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“It is unlawful for any employer in this State to fail or refuse to hire a prospective employee because the prospective employee submitted to a screening test and the results of the screening test indicate the presence of marijuana.” That’s quite the job protection statute. Even states that have legalized recreational marijuana haven’t gone so far as to ensure lawful pot smokers aren’t fired (or not hired) for toking up. But Nevada isn’t like most states....

Once a registered sex offender, always a registered sex offender – even if the offender was wrongfully listed on the sex offender registry. That’s a hard-edge reading of a federal appeals court decision in Roe v. State of Nebraska. The plaintiff sued the state for negligently listing him on the registry, but a trial court dismissed the case as untimely. “We conclude that even if Roe’s pleading was sufficient to state a claim of negligence against the defendants, his claim is barred by the two-year statute of limitations of the Nebraska State Tort Claims Act,” said the U....

New York City’s stop-and-frisk practice is going to end up costing the city unless the decision reached by a federal district court on Monday is successfully appealed and overturned by the Second Circuit. U.S. District Court Judge Shira A. Scheindlin ruled that despite its proposed benefits to public safety, the stop-and-frisk tactics taken up by the New York Police Department (NYPD) were simply a “policy of indirect racial profiling,” reports The New York Times....

In a First Amendment action alleging that a professor’s union impermissibly charged plaintiff a pro rata share of expenses unrelated to the union’s collective bargaining duties, summary judgment for defendant is reversed where: 1) a public-sector union’s political activities aimed at securing a new contract may be chargeable to nonmembers if those activities are pertinent to the union’s role as a collective bargaining representative; 2) nonmembers may be required to subsidize lobbying efforts undertaken by a “parent” union of the local public-sector union if the lobbying is related to collective bargaining and may ultimately inure to the benefit of local union members; 3) the district court erred in upholding the union’s charges to nonmembers for (a) political activity undertaken to secure a new contract, (b) lobbying by the local union’s state affiliate, (c) costs incurred to send union delegates to the state affiliate’s annual convention, and (d) the salaries of the union’s employees; 4) the district court erred in dismissing plaintiff’s challenge to the union’s charges for media communications by its national affiliate; and 5) it erred in holding, sua sponte, that plaintiff will be required to arbitrate future claims against the union before filing suit....

On April 16, 1994, two surface-to-air missiles downed an aircraft carrying then Rwandan and Burundi Presidents, Juvenal Habyarimana and Cyprien Ntaryamira, both of Hutu ethnicity, over the Rwandan capital of Kigali. Both were killed in the attack. The killings fueled the Rwandan genocide, and cost more than one million innocent victims their lives. Some people, including the presidents’ widows, believe the then Tutsi-led Rwandan Patriotic Front – headed by current Rwandan President Paul Kagame – was behind the killings....

May is Food Allergy Action Month, although for parents whose children have serious food allergies, that’s pretty much every month. (That’s also true for Food Allergy Awareness Week next week.) While daycare centers and schools have gotten better about monitoring food ingredients and intake, and food producers have gotten better about labeling ingredients, it can still be scary raising a child with serious food allergies. So here are three of the biggest legal food allergy concerns parents face, and how to best deal with them....

In UFCW Local 1776 v. Eli Lilly & Co., No. 09-0222, a putative class action against Eli Lilly, manufacturer of the drug Zyprexa, asserting a civil RICO violation predicated on mail fraud, conspiracy to violate RICO, violation of state consumer protection laws, common-law fraud, and unjust enrichment based on Lilly’s alleged misrepresentations about Zyprexa’s efficacy and safety, the court vacated the certification of a class and denial of summary judgment, holding that 1) because plaintiffs’ excess price theory was not susceptible to generalized proof with respect to either but-for or proximate causation, class certification based on this theory was an abuse of discretion; and 2) the district court did not consider individual claims under plaintiffs’ quantity effect theory when it ruled on Lilly’s motion for summary judgment....

Defendant’s crack cocaine distribution sentence is affirmed in part where: 1) the district court appropriately relied on an informant’s testimony to find that defendant had produced crack; and 2) production of three ounces of crack qualified as relevant conduct under the Sentencing Guidelines. However, the sentence is reversed in part where the district court erred in attributing two points to defendant for committing one of the offenses of conviction while serving under a criminal justice sentence....

Conviction of defendant for premeditated murder, bank robbery and related crimes is affirmed where: 1) tape recording was properly admitted as Confrontation Clause was not implicated because the statements were not testimonial and were admissible under Federal Rule of Evidence 804(b)(3); 2) defendant’s claim of prosecutorial misconduct is rejected; and 3) it need not be decided whether witness’ testimony was improper where it could not have materially affected the verdict. Read US v....

District court order suppressing evidence against defendant is reversed where defendant was not seized within the meaning of the Fourth Amendment under California v. Hodari D., 499 U.S. 621, 627 (1991), as there was no application of physical force and no submission to the assertion of authority. Read US v. Waterman, No. 08-2543 Appellate InformationAppeal from the United States District Court for the District of Delaware. Argued: March 24, 2009Filed: June 24, 2009...

For years, Volkswagen sold millions of cars with ‘defeat devices’ designed to evade environmental controls and misrepresent the cars’ emissions. When VW’s fraud was made public this September, the consumer lawsuits began piling on almost immediately. Over 500 class actions have been filed in 60 federal judicial districts. Now, the U.S. Judicial Panel on Multidistrict Litigation has giving those suits a new home in the Northern District of California, where they will be handled by Judge Charles Breyer, brother to Supreme Court Justice Stephen Breyer....

A putative class action brought by investors against multinational bank Barclays was revived by the Second Circuit last week, when the court vacated in part the district court’s dismissal of the suit, reports Reuters. While the Second Circuit agreed with Judge Shira Scheindlin (of New York City stop and frisk fame) that Barclay’s SEC filings were not materially false, the court found her dismissal of the other claims, prior to discovery, premature....

He’s behind bars, but Kwame Kilpatrick is not done. Not by a long shot, even if his case is exactly that. The disgraced former Mayor of Detroit, convicted of a bevvy of corruption charges related to extortion, racketeering, bribery, and tax evasion, is serving a 28-year sentence. He may get a second shot at defending himself, however, if the Sixth Circuit agrees that the trial judge made significant mistakes in handling Kilpatrick’s trial....

Is crack cocaine more powerful than powder cocaine? While that issue wasn’t for the 7th Circuit Court of Appeals to decide, the court did decide on whether the more severe penalty imposed on a defendant for distributing crack cocaine was a violation of Due Process and Equal Protection. The question before the court, in simple terms, was this: Do the excessively more severe crack cocaine penalties violate the constitution? Quick facts: The defendant, Roderick Moore, was arrested on federal drug trafficking charges in 2008, for selling powder and crack cocaine to a cop....

In Hapner v. Tidwell, No. 09-35896, an action under the National Environmental Policy Act, challenging the Smith Creek Project in the Gallatin National Forest to reduce the risks of severe wildfire, insect infestation, and disease, as well as to promote habitat diversity, the court affirmed summary judgment for defendants in part where the Forest Service’s risk reduction calculations are supported by studies conducted in other regions, as well as by extensive modeling....

Four California foster kids sued California Supreme Court Chief Justice Tani Cantil-Sakauye in her capacity as Chair of the California Judicial Council alleging that “crushing and unlawful caseloads” frustrate the ability of Sacramento Dependency Courts to fairly and adequately hear their cases, and prevent court-appointed counsel from providing effective assistance. Their suit seeks a Dependency Court for Sacramento’s abused and neglected children that meets basic due process requirements, and provides adequate, competent, effective counsel for the children of Sacramento County in dependency proceedings....

If you follow our numerous appellate court blogs, you’ll know that immigration appeals and deportation appeals aren’t easy to win. A Jamaican citizen, Nigel Singh, however, had found success when the Third Circuit Court of Appeals overturned his deportation order. The Board of Immigration Appeals had ordered Singh’s deportation after he had been found guilty of bankruptcy perjury. But the Third Circuit Court of Appeals found that the government failed to meet its burden before the BIA....

The Tenth Circuit recently handed down a decision that could present a wonderful business opportunity to some enterprising online “journalism” sites. The circuit court’s opinion will likely stand for the rule that outfits like Examiner.com can drape themselves within a safe-harbor cloak when their independent contractors run afoul of copyright laws. The controversy first began when Examiner.com – an innocent player according to the circuit – posted up pictures owned by paparazzi/gossip outfit BWP without prior authorization....

Twelve former NFL players and one widow have had the dismissal of their case against their former teams affirmed by the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals. After all that has come to light in the CTE fallout, the case probably would have at least been illuminating, if not impactful. The former players were alleging a civil conspiracy, under RICO, that the teams were overmedicating the players, without providing the players with adequate information about the consequences, which cut-short their careers....

Legal recruiting has a new game, and its name is Pymetrics. If you don’t know about the program, it’is a computer game that sorts out personality types. Big business has been using it for hiring, and now BigLaw is doing it, too. O’Melveny & Myers says it will open the applicant pool to anybody, especially since the program is designed to weed out bias in employment. That, and it makes the interviewing process way more fun....