Free Speech, Due Process and Trial by Jury
A residential sales leaseback firm with a significant presence in Texas is seeking a temporary injunction against Feldman & Feldman that would force the Houston plaintiff’s law firm to remove allegedly defamatory statements from its website. The litigation also includes allegations of barratry, is connected to nine federal lawsuits across Texas and pits Dallas lawyers against Houston lawyers.
U.S. District Judge Andrew Hanen in Houston rejects claim by defendants that "through no fault of their own" they can’t access needed records and witnesses because of political upheaval in the South American nation.
A federal judge has ordered Houston ISD to pay nearly $300,000 in legal fees for violating the First Amendment rights of a community activist who was banned from district premises.
The first round of lawsuits – 31 of them as of 10:30 a.m. Tuesday – hit the Harris County District Court dockets through late Monday evening charging a plethora of individuals, businesses and a non-profit organization with gross negligence and premises liability related to the tragedy that occurred Friday at the Astroworld Festival that killed eight people and injured hundreds of others. The Texas Lawbook has the details, including the lineup of plaintiffs and defense lawyers already involved.
Within hours of eight people dying and scores of others being injured at the Astroworld Festival Friday night, the website of Houston lawyer Chad Pinkerton was blowing up. He was getting calls and emails from victims and their families. Pinkerton is one of a dozen prominent lawyers – including Richard Mithoff, C.J. Baker and Rusty Hardin, to name a few – likely to file lawsuits this week seeking hundreds of millions of dollars in damages against Live Nation, rapper Travis Scott and a plethora of other potential defendants connected to the tragedy that took place outside of NRG Stadium.
But unlike many other lawyers, Pinkerton has been in court before against Live Nation and he knows the concert producer’s modus operandi.
The legal liabilities will reach into the hundreds of millions of dollars for the producers, promoters, performers and subcontractors – including security firms – of Houston’s Astroworld Festival Friday night that resulted in the deaths of eight people and dozens of others who were injured, legal experts predicted Saturday. Rapper Travis Scott, who was performing at the time of the crowd surge, may also face significant liability.
A hearing Friday on plaintiff lawyer Randy Sorrels’s motion for entry of judgment dealt only with relatively minor calculations of a just sum – an indication that both sides expect District Judge Ravi Sandill to uphold in whole or large part last week’s jury verdict on behalf of Ulysses Cruz, who sued Allied Aviation Fueling Co. of Houston.
Six women and two men are currently hearing opening statements in a trial that began today in Las Vegas between Blackstone-owned ER physician staffing company TeamHealth and UnitedHealthcare over reimbursement rates of ER physicians. It’s the first trial in a series of TeamHealth cases to involve a major insurer that provides health plans through employers. Litigation writer Natalie Posgate is tuning into opening statements and will report back later.
If anything, the noted Houston plaintiffs’ lawyer claims, jurors should have given Ulysses Cruz, a paralyzed airport service worker, more for the lifetime of pain and anguish he faces after being hit by a van on a tarmac at George Bush Intercontinental Airport. And Sorrels believes the verdict exceeding one-third of a billion dollars will survive appeal.
A Fort Worth state judge this week denied a temporary injunction sought by American Airlines that would have enjoined ticket distribution vendor Sabre Holdings Corp. from utilizing its New Airline Storefront display product and paying travel agents incentives to book higher-priced Delta Airlines tickets over American tickets.
© Copyright 2026 The Texas Lawbook
The content on this website is protected under federal Copyright laws. Any use without the consent of The Texas Lawbook is prohibited.
