The Arkansas Supreme Court this week unanimously reversed a lower court’s $1.2 billion verdict won previously in an off-labeling lawsuit waged by the state’s attorney general against the maker of widely used and effective antipsychotic medication
Points of LightAs national news coverage of BP’s effort to do the right thing by promptly compensating those hurt by the 2010 Gulf oil spill continues to expose the incestuous and shameless nature of the civil justice system in the nation’s #2 Judicial Hellhole, 7 in 10 recently surveyed Louisiana voters express support for tort reform legislation
Judicial HellholesA Baltimore judge has soundly rejected a proposal by the law firm of Peter Angelos to consolidate approximately 13,000 asbestos-related lawsuits involving different products, exposures, and illnesses, along with scores of defendants
Points of LightNew York federal District Judge Lewis Kaplan today issued his long awaited verdict in Chevron v. Donziger and, as expected, it is an encouraging win for the energy giant and a crushing loss for a once high-flying, if conniving, tort kingpin
Points of LightThe Times-Picayune reports reports that the 5th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals upheld a lower court’s dismissal of lawsuits filed by 11 Louisiana parishes based on state law, ruling that the claims against BP were preempted by federal law
Judicial Hellholes, UncategorizedA Florida Senate bill aimed at keeping passive nursing home investors out of the cross-hairs of personal inuury lawyers has passed out of committee on an 8-1 bipartisan vote this week
Points of LightATRA spokesman Darren McKinney appeared on WKBK-Radio’s Dan Mitchell Show this week to renew his organization’s criticism of New Hampshire’s “meritless, no-injury” lawsuit against ExxonMobil for alleged groundwater contamination from leaky gas station storage tanks
Judicial HellholesAs the push continues to expose and punish that lowly element of the plaintiffs’ bar that lies, cheats and manipulates civil courts and abestos trust funds to maximize their profits, ethics and justice be damned, ATRA offers up links to both a recent editorial and a Pennsylvania television interview that help make the tort reformers’ case
UncategorizedIn an apparent bid to make sure California remains as the #1-ranked Judicial Hellhole for an unprecedented third year in a row, food suit shysters there have watsed no time in getting 2014 off to a familiar start, filing two meritless class actions in federal court
UncategorizedA Nevada judge this week ordered state Attorney General Catherine Cortez Masto to pay the legal and discovery costs of a mortgage processing provider she and a private-sector class-action law firm from Washington, D.C., had unsuccessfully sued for fraud
Judicial Hellholes, Points of LightOn January 27, 2014, the California Second Appellate District Court held that a negligence claim against a medical-device manufacturer that was based on state law duties that paralleled requirements under federal law was not preempted.
Judicial HellholesLouisiana’s Supreme Court this week landed a solid blow against the state’s notorious “Buddy System,” wherein state Attorney General James “Buddy” Caldwell hires his friends among the personal injury bar to sue deep-pocket corporate defendants on behalf of the state so they can collect big fees and, in turn, generously contribute to his next political campaign.
Judicial Hellholes, Points of LightPerhaps inviting a new stampede of speculative and opportunistic litgation on the courts of the former #1 Judicial Hellhole, Philadelphia, the Pennsylvania Supreme Court last week ruled in Lance v. Wyeth that pharmaceutical companies can now be held liable for “negligent design defect” — a theory of liability not previously available to plaintiffs in the Keystone State
Judicial Hellholes, UncategorizedA unanimous U.S. Supreme Court yesterday overturned an appellate court decision that had been heralded as a needed check on so-called “pay-to-play” litigation
Judicial HellholesIn an important ruling last Friday, U.S. Bankruptcy Judge George Hodges in North Carolina reduced an asbestos defendant’s liability by 90 percent, down to $125 million from $1.4 billion, finding that the larger amount had been based on fraudulent claims by scheming plaintiffs’ lawyers and their clients
Points of LightBP has filed a lawsuit against San Antonio-based tort kingpin Mikal Watts, accusing him of fraudulently ginning up more than 40,000 “phantom” claims on one of the compensation funds BP established to mitigate damages from the 2010 Gulf oil spill
Judicial HellholesNot all news coming out of Judicial Hellholes is bad news, and a decision by the New York Court of Appeals, the state’s highest court, rejecting an equitable medical monitoring claim is very good news
Judicial Hellholes, Points of LightThe American Tort Reform Foundation issued its annual Judicial Hellholes® report today, naming civil courts in California, Louisiana, New York City, West Virginia, Southwestern Illinois’ Madison and St. Clair counties, and South Florida among the nation’s “most unfair”
Judicial HellholesThe U.S. Solicitor General’s office has weighed in on a closely-watched patent case — Limelight v. Akamai – and its brief could spell trouble for patent trolls
UncategorizedWatch this space Tuesday, December 17, for the latest addition of the American Tort Reform Foundation’s annual Judicial Hellholes report
Judicial HellholesThe U.S. Supreme Court will soon decide whether to hear the appeal of an important patents case, and sanity recommends that it should
Uncategorized