Free Speech, Due Process and Trial by Jury
Can a ballpoint pen change the fate in your case? Two Dallas Greenberg Traurig lawyers proved to a local jury last week that it can indeed – especially if the pen is really a hidden camera.
Lawsuits over contract disputes and regulatory battles with the government are larger litigation threats to Texas-based businesses – especially oil and gas companies – than are class action litigation from consumers and employees, according to a new study by the law firm Norton Rose Fulbright.
A district judge heard closing arguments Thursday in Dallas from lawyers for the State of Texas and advocacy group Children’s Rights on how she should provide federal oversight to reform Texas’s long-term foster care system. Thursday morning’s closings were the denouement of a two-week bench trial that occurred in December after lawyers from Children’s Rights in New York, Yetter Coleman in Houston and Haynes and Boone in Dallas partnered up to bring a class-action lawsuit against the State of Texas to advocate for the more than 12,000 foster children in the state’s long-term foster care system.
Diane Lettelier, senior managing counsel for the Plano-based retailer, told Senators Thursday that the company is so frequently targeted by unfounded patent lawsuits and threatening demand letters concerning its use of technology that it now shies away from using technology marketed by small tech firms. Adopting new technology makes the company a target for so-called patent trolls, she said.
A Houston jury ruled Thursday that Energy Transfer Partners breached its contract with competitor Enterprise Products Partners by failing to properly maintain a natural gas pipeline being used by the two energy midstream giants. The Harris County District Court jury awarded Enterprise $3.7 million.
A Texas district judge ordered a waste management service provider to pay $1.5 million, including more than $500,000 in attorney fees and a $20,000 sanction, to electric delivery giant Oncor after a lengthy breach of contract battle between Oncor and metal recycler, GLM DFW Inc.
The IRS levied a record-setting $3.2 billion tax bill Wednesday against Dallas entrepreneur and philanthropist Sam Wyly and the estate of his brother, Charles Wyly. The IRS claims Sam Wyly owes $2 billion in back taxes, penalties and interest from income generated from trusts that the brothers established in the Isle of Man more than two decades ago. "The IRS figures are baloney,” Sam Wyly told The Texas Lawbook. “We believe the IRS figures are so absurd as to undermine the credibility of the IRS."
A Dallas judge on Wednesday ordered two local companies and its owner to pay Austin-based Growtheorem $6.4 million for wrongfully cutting the consulting company out of a deal that caused it to lose out on commissions it claimed the defendants had promised it.
The number of new patent case filings is on pace to rise in the first quarter of 2015 in the Eastern District of Texas. But an increasingly popular avenue for dealing with patent disputes is siphoning legal work away from the busiest forum in the country for settling squabbles over the ownership of inventions. Welcome to the Patent Trial and Appeal Board.
An eight-person jury heard a preview of the measures that a group of football fans took to get to the 2011 Super Bowl in Dallas, such as two diehard Green Bay Packers fans from Madison, Wisconsin, only to have their Super Bowl experience ruined by the infamous seat fiasco at the Cowboys Stadium. “[Their trek] will remind you of Planes, Trains and Automobiles,” said Michael Avenatti, the lead attorney for seven disgruntled ticketholders who are finally getting their day in court against the National Football League in a federal trial that began Monday in Dallas. “It was needless to say, an odyssey.” Check here for updates throughout the trial from The Texas Lawbook.
In a highly watched oil and gas case, the state's highest court issued a mixed decision in a case in which royalty owners allege self-dealing by executive mineral right-holders who negotiate drilling agreements. Experts say the ruling will likely lead to greater scrutiny by trial courts. The plaintiff's lawyer says his client is disappointed that oil and gas operators will not be held responsible in these kind of mineral rights disputes.
A federal jury in Plano found that a California company owes $48.7 million in actual damages and $10 million in punitive damages to Texas Advanced Optoelectronic Solutions [TAOS] for breach of contract, patent infringement and misappropriation of trade secrets.
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