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Xodus v. Wackenhut Corp., 09-3082, involved a plaintiff’s suit against a security firm, claiming that it violated Title VII when it did not hire him as a security guard because plaintiff would not cut his dreadlocks. In affirming the district court’s judgment that defendant did not engage in religious discrimination when it refused to hire plaintiff on account of his dreadlocked hairstyle, the court held that the district court’s decision to credit the interviewing manager’s testimony that plaintiff never informed him that religious belief required him to wear dreadlocks is both plausible from the evidence and sufficiently explained in the opinion....

After more than 27 years of service on the nation’s highest court, Supreme Court Justice Stephen Breyer announced his retirement last week. He plans to step down this summer, after the current session. On the presidential campaign trail, President Biden promised he would nominate a Black woman to the U.S. Supreme Court if given the opportunity. And in his speech at a White House event on Justice Breyer’s retirement, Biden reiterated his commitment to that goal....

It’s not every day a state circuit court weighs in on someone’s job qualifications. Daniel Cameron, a 2011 graduate of the Brandeis School of Law at the University of Louisville, declared his candidacy for Kentucky Attorney General in January 2019. And it wasn’t long before his opponent raised questions about his level of legal experience. Then, one member of the voting public decided they were concerned enough to file a complaint seeking Cameron’s disqualification from the race....

Former New York State Senator Dean Skelos got a new term – four years and three months in prison. The ex-majority leader was convicted of federal corruption charges, including soliciting bribes and defrauding the public. A jury found him guilty – for the second time – in July. Skelos got a break last year when an appeals court threw out his conviction due to faulty jury instructions in United States v....

In a recent statement by Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, the SCOTUS watching world was warned to be on the lookout for some big 5 to 4 decisions coming down from the High Court this month. Among the expected contentious decisions, the census question case and a political gerrymandering case seem to be the most hotly anticipated cases. These cases are expected to be decided along partisan lines, though it’s not too uncommon for justices to cast unexpected swing votes....

Driving down a back road with the windows rolled down and music blasting is a favorite pastime for many Americans who consider it an integral part of road trips. But when these drivers enter more residential areas, their loud music may be considered a nuisance or even a noncriminal offense. On July 1, Florida implemented a law prohibiting car stereos from being too loud. The law states that if a car’s music can be heard from 25 feet away (roughly two lanes of traffic), it is a noncriminal traffic violation that can result in a fine of up to $114....

Action Regarding Damage to Interstate Carriage In Mason & Dixon Intermodal, Inc. v. Lapmaster Int’l LLC, No. 09-17833, a diversity action regarding damage to goods in interstate carriage, the district court’s order granting approval of the parties’ good-faith settlement under California law is affirmed where 1) to the extent that the additional burden of a generally applicable state law did not appreciably affect a shipper’s grounds for or measure of recovery against a carrier, it could not affect a carrier’s calculus in setting rates, and therefore could not conflict with the Carmack Act’s purpose; and 2) because plaintiff and third-party defendant were joint tortfeasors under California law, the district court did not err in applying Cal....

Is this the most interesting employment law battle happening in the country today? We certainly think so. There are the unpaid Black Swan movie production interns suing Fox Searchlight. There are magazine interns suing over unpaid internships at Hearst and underpaid internships at Conde Nast. There is even a lawsuit against Atlantic Records and Warner Music, filed this week, according to Reuters. With an economy stuffed with unemployed, desperate recent graduates, and companies reluctant to hire paid labor, we can only imagine that there will be even more to come....

The dairy industry has long held legal sway, which they’ve needed to wield in recent years as demand for products made with cow’s milk has been challenged by a growing interest in plant-based milk and dairy alternatives. The dairy industry has waged a legal fight to ban milk alternatives from labeling their products with terms like “milk” or “dairy.” Cash Cow While the power of certain industries like Big Pharma is well-known, not many are aware of the massive influence of the dairy industry, which receives tens of billions in government subsidies each year....

Fee-shifting has long since been broken in the Federal Circuit. Chief Judge Randall Rader has written an op-ed and numerous concurrences on the subjecting, lamenting the lack of fee awards and the circuit’s uniquely high standard for shifting fees. He got his wish. Yesterday, in a pair of extremely important decisions, the Supreme Court, as predicted, fixed fee-shifting. How? By dropping the Federal Circuit’s impossibly high standard down to a “case-by-case exercise” of a trial judge’s discretion, a discretion which must be respected on appeal now that the circuit’s de novo review has been dropped as well....

$5.6 million jury award in damages to a marketing firm’s breach of contract suit vacated Smart Mktg Group Inc. v. Publ’n Int’l Ltd., 09-2646, concerned a challenge to a jury’s award of $5.6 million in damages in finding in favor of a plaintiff, in a marketing firm’s breach of contract suit against an online company, involving an agreement to develop programs that would deliver location-specific, brand specific, internet sales leads to auto dealers....

Plaintiff’s motion to compel the payment of costs is granted and the defendants ordered to pay the costs previously ordered by the court of appeals where the original award of costs was a permissible exercise of the court’s discretion, and there was no operative bill of costs in the district court which could be set off against those awarded to plaintiff in the appeal. Read Smart v. International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers, Local 702, No....

To date, people who have attempted to sue social media companies over users’ posts have had little success, but that may be about to change. On May 4, the Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals issued a ruling that could open the door for litigants who think social media companies are liable for injuries stemming from user posts. In that case, Lemmon v. Snap, Inc., the court reversed a lower court dismissal of a case in which plaintiffs contended that Snapchat bears responsibility for the deaths of three teenagers who died in a 2017 car crash in Wisconsin....

In another 5-4 decision, the Supreme Court has ruled that Montana cannot prohibit scholarships funded by tax credits from going to religious schools. The majority found that the state constitution’s “no aid” provision discriminated against religious families in violation of the Free Exercise Clause. SCOTUS Overrules Montana Supreme Court In 2015, the Montana Legislature passed a bill creating a tax credit for those who donate to organizations that provide students with scholarships to private schools....

In May, the Third Circuit ruled on a False Claims Act suit against Genentech. Other major decisions involved asbestos litigation, a petition for IRS relief, and a First Amendment retaliation claim. For a quick review of the top cases from May 2017, we’ve put together a list from the FindLaw Opinion Summary Archive: In an action brought by certified nursing assistants against their employer for violations of the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) and related New Jersey state wage and hour laws, the District Court denial of defendant’s motion to dismiss or to stay pending arbitration is affirmed over defendant’s claim that both overtime claims must first be submitted to arbitration to resolve disputed interpretation of the collective bargaining agreement (CBA), including the definition of the wage differentials and policies concerning the meal breaks....

Here at FindLaw, we understand the pressures of being a legal professional - most of us are recovering lawyers - so we want to help by tossing you that preferred life preserver of the legal profession, the short list. Today’s offering: Top five things to know about the Solicitor General’s number two, newly-appointed Principal Deputy Solicitor General Sri Srinivasan. No stranger to the Supreme Court. After working as a Bristow Fellow and clerking for Justice Sandra Day O’Connor and Judge J....

In US v. Fox, No. 09-5131, the court of appeals reversed defendant’s conviction for possession of an unregistered shotgun with a barrel less than 18 inches long, holding that “when an officer entered defendant’s wife’s car and directed her to drive to a nearby parking lot, she was seized under the Fourth Amendment, and thus her purported consent to a subsequent search was tainted by an illegal seizure.” “A warrantless search of an individual’s home is “per se unreasonable under the Fourth Amendment unless the government can show that it falls within one of a carefully defined set of exceptions....

Conviction and sentence on a defendant as a career offender for multiple drug related crimes is affirmed as, although the defendant’s status as a career criminal has had the effect of more than doubling his guideline range from 120-135 up to 262-327 months’ imprisonment, there is no error in the district court’s decisions that led to it. Read US v. Gregory, No. 09-2735 Appellate Information Appeal from the United States District Court for the Northern District of Illinois, Eastern Division...

Remember Usher, the R&B singer who was inescapable on pop radio in the late 90s and throughout the early 2000s? Who starred in “Moesha” and “She’s All That” and whose “Confessions” album was described as “the ‘Thriller’ of our generation”? Well, he’s back – in the Third Circuit, that is. Usher won a long-standing copyright infringement lawsuit over his 2004 hit song “Bad Girl” last Friday, when the Third Circuit tossed the infringement suit against him....

Under federal immigration law, the government may deny someone a visa if, “at the time of application for admission or adjustment of status, is likely at any time to become a public charge.” What’s a public charge? Anyone, according to U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, who is likely to become primarily dependent on the government for subsistence. Of course, government subsistence can take many forms, and the Trump Administration issued an update to the public charge rule that would allow the immigration officials to deny green cards or visas to people who now rely on or might in the future need government programs including food stamps, Medicaid, and housing subsidies....