explicitly regulated expression based on content and was thus presumptively invalid. As the Court wrote: “Congress enacted 18 U. S. C. Section 48 to criminalize the commercial creation, sale, or possession of certain depictions of animal cruelty....