9th Circuit Court

US Lawyer Wrongly Accused in Madrid Bomb Case Loses Patriot Act Challenge

Because he earlier accepted $2 million from the government for being mistakenly arrested in an international terrorism case and is barred by the terms of the settlement from seeking new injunctive relief, an Oregon lawyer lacks standing to pursue his challenge to the constitutionality of the USA Patriot Act, a…

Dec 10, 2009 8:36 PM CST

Judge Axes Guilty Plea, Says Broadcom Exec Didn’t Lie to SEC, Dismisses Case

Nearly 18 months ago, Broadcom Corp. co-founder Henry Samueli pleaded guilty to a felony charge of lying to securities regulators about his role in an alleged company stock options backdating scheme. But in fact Samueli didn’t make any material misstatement to the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, a federal judge…

Dec 10, 2009 6:15 PM CST

Kozinski’s Turducken Dissent Sets Up Cert Petition in Privacy Case

The government is asking the U.S. Supreme Court to overturn a federal appeals court ruling allowing engineers and scientists to pursue a suit that claims newly instituted background checks invade their privacy. The plaintiffs, employees of NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, contend the government wants to ask friends and acquaintances about…

Dec 7, 2009 7:30 PM CST

Many More Mortgage Fraud Cases in Pipeline; ‘Like Shooting Fish in a Barrel’

Mortgage fraud prosecutions are likely to increase exponentially as federal authorities gear up nationwide to put a higher priority on such cases. In Nevada, they have some 300 cases in the pipeline, cherry-picking the most egregious, reports the Las Vegas Sun. Like complex drug cases, mortgage fraud cases can mushroom…

Nov 19, 2009 8:12 PM CST

Federal PD Wins Health Costs for Same-Sex Spouse in ‘Legal End-Run’

A federal public defender, thwarted in an earlier effort to enroll his same-sex spouse in his employer’s health coverage plan, has won a ruling requiring his employer to pay him for the costs of obtaining outside insurance. The Los Angeles Times calls the ruling by Judge Stephen Reinhardt of the…

Nov 19, 2009 3:00 PM CST

Law Firm Manager Gets 41 Months for Embezzling $1.3M

Sentenced yesterday by a federal judge in California to 41 months for embezzling $1.3 million from the law firm at which she formerly worked as office manager, Regina Schenck blames a “demeaning” climate at Diepenbrock Harrison and a “horse addiction” for fueling her crime. In a presentence letter to U.S.…

Nov 18, 2009 11:19 PM CST

Chevron Sues Plaintiffs Lawyer for $4M, Alleges Malicious Prosecution

After making headlines several months ago by posting a video on YouTube to bolster its defense of an Ecuador-based environmental mass tort case, Chevron is again trying an unusual litigation tactic in a closely related case. The company has sued a plaintiffs attorney for $4 million in federal court in…

Nov 17, 2009 10:51 PM CST

Goal of New ABA Web Effort: All the Federal Decisions that Are Fit to Print

Want to know more about a 9th Circuit opinion on the First Amendment rights of a citizen ejected from a city council meeting for giving a Nazi salute? Or the 5th Circuit opinion allowing a Halliburton employee to sue over her alleged rape in Iraq? You can find those opinions…

Nov 17, 2009 11:30 AM CST

Judge Nixes ‘Hackintosher’ Bid to Put Mac OS X in Cloned Computers

Apple won a legal battle over the use of its operating system Friday, when a federal judge in San Francisco ruled that Psystar violated copyright law by selling its own cloned computers with Mac OS X. The clone-maker got around Apple’s restrictions on using the operating system in non-Macintosh machines…

Nov 16, 2009 7:28 PM CST

Misconduct By 3 Sekhon Firm Lawyers Puts Up to 700 Clients in Peril

Sekhon & Sekhon claimed a 95 percent success rate concerning more than 1,000 immigrants that the law firm helped to win political asylum in the United States. But now up to 700 could be deported because they lied to immigration judges and asylum officers after the law firm and interpreters…

Nov 16, 2009 6:10 PM CST

Supreme Court Overturns 9th Circuit a Third Time in Bludgeon Murder Case

For the third time, the U.S. Supreme Court has overturned the San Francisco-based 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals and restored the death penalty for a man convicted of the bludgeon murder of a 19-year-old woman in 1981. The Supreme Court’s per curiam opinion (PDF) said it is “fanciful” to…

Nov 16, 2009 5:16 PM CST

9th Circuit Calls for Accounting of Judge’s Handling of $33.8M Trust

Describing a controversial federal judge’s accounting for a $33.8 million trust as “curious,” the 9th Circuit today called for another judge to provide an accounting of how the money was handled. The decision concerns disputed assets of the late Philippines dictator Ferdinand Marcos which were entrusted to Real, who is…

Nov 14, 2009 1:24 AM CST

Bizarre Beatles Song-Selling Defense: Techies Created—and Can Copyright—New Tunes

The music of the Beatles isn’t legally available on the Internet. However, a little-known company is not only offering the back catalog of the famous 1960s rock ‘n’ roll group online but is trying to copyright it, based on what Ars Technica’s Law & Disorder blog characterizes as a “entertainingly…

Nov 5, 2009 10:19 PM CST

Plaintiffs Lawyers to Earn Up to $28M in Risky Wal-Mart Wage & Hour Litigation

Although Wal-Mart Stores Inc. has agreed to pay as much as $85 million to settle 39 consolidated wage-and-hour class action lawsuits involving more than 3 million employees, it wasn’t at all clear when the litigation began to unfold that the case would be a big winner. Now a hot litigation…

Nov 4, 2009 8:26 PM CST

Landlord to Pay Record $2.72M in Apartment Rental Discrimination Case

Real estate mogul Donald Sterling, who owns the Los Angeles Clippers, has agreed to pay $2.725 million to settle litigation alleging that he violated fair housing law by discriminating against dozens of African-Americans, Hispanics and families with children at dozens of Los Angeles-area apartments that he also owns. The settlement…

Nov 3, 2009 9:43 PM CST