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.
In this edition of Litigation Roundup, a jury in Dallas awards a woman $450,000 in a revenge porn lawsuit, Dallas lawyers secure a $30 million win in an Illinois mesothelioma case and a federal judge in Houston brings a rare, early end to a patent case following a Markman hearing.
In this edition of Litigation Roundup, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission accused a Fort Worth company of operating a $191 million Ponzi scheme involving the purchase and sale of cattle, and a trial team from Susman Godfrey secured an $86 million defense win. Also highlighted is a Fifth Circuit panel’s holding that the Federal Trade Commission used an incorrect standard in determining a $7.1 billion acquisition of a cancer test maker would harm competition, but the court also agreed with the agency’s conclusion, which was enough to prompt Illumina to announce it would divest Grail anyway.
Two former clerks for Justice Sandra Day O’Connor — Justin Nelson of Susman Godfrey and Allyson Ho of Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher — spoke to The Lawbook about lasting memories and lessons learned from their time working alongside her at the U.S. Supreme Court. Justice O’Connor, who inspired many women to pursue careers in the law after becoming the first woman appointed to the high court, died Dec. 1 of complications related to dementia and a respiratory illness. Today, her funeral will take place.
The team, led by Jim Thompson, Nicholas Shum and Stephanie Noble had been defending Aera Energy against the claims lodged by business partners Vaquero Partners and Madison Energy for two years before the two-month trial began in October. The jurors deliberated for about a day and a half before determining Vaquero and Madison were entitled to no damages related to Aera’s operation of the Bakersfield-area oil and gas lease.
In this edition of Litigation Roundup, Dallas residents were granted a temporary injunction that will prohibit the city from enforcing new ordinances that would severely restrict the availability of short-term rental homes, Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton accuses the U.S. State Department of conspiring to censor conservative-leaning media outlets, and the Texas Supreme Court agrees to hear a case involving the scope of the Public Utility Commission of Texas’ authority.
In this edition of Litigation Roundup, Texas follows up on a Medicaid fraud lawsuit accusing Pfizer of manipulating data about the efficacy of a pediatric attention-deficit drug with a lawsuit accusing the pharmaceutical company of lying about the effectiveness of its Covid-19 vaccine, Antero Resources continues its fight to recover an $11.9 million judgment from a former manager and an intermediate appellate court finds a fatal products liability suit should be litigated in Dallas.
The federal appellate court had asked the Texas Supreme Court to answer two questions clarifying how Texas Civil Practice & Remedies Code § 16.064 applies to the claims of former United Airlines flight attendants, Marvin Sanders and Matthew Sodrok, who say they were injured when a smoke detector activated — despite the absence of smoke or fire on board — at such a high volume that it burst their ear drums, caused their ears to bleed and left them with permanent hearing loss. The justices’ answers revived the lawsuit against The Boeing Company and two companies that provided parts and maintenance for the allegedly defective smoke detector.
The Texas Supreme Court heard oral arguments Tuesday morning in a lawsuit where mother of four Grissel Velasco is suing Dr. Michiel R. Noe for both his failure to perform a sterilization procedure she requested and his failure to inform her the procedure had not been done. Velasco is seeking pain and mental anguish damages for the so-called wrongful pregnancy that came about 15 months after she thought she had been sterilized.
In this edition of Litigation Roundup, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit sides 2-1 with a group of small refineries challenging an EPA decision to deny their requested exemptions from certain obligations under the Clean Air Act, the founder of SAExploration reaches a settlement with the SEC in a $100 million fraud case and private equity firm Welsh, Carson, Anderson & Stowe XI moves to toss an FTC monopoly suit lodged against it.
After hearing six days of testimony, a jury in the Northern District of Texas unanimously sided with Computer Sciences Corporation and found the company was entitled to $70 million in actual damages for Tata Consultancy Services’ misappropriation of its proprietary source code and $140 million in exemplary damages because the misappropriation was willful and malicious.
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