Free Speech, Due Process and Trial by Jury
On the first day he became the new Chief Judge of the Eastern District of Texas, Amos Mazzant III issued an order that shook up the caseload assignments for the eight judges who serve in that district. Here, we share Chief Judge Mazzant’s answers to a handful of questions The Lawbook posed to him regarding the new order.
A judge in Beaver County, Pennsylvania, has determined that Cardinal Midstream is owed $51.9 million in damages from Energy Transfer in a lawsuit stemming from a 2018 gas pipeline explosion.
In this edition of Litigation Roundup, a team of Kirkland lawyers gets an early win for a client facing a whistleblower’s False Claims Act suit, a suit stemming from the romance scandal involving former judge David Jones gets trimmed and the Dallas appellate court declines to bring an early end to a barratry lawsuit against a personal injury law firm.
A new lawsuit filed in Harris County Thursday evening accuses litigation support services company Lexitas of systematically breaching an agreement with Houston-based legal video and litigation support company SmartDisk by siphoning off work it was entitled to perform to other entities.
The Fifth Court of Appeals this week granted an emergency motion to stay a trial court’s order that would have required Sun Holdings and affiliated companies to post a more than $150 million supersedeas bond before appealing a $30.7 million jury verdict against it.
In an interview with The Texas Lawbook Tuesday, Alamdar S. Hamdani said he chose Bracewell in part because of its deep roots in his “adopted hometown” of Houston, its international platform and its “growing and burgeoning enforcement practice.”
In this edition of Litigation Roundup, Texas turns to the state’s Supreme Court in a bid to revive its lawsuit alleging Google violated the Texas Deceptive Trade Practices Act, a Haynes Boone team gets a $3.5 million jury award overturned on appeal, and a new lawsuit in Dallas alleges the illegal dumping of tons of dirt tainted with heavy metals has imperiled construction of an affordable housing project.
At an evidentiary hearing where the parties were supposed to fight to convince Chief U.S. Bankruptcy Judge for the Southern District of Texas, Eduardo V. Rodriguez, to strike the experts offered by the other side, a détente was reached shortly after lunch Thursday. But during the hearing, the U.S. Trustee revealed that the secret romantic relationship between former judge David Jones and former Jackson Walker bankruptcy partner Elizabeth Freeman began in 2010 or 2011 and said the firm learned about it in 2021.
Speaking to members of both chambers at the Texas Capitol Wednesday morning, Chief Justice Jimmy Blacklock launched his speech by asking that lawmakers approve an across-the-board 30 percent increase in pay for judges at all levels. That increase would take Texas from having the 48th lowest paid judiciary to the 31st out of 50 states, he said.
Bill Pedersen III joins Carter Arnett after serving one term as a justice on the Fifth Court of Appeals in Dallas. In an interview with The Texas Lawbook, Pedersen called the firm a “go-to litigation boutique” and said he couldn’t pass up the chance to join its ranks.
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