Free Speech, Due Process and Trial by Jury
In this edition of Litigation Roundup, Baker Botts is hired by Tesla to defend against patent infringement claims in the Eastern District of Texas, jury selection is underway in an airline crash fatality suit that a Dallas law firm is taking to trial in Washington State, and a recent appellate ruling from Eastland could have a broad impact in personal injury cases.
In this edition of Litigation Roundup, Phillips 66 must pay $195 million in exemplary damages — on top of nearly $605 million in compensatory damages — in a trade secrets case in California, a federal judge in East Texas sides with female athletes at Stephen F. Austin State University who brought a Title IX lawsuit after the university announced it would end several women’s sports programs, and Amazon is the latest target of a company accusing retail behemoths of infringing barcode technology.
Information technology company Sungard AS New Holdings has asked the court to approve a $385,000 settlement it reached with Jackson Walker that would end its bankruptcy fee dispute with the Dallas-based law firm. This marks back-to-back weeks companies involved in the bankruptcy fee dispute have asked the court to approve settlements with the firm.
In this edition of Litigation Roundup, Skechers draws a patent infringement lawsuit in the Eastern District of Texas over its line of slip-on shoes, Dallas-based Southwest Airlines is accused of race discrimination by a doctor who was removed from a flight, and the Fifth Court of Appeals clarifies the rules on supersedeas bonds in an appeal from a $30.7 million jury award.
Seadrill Partners and Seadrill Limited — the offshore drilling rig operators whose bankruptcy proceedings are among the 33 cases where the U.S. Trustee’s Office is trying to claw back millions in fees awarded to Jackson Walker — asked the court on Friday to approve its $485,000 settlement with the Dallas-based law firm.
After nearly 12 years of litigating, it took exactly one day of trial testimony for Jim Crane and Drayton McLane to settle their $440 million fight over the sale of the Houston Astros and a stake in a regional sports network. The Texas Lawbook’s Michelle Casady has the details from the courtroom and more.
Two heavyweights of the Houston business community, Jim Crane and Drayton McLane, were at their respective tables in the well of the courtroom as a panel of nine women and six men —12 jurors and three alternates — filed into the jury box in the Ceremonial Courtroom on the 17th floor of the Harris County Civil District Courthouse Thursday morning for the first day of testimony in a case where $440 million is at stake.
A Harris County jury on Thursday will begin the job of determining whether Jim Crane was duped into paying too much to buy the Houston Astros from the prior owner in 2011. Jury selection began this week, and opening statements are expected to come Thursday morning in the trial, which is scheduled to last three weeks.
Lawyers for IBM were seeking an award of about $59.2 million in fees and costs for work done on the case. U.S. District Judge Andrew Hanen did knock down the hourly rate of some Quinn Emanuel lawyers from $1,925 an hour to a maximum of $935 an hour, and also pinged the legal team for a few expensive dinners in New Orleans and stays at the Four Seasons and the Ritz Carlton. “While, of course, the attorneys do not need to stay at a motel along the interstate, BMC should not be required to pay for these establishments for a large number of attorneys who were peripherally involved,” Judge Hanen wrote.
In this edition of Litigation Roundup, a professional gambler is accused of running a $9 million Ponzi scheme, a few cities challenging the Texas Regulatory Consistency Act are dealt a loss on appeal, and the Kentucky attorney general taps a Dallas law firm to help bring a consumer protection lawsuit against shopping website Temu.
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