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US v. Schiff, No. 08-1903, involved a criminal prosecution of corporate executives at the pharmaceutical giant Bristol-Myers Squibb for securities fraud under 15 U.S.C. section 78j(b) and Securities and Exchange Commission Rule 10b-5. The court of appeals affirmed the district court’s pretrial order (1) dismissing the government’s theories of omission liability under Rule 10b-5 that attempted to hold defendant accountable for omissions in quarterly SEC 10-Q filings based on alleged misstatements in a company’s quarterly conference calls; and 2) excluding the government’s expert, following a Daubert hearing, who would have testified to the company’s stock price drop as evidence of Rule 10b-5’s materiality element....

Judge Stephen Reinhardt, a prominent liberal judge of the U.S. Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals, has died. Appointed by President Carter 37 years ago, Reinhardt died unexpectedly when he suffered a heart attack at his dermatologist’s office. He was 87. Fellow jurists said he was “deeply principled, fiercely passionate” about his work. Judge Sidney R. Thomas, chief judge of the Ninth Circuit, said they lost a friend and a colleague....

The Supreme Court may rule supreme, but not even its own decisions are safe from itself. While Chief Justice Roberts is known as a staunch supporter of the doctrine of stare decisis, some commentators believe this might be the year for some seriously big SCOTUS reversals. With the High Court packed with a conservative majority, one major source is predicting that three longstanding precedents may not have long for this world....

New attorneys practicing in the Sixth Circuit will have to learn the local court rules and make sure that their case will go as smoothly as possible (procedurally, anyway). Whether it’s getting acclimated to the court’s e-filing system, or knowing the security measures for entering the building, here are three tips to get you started. No cameras, cell phones, or recording devices permitted. While other circuit courts may ban liquids TSA-style, new attorneys in the Sixth should know that cameras, cell phones, or any recording devices are prohibited inside the courtroom unless authorized by a judge....

This post was updated on March 30, 2022 Estate planning, although necessary, is never fun. Between federal estate taxes and state inheritance laws, designing a plan for your property after death — and drafting the essential documents — can be a major headache. Those arrangements can only get harder for non-U.S. citizens. While navigating estate and immigration laws may seem overwhelming, here are five tips that can help simplify the process....

Price v. Wolford, No. 09-6139, involved the Oklahoma Health Care Authority (OHCA)’s appeal from the district court’s order allotting part of a malpractice settlement to OHCA in full satisfaction of the lien. The court of appeals reversed, on the ground that the district court correctly construed Oklahoma law but erred in finding that the settling parties had proved by clear and convincing evidence that only $67,666.67 of the settlement could be attributed to medical care paid by Medicaid....

Elon Musk may be getting cold feet. Although he says he remains committed to buying Twitter, he has put the deal on hold until he gets “proof” about the number of bots on the site. Twitter didn’t take the news lightly. It announced that it planned on moving forward with their merger agreement. And it sounds like it’ll fight Musk if he tries to back out. So what does this mean?...

The trial of Capital Gazette gunman Jarrod Ramos began June 29, almost exactly three years after he opened fire at the Annapolis, Maryland newspaper. Ramos pled guilty to all 23 criminal charges filed against him, including the murder of five Capital Gazette employees: Gerald Fischman, Rob Hiaasen, John McNamara, Rebecca Smith, and Wendi Winters. But his case has moved forward to trial despite the guilty plea. Why? His attorneys argue that Ramos cannot be held criminally responsible for his actions due to mental illness - often known as an insanity plea....

Native Ecosystems Council v. Tidwell, No. 06-35890, involved an action challenging the Forest Service’s approval of a project to update grazing allotments in the Beaverhead-Deerlodge National Forest. The court of appeals reversed summary judgment for defendant, on the grounds that 1) because the Forest Service’s environmental assessment was based on a nonexistent management indicator species, its habitat proxy analysis was not reliable; and 2) the Forest Service failed to take the requisite “hard look” at the project as required by the National Environmental Policy Act....

District court’s denial of defendant’s petition for habeas relief is affirmed where: 1) defendant forfeited his right to raise a Batson claim on appeal; 2) defendant’s ineffective assistance claim fails to meet the first prong of the Strickland standard; and 3) a state court reasonably applied established federal law regarding Sixth Amendment ineffective assistance claims. Read Clausell v. Sherrer, No 06-4606 Appellate Information On Appeal from the United States District Court for the Western District of New Jersey...

What’s worse: being convicted of conspiracy to commit bank fraud, or having no lawyer to challenge your sentence? For Kay Rogers, it was a bit of the what the British call a “Hobson’s choice.” She really had no choice. She was convicted and she has no lawyer. It has a lot to do with the $4 million restitution order against her when she was a county auditor. She filed a civil suit against the bank that is getting the restitution payments because, she says, the bank committed fraud....

In the closely watched abortion case out of Louisiana and the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals, SCOTUS appears to have erred on the side of caution and issued the temporary stay pending their decision on whether to take that matter up on certiorari. Notably, while the 5 to 4 decision extends the emergency stay of enforcement on Louisiana’s law that would impose certain requirements on abortion providers in the state, if the Justices refuse to take the matter up, the stay automatically terminates and the law will then go into effect....

In an appeal from the Social Security Commission’s denial of supplemental security income benefits to plaintiff, the district court’s denial of attorney’s fees to plaintiff is affirmed where a plaintiff may not be awarded attorneys’ fees against the U.S. under the Equal Access to Justice Act with respect to issues not reached by a district court in reversing a federal agency’s decision. Read Hardisty v. Astrue, No. 08-35919 Appellate Information...

In 2012, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that police may attach a GPS tracking device to your car, unbeknownst to you, if they obtain a search warrant. But what if you discover a police-ordered GPS tracker on your car, have no idea where it came from, remove it, and toss it onto a shelf in your garage? And then, what if the police grow suspicious that the tracker has become static, identify its location within your garage, and then obtain a second search warrant to enter your property on the grounds that you’ve stolen the tracker?...

It’s hard for a caregiver to convince an older parent to give up driving. In many ways, it can feel like giving up one’s independence. But there comes a time when it has to be done. As we age, there are warning signs that driving is no longer a good idea for ourselves or a family member. Our reaction times naturally slow down, and our eyesight worsens. Statistics even show we develop limited mobility in the neck....

The Second Circuit Court of Appeals tossed out a conspiracy lawsuit against JPMorgan Chase & Co for violating RICO. The case involved the notorious Bernard Madoff, a.k.a. “Bernie” Madoff. For those of you unfamiliar with the Bernie Madoff saga, Madoff was arrested several years back for running a ponzi scheme and swindling investors out of billions of dollars. Madoff now enjoys the walls and bars of his prison cell as fingers continue pointing to others who may have been involved in the scheme....

June is Pride Month, so every Monday this month FindLaw will be looking at the unique legal issues faced by LGBT members of our community – what the laws are currently, and what they may be in the near future. We’ll be rounding up our coverage of family law, employment rights, and services and accommodation discrimination. This week? We look at upcoming legislation and court decisions that could affect LGBT rights....

In a motion for costs by the prevailing party in an appeal, the motion is denied where, while an award of costs to a prevailing party pursuant to Rule 39 is customary, the court retained discretion to deny costs when, in the exercise of its discretion, it determines taxation is not appropriate, and equitable considerations militated against taxing costs. Read Moore v. Delaware, No. 08-2426 Appellate Information Argued June 17, 2009...

If you have an iPhone or an interest in intellectual property law, you may have been following the Apple/Samsung trial over the last few weeks. Yesterday, the epic trial concluded with hours of closing arguments. Those arguments came after the hours of jury instructions. (District Judge Lucy Koh spent two hours reading 109 pages of jury instructions to the court before the attorneys got to the good stuff.) Make no mistake: jury instructions are important, especially in a high-stakes trial....

Terence Tribble was arrested on Mother’s Day in 2006 for drinking on a public way. Officers Nicholas Evangelides and Roger Fieser found heroin and crack cocaine on Tribble during a search incident to arrest. (A bad Mother’s Day for Tribble; the worst Mother’s Day ever for his mom.) The drug charges against Tribble were dismissed for lack of probable cause. Tribble filed a civil rights lawsuit against the officers for illegal stop, false arrest, illegal search, and a violation of due process....