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Good morning. Just as the trial was set to begin, Fox and Dominion Voting Systems struck a $787.5 million deal – but the litigation against Fox over its coverage of the 2020 election isn’t over. Plus, New York gets a new top judge, and the 9th Circuit helps sort out whether “I Can’t Believe It’s Not Butter!” spray is legally butter. Turns out, it isn’t.
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Just before opening statements were set to begin, Dominion Voting Systems and Fox Corp announced they had reached a settlement to end the trial over claims that Fox knowingly aired falsehoods alleging the voting technology company rigged the 2020 election against Donald Trump. But Fox isn’t done with litigation over its coverage of the election, reports Jack Queen.
Voting technology company Smartmatic is pursuing its own lawsuit against Fox, this one seeking $2.7 billion in damages in a New York state court. The London-based voting software company sued Fox and five individuals, including former Trump lawyers and hosts, alleging in its lawsuit that the defendants knowingly spread false claims that its software was used to flip votes.
Smartmatic attorney J. Erik Connolly said in a statement that the company is committed to clearing its name, recouping the damage done to it and “holding Fox accountable for undermining democracy.”
Fox denies the allegations, saying in a recent statement that the network had a right to report on highly newsworthy allegations of voter fraud.
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Appeals court Judge Rowan Wilson in New York was confirmed as the chief judge on the state’s highest court, after Democratic New York Governor Kathy Hochul’s prior nominee was voted down by lawmakers from her own party. Wilson becomes the first Black chief judge in New York, a role that includes oversight of the entire state court system. (Reuters)
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Covington will open a Boston office with seven lawyers, including the chair of Mintz Levin’s corporate practice. Megan Gates, who was also co-chair of Mintz’s securities and capital markets group, will help lead Covington’s new outpost opening this spring. (Reuters)
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Norton Rose Fulbright is expanding in St. Louis and Atlanta with six new partners, including the leaders of Bryan Cave’s insurance and technology transactions practices. Kevin Fischer, Bruce Baty, Jodi Adolf, Michael Schwartz, Sean Christy and Chuck Hollis have left Bryan Cave to join Norton. (Reuters)
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That’s how many hours of questioning JPMorgan Chase & Co CEO Jamie Dimon (above) could face when he is deposed regarding what he knew about the bank’s relationship with sex offender and former client Jeffrey Epstein. The bank faces lawsuits seeking damages by women who claim that Epstein sexually abused them, and by the U.S. Virgin Islands, where the late financier had a home. JPMorgan is separately suing former private banking chief Jes Staley, claiming he concealed what he knew about Epstein and should cover losses it may incur in the two lawsuits. U.S. District Judge Jed Rakoff in Manhattan told Dimon to set aside two days for his deposition and said the CEO may be questioned by the plaintiffs’ lawyers for five hours and by Staley’s lawyer for two hours.
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It has been decades since the U.S. Supreme Court issued a pair of rulings — one from 1972, the other from 1988 — that set out two different standards for how investors can bring classwide securities fraud claims. But a new petition to the 6th Circuit from FirstEnergy Corp, in a securities fraud case alleging more than $8 billion in investor losses, shows that courts are still trying to figure out which standard to apply. Alison Frankel has the details on FirstEnergy’s argument that an Ohio trial judge wrongly certified shareholders and bond investors under the Supreme Court’s Affiliated Ute standard when he should have applied the more rigorous test from Basic v. Levinson. Interlocutory review of class certification is rare, Frankel says, but with $8 billion on the line, the 6th Circuit doesn’t want to get this one wrong.
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“As a matter of legal classification, it is a spray.“
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The U.S. Supreme Court is expected to rule today by 11:59 p.m. ET on whether to freeze a lower court ruling that would sharply limit access to the abortion pill mifepristone while a legal challenge to the drug’s regulatory approval plays out. Challengers to the drug asked the justices to implement the curbs ordered by conservative U.S. District Judge Matthew Kascmaryk in Amarillo, Texas. The restrictions could cut off access to the drug entirely for months, the Biden administration and the drug’s distributor, Danco Laboratories, told the justices. Justice Samuel Alito last Friday temporarily blocked the restrictions on mifepristone in order to give the Supreme Court time to weigh requests to pause the lower court’s order.
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The U.S. Supreme Court is slated to weigh a convicted stalker’s claim that thousands of unwanted Facebook messages he sent to a female musician were legally protected speech in a case that tests the limits of the First Amendment. Billy Counterman, represented by John Elwood of Arnold & Porter, is urging the justices to overturn his stalking conviction, arguing Colorado’s criminal court violated his First Amendment rights by deeming his messages to singer-songwriter Coles Whalen a “true threat” that fell outside free speech protections.
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U.S. District Judge Mary Kay Vyskocil in Manhattan will hold a hearing in a lawsuit filed by Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg against Republican U.S. Representative Jim Jordan to stop what Bragg called a “campaign of intimidation” against his office’s prosecution of former President Donald Trump. Jordan on Monday asked the court to let a House panel’s investigation into the criminal prosecution of Trump proceed, saying a subpoena of a former Manhattan prosecutor was needed by lawmakers as they consider possible legislation. Bragg has accused Jordan of impeding New York’s “sovereign authority” and interfering in an ongoing criminal case.
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Accused document leaker Jack Douglas Teixeira is due back in Boston federal court for a detention hearing after his arrest last week on charges that he unlawfully copied and transmitted classified materials, sharing top secret military intelligence records online. Teixeira, a 21-year-old member of the U.S. Air National Guard, made his initial appearance on Friday. Boston’s top federal national security prosecutor, Nadine Pellegrini, requested that Teixeira be detained pending trial. The court appointed a public defender to represent Teixeira. U.S. Magistrate Judge David Hennessy will preside at the detention hearing.
Court calendars are subject to last-minute docket changes.
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U.S. Supreme Court justices appeared ready to bolster the ability of employees to obtain accommodations at work for their religious practices in a case involving an evangelical Christian former mail carrier’s claim of discrimination against the U.S. Postal Service. Baker Botts’ Aaron Streett, who argued for Gerald Groff, faced off against U.S. Solicitor General Elizabeth Prelogar. (Reuters)
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In a consent decree approved by U.S. District Judge Christopher Cooper in Washington, D.C., the EPA agreed to review and update its emissions rules to more fully regulate hazardous air pollutants from oil and gas storage, production and transmission facilities. Environmental groups, including the California Communities Against Toxics, the Sierra Club and others, sued the agency in April 2022, claiming it had an obligation under the Clean Air Act to update the rules every eight years but had not done so since 2012. (Reuters)
- Alphabet’s Google convinced the Federal Circuit to cancel three anti-malware patents at the heart of a Texas jury’s $20 million infringement verdict against the company. The appellate court said that Alfonso Cioffi and Allen Rozman’s patents were invalid because they contained inventions that were not included in an earlier version of the patent. (Reuters)
- The DOJ reached a settlement with General Motors to resolve the department’s allegation that the automaker discriminated against non-U.S. citizens by unnecessarily requiring lawful permanent residents to provide an unexpired foreign passport as a condition of employment. Under the terms of the agreement, the Detroit-based company will pay $365,000 in civil penalties but will make no admission of wrongdoing. (Reuters)
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A Moscow court rejected an appeal from Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich to be freed from pre-trial detention, meaning he will stay in a former KGB prison until at least May 29 while a spying case against him is investigated. Russia’s FSB security service arrested Gershkovich on March 29 in the Urals city of Yekaterinburg on espionage charges that carry a possible 20-year prison sentence, charges Gershkovich denies. The U.S. has deemed him “wrongfully detained,” and President Joe Biden has called his detention illegal. (Reuters)
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Milbank added three partners specializing in structured finance from King & Spalding, including Michael Urschel, the head of the firm’s practice. Urschel is joining Milbank’s alternative investments practice in New York along with partners Kathryn Weiss and Martin Eid. (Reuters)
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Clifford Chance hired two Washington, D.C.-based partners from rival Baker Botts: William Lavery and Joseph Ostoyich. A former executive committee member at Baker Botts, Ostoyich will lead Clifford Chance’s U.S. antitrust litigation practice. (Reuters)
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Mayer Brown added Justin Herring as a New York-based litigation partner. Herring was the former executive deputy superintendent of the cybersecurity division of the New York State Department of Financial Services. (Reuters)
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Orrick added partners in Germany and France from Eversheds: Aurélien Loric will head Orrick’s restructuring practice in Paris, and Werner Brickwedde joins the firm’s energy transaction practice in Dusseldorf. Brickwedde previously led Eversheds’ national M&A practice. (Reuters)
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Eversheds hired partner David Wyles for its London-based energy and infrastructure M&A finance team. Wyles previously was the head of Herbert Smith Freehills’ infrastructure finance practice. (Reuters)
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Polsinelli added Atlanta-based real estate finance partners Joshua Reif and Aleksandra Strang from Nelson Mullins. (Polsinelli)
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Haynes and Boone added Alla Digilova as a New York-based partner in the firm’s capital markets and securities practice. Digilova was previously at Kirkland. (Haynes and Boone)
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Bracewell brought on Bucky Brannen in Dallas as a tax partner. Brannen was previously at Baker Botts. (Bracewell)
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Womble Bond Dickinson hired Tracy Bacigalupo in New York as a partner in the corporate and securities group. Bacigalupo was previously at McDermott. (Womble)
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