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We’ve got a twin pack of updates for you on this midsummer Monday afternoon, both involving preliminary injunctions, video content, and non-traditional distribution mediums. In one case, which pits a major television network against an alternative video distribution medium (it’s almost Aereo part II), the panel declined to issue a preliminary injunction. In the other, we have a bit of backtracking (but not enough) by the panel in an amended opinion in a dangerous precedential case that imposed prior restraint on speech on the basis of a questionable copyright claim....

For small businesses, celebrating Administrative Professionals Day, or Secretaries Day, as it is used to be called, may seem like a needless expenditure. However, when it comes to keeping morale high, small gestures can go a long way. And on the Wednesday of the last full week of April, every year, you have the opportunity to show your admins that you appreciate them and boost staff morale. So if you don’t want to break the bank appreciating your staff, below, you can read about some cost effective ways to celebrate the administrative professionals that keep your business up and running....

Justice Sonia Sotomayor, in a discussion with faculty and students at Oklahoma City University’s law school, sounded the alarm on privacy intrusion, by both public and private actors, reports The Wall Street Journal’s Bits Blog. This alarm, of course, is one that many Americans have been hearing ever since Edwards Snowden blew the whistle on the National Security Agency’s mass surveillance here and abroad. “There are drones flying over the air randomly that are recording everything that’s happening on what we consider our private property....

The Supreme Court on Wednesday heard oral arguments on the extent of the government’s power to detain immigrants facing removal, without the opportunity for release. Currently, thousands of immigrants and asylum seekers are held in prison-like conditions while their cases work through the immigration system. Those detentions are long, taking over a year in most cases, and detained immigrants are offered no bond hearings. The Ninth Circuit ruled last year that such detainees must be given a bond hearing within six months and that the government must release those who it cannot prove are a flight risk or danger to the public....

What do you get when you cross the Supreme Court with a painfully long beloved Christmas carol? An acute awareness that after more than 200 years, the Court has seen it all. So come along, boys and girls, as we learn that the drummers drumming and lords-a-leaping aren’t quite as innocent in the judicial version of this gift list. In 1910, the Supreme Court upheld Al Williams’ conviction for “drumming” on a train in violation of an Arkansas statute that prohibited soliciting “business or patronage for any hotel, lodging house, eating house, bath house, physician, masseur, surgeon, or other medical practitioner, on the trains … operating or running within the state....

Appeal From Denial of Costs in Condemnation Action In Transwestern Pipeline Co. v. 17.19 Acres of Prop. Located in Maricopa Cty., No. 09-16850, an appeal from the district court’s denial of defendant’s motion for fees and costs in a condemnation action, the court affirmed where the term “United States,” as used in 42 U.S.C. section 4654(a)(2), did not include a private entity prosecuting a condemnation action under the authority granted by the Federal Electric Regulatory Commission....

When Tucker Carlson says on his show “[r]emember the facts of the story; these are undisputed" no reasonable person would believe that he was about to state facts. At least, that was Tucker Carlson’s own argument in defending himself from a libel suit. That argument convinced U.S. District Judge Mary Kay Vyskocil, who dismissed a lawsuit brought by model and actress Karen McDougal. McDougal sued for defamation, alleging Carlson baselessly told his audience she was extorting the President....

District court’s reduction of defendant’s sentence from 295 months to 115 months is reversed and remanded where the Federal Criminal Rule 35(b)(2) does not authorize the district judge to reduce the sentence on the basis of the 18 U.S.C. section 3533(a) factors that he would consider in initial sentencing. Read US v. Shelby, No. 08-2729 Appeals from the United States District Court for the Northern District of Illinois, Eastern Division...

The conclusion of Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation, and the issuing of his final report, have been about as much of a media circus as we’ve all come to expect. However, as the 400-plus page report explains, Mueller did not find a “criminal conspiracy” between the Trump campaign and Russian actors, nor did it come to a conclusion as to whether the President obstructed justice. Before the report was even issued, Congress was informed that the report failed to prove President Trump, or his campaign, “colluded” with Russia, but even Attorney General Barr made it clear that the report did not totally exonerate the President....

Historically, the U.S. Supreme Court has been reluctant to weigh in on redistricting issues, even holding in 2019 that federal courts cannot review partisan gerrymandering claims. But two recent decisions from SCOTUS’s notorious “shadow docket,” while technically a win for voting rights advocates, signaled that the Court might be gearing up to make a big decision on the issue. North Carolina Earlier this year, the North Carolina Supreme Court invalidated a new congressional map drawn by the state legislature that would likely result in Republicans picking up two more seats....

If you’ve been following Supreme Court oral arguments this term, you might have noticed something slightly different: a large influx of women advocates. Almost half of the lawyers arguing before the Court in its October cycle were women. The amount of women appearing before the Supreme Court is unprecedented, and it comes at a time when the Supreme Court itself has its greatest percentage of female justices ever, with the potential that women could soon become a majority on the Court....

Anxiety is difficult enough to deal with on its own. When you add in managing a heavy workload or interviewing for a new job, it can become debilitating. Working With Anxiety 101 You cannot be fired for having severe or chronic anxiety. It is a protected diagnosis under federal law. The Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) protects chronic conditions that limit “bodily function.” Because anxiety alters the body’s functions of thinking and concentrating, it is covered as a disability in most cases....

“Shake and Bake,” also known as the “One Pot Method,” is a procedure for manufacturing methamphetamine. This new meth-making method combines all of the ingredients into a single bottle (such as a Gatorade bottle). The meth maker shakes the bottle, burps out the excess pressure, and hopes that it doesn’t explode into a ball of flames. An informant in Calhoun County witnessed an associate of Lonnie Hodge, Ms. Freeze, using this method....

When Dr. Mark Troxler sued the clinic where he worked for fraud on behalf of the United States, it’s doubtful his lawyers anticipated the speed at which his claims would be dismissed. When the case got to the doorstep of the district court, defendants filed the legal world’s equivalent of a “yeah, so?”: 12(b)(6). Upon appeal, here’s what the Circuit Court had to say: “I second that motion!” Who knew that whistleblowing would be so thankless?...

Federal law makes it a felony for a habitual offender to commit domestic assault within Indian country, when the abuser has two or more prior convictions for domestic violence. And since the law seeks to protect Native American women from abuse, those predicate convictions can come from tribal courts. But tribal courts are not required to provide lawyers for criminal defendants in many cases, including misdemeanor domestic assault charges. And while that would be a violation of the Sixth Amendment should it occur in state or federal court, that does not stop federal courts from relying on lawyerless tribal convictions as predicate offenses for the domestic violence law, the Supreme Court ruled on Monday....

A recent court ruling in France underscores just how blasé that country is about sex. After a French business traveler died of a heart attack while having sex with a stranger, the country’s national health insurance provider claimed that the death was work-related. Seeking to get the man’s employer to pay a share of the benefits paid to the family, the insurer argued that sex with strangers on a business trip is a normal activity, “like taking a shower or a meal....

Last year, a jury returned a sizable verdict against GlaxoSmithKline, for the widow of a BigLaw partner that took his own life while on anti-depressant medication. The case alleged that the maker of the anti-depressant Paxil failed to adequately warn adult users of the risk of suicide. The drug maker argued that it was the stress of BigLaw that drove him to it. But, despite the fact that a jury found the drug maker liable, on appeal, as it turned out, the jury shouldn’t have even had the chance....

This last weekend marked another sad chapter in Washington, D.C.’s — and America’s — obsession with sex scandals. This time, it was Rep. Katie Hill, D-Calif., who was felled by salacious allegations and pictures. The 32-year-old married freshman lawmaker, viewed as a rising star in her party, was accused of carrying on sexual relationships with both a campaign staffer and an employee in her Congressional office. Hill acknowledged the former but denied the latter, which would be a violation of Congressional ethics rules....

In what is undoubtedly a tragic case, a state trooper shot and killed a dog that was loose on the highway. Sadly, in Hansen v. Black, the owners were left with no legal remedy as the courts have ruled the officer’s actions were reasonable. The dog had gotten loose and was causing havoc for drivers. The officer attempted to get the dog off the highway, but it did not respond to his commands, and kept running away when chased....

The battle over where transgender youth can go to the bathroom has quickly turned into a political and legal flashpoint. The Supreme Court delved into the fight recently, staying an order that would allow transgender Virginia high schooler Gavin Grimm to use the bathroom that matched his gender identity. Then, on Sunday, a federal judge in Texas blocked the Obama administration’s guidance on transgender students and bathroom access. But these fights aren’t just about the rights of transgender youth and debates about who can pee where....