Free Speech, Due Process and Trial by Jury
Michelle Casady is based in Houston and covers litigation and appeals — including trials, breaking news and industry trends — for The Texas Lawbook.
Michelle Casady has been a reporter in Texas since January 2009. She's covered crime at The Bryan-College Station Eagle, courts at the San Antonio Express-News and civil litigation for Law360. In July 2022, she joined The Texas Lawbook.
Her reporting has included covering arrests, trials, plea deals and settlements, executions, natural and manmade disasters, colorful characters and various oddities.
She lives in Houston with her husband Matt, a sweet dog Hurricane Harvey brought into their lives, and a confident cat who keeps everyone in line. She holds a bachelor's degree in journalism from Texas Tech University and was a 2018 fellow of the Loyola Marymount University Journalist Law School.
You can reach Michelle at michelle.casady@texaslawbook.net or (713) 614-7929.
Brad Howell comes to Dykema after nearly six years at MehaffyWeber. He’s handled cases involving products liability, statutory indemnity, toxic torts, catastrophic injuries, wrongful death, fire investigations and commercial litigation. He counts among his clients one of the world’s largest heavy equipment manufacturers and has represented clients in courts across 11 states.
This week a three-justice panel of the Fifth Court of Appeals in Dallas ordered Dallas County District Judge Staci Williams to hold a hearing on a motion to dismiss pending before her that was brought under the Texas Citizens Participation Act. The state’s anti-SLAPP law requires that a hearing on a motion to dismiss take place within 60 days, but Judge Williams’ staff told the relators in this case — who tried six times to get a hearing set — that, while it does its best to accommodate requests for hearings, its docket is “jammed packed” and “there is no way to SQUEEZE your motion into the requested docket.”
In this edition of Litigation Roundup, Yelp prevails against the Texas attorney general’s office in a suit that accused the website of violating the Texas Deceptive Trade Practices Act, a Dallas-area law firm represents an insurance company accusing nearly 50 defendants of RICO violations related to New York workers’ compensation benefits, and a split Texas Supreme Court issues a ruling clarifying the tolling period in a healthcare liability claim.
Gerger Hennessy & Martin is now Gerger Hennessy Martin & Peterson, after Heather Peterson joined the firm March 1. Peterson recently spoke to The Lawbook about her career in criminal justice and why joining Gerger’s firm made sense for her and her clients.
In this edition of Litigation Roundup, Samsung is fighting a $287 million state court verdict against it in federal court, a Collin County jury awards a man who alleged a botched spinal surgery left him paraplegic $6.2 million and an intermediate appellate court hands ExxonMobil a win in a lawsuit brought by workers injured in a plant explosion.
U.S. District Judge Alan D. Albright presided over the trial that began with jury selection Feb. 15. Testimony began Feb. 20 and the jury returned its verdict Monday, determining Google had infringed five patents held by communications company Flyp with its Google Voice internet phone service.
A three-justice panel of the Fourteenth Court of Appeals issued an opinion reviving the lawsuit brought by the family of Carolyn Burford against her husband’s former employer, Alcoa Inc., over her allegedly fatal exposure to asbestos. At a hearing before dismissing the case, Judge Mark Davidson, who presides over the asbestos multidistrict litigation court in Harris County, had said he was “reluctantly” granting Alcoa’s no-evidence motion for summary judgment and hoped his ruling would be reversed on appeal.
In this edition of Litigation Roundup, a few recent rulings from the Texas Supreme Court are highlighted, a San Antonio attorney charged with defrauding clients out of as much as $65 million over 20 years goes to prison, and cryptocurrency miners sue the Department of Energy over an effort to get data on energy use.
The Texas Supreme Court on Tuesday entered a stay for the second time in a case that involves the intersection of rules governing civil discovery and federal laws regarding the dissemination of child pornography. In January, the court lifted its first stay in the case and in a 5-4 decision denied Magdoline Elhindi’s petition for writ of mandamus. Tuesday’s stay came amid consideration of Elhindi’s motion for rehearing, which remains pending.
The jury that was selected last Monday and began deliberating that Friday took about two and a half hours to side with construction staffing company Harris Ventures, which does business as Staff Zone, in its dispute with landlord JM-RB Properties. The panel’s 10-2 decision awarded Staff Zone about $1.3 million in lost profits incurred when it was “constructively evicted” from the building it leased in Plano, plus $450,000 in attorney fees and about $150,000 to cover expert witness costs.
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