Labor, employment and ADA attorney John Bosco has joined Bailey Brauer PLLC.

The firm said Bosco represents international, national, and regional clients in labor, employment, and accessibility matters across the United States and in select foreign jurisdictions. He handles all areas of employment law, including trade secrets, discrimination, retaliation, wage and hour claims, and regulatory agency investigations.

“I have known Clayton and Alex for a long time and have a tremendous amount of respect for their work,” said Bosco. “Several of my clients said they held Bailey Brauer in high esteem as a great litigation firm. They have been very encouraging about this move.”

The co-author of the Thomson West compliance and litigation manual Public Accommodations Under the Americans With Disabilities Act, Bosco’s practice includes a focus on federal and state ADA issues involving physical and technological accessibility. He also represents clients in labor union-related matters including collective bargaining and litigation before the National Labor Relations Board.

“We are excited to add such a respected employment-focused attorney to the firm,” said co-founder Alex Brauer. He notes that the recent move into new office space in Dallas’ Campbell Centre I provides the firm the physical space needed for staff expansion. “This is just the first page in an exciting next chapter in the growth of our firm.”

Bosco joins Bailey Brauer from the Dallas office of Miami-based Leon Cosgrove. He is also a former vice president and assistant general counsel for JPMorgan Chase Bank. He earned his law degree in 2004 from Wake Forest University School of Law and graduated from the University of Florida in 2001.

Bradley Arant Boult Cummings LLP announced that Samuel D. Lipshie, a partner in the firm’s Nashville office, has again been named by Who’s Who Legal as among the world’s leading sports and entertainment law practitioners. He is listed in the Who’s Who Legal: Sports & Entertainment 2019 directory.

As the leader of Bradley’s Media and Entertainment Practice Group and also a member of the firm’s Litigation and Intellectual Property practice groups, Lipshie practices in the areas of entertainment, music, intellectual property and commercial litigation and dispute resolution. He has extensive experience in connection with the acquisition and disposition of media, broadcast and other intellectual property. In a release, the firm said he has handled high-profile copyright, royalty (publishers, producers and talent), sports, entertainment, media and intellectual property litigation, as well as a multitude of cases involving trade secrets, trademarks, covenants not to compete, interference with contractual relations, and other business and commercial issues.

Scheduled to be published in October 2019 by London-based Law Business Research Limited, the Who’s Who Legal: Sports & Entertainment 2019 seeks to identify the leading sports and entertainment lawyers in the international marketplace. The attorneys listed were highly recommended by peers and clients for their counsel to individuals, corporations, and industry associations. Only lawyers who receive the highest number of recommendations as determined through independent research for Who’s Who are listed in the publication. The Who’s Who Legal guides are intended to serve as reference sources for companies seeking to corroborate the reputations of lawyers recommended by another party.

Two verdicts won by Provost Umphrey Law Firm earned recognition among the Top Texas Verdicts & Settlements for 2018 based on a comprehensive review by VerdictSearch.

A $6.34 million Harris County negligence verdict against a suburban Houston apartment complex in connection with the 2014 murder of a 15-year-old girl was the largest premises liability verdict in Texas last year. Testimony showed Corriann Cervantes was tortured and murdered, her body left in an abandoned apartment in a Clear Lake area complex. Two young men were convicted of capital murder for their roles in the attack. Provost Umphrey attorneys Joe Fisher, Guy Fisher and Taylor Thompson as well as Andrew Bender of The Bender Law Firm prevailed in the civil suit filed by the girl’s family against the apartment complex owners.

Also last year, jurors in Denton County returned a $4.8 million verdict against ladder manufacturer Werner Co., after finding the company liable for the faulty design and marketing of an aluminum ladder that collapsed and permanently injured John DeVallee’s hand. The verdict is the fourth-largest product liability award and ranked 33 overall on the Top Verdicts list. Provost Umphrey’s Joe Fisher and Edward Fisher were on the trial team with attorney Brian Zimmerman of Zimmerman, Axelrad, Meyer, Stern & Wise, P.C. and David L. Cook of Harris Cook LLP.

The Texas Top Verdicts annual list is developed from research compiled by VerdictSearch, a recognized leader in U.S. verdict information. The full list will be published in the July 2019 edition of Texas Lawyer.

Miller & Chevalier Chartered announced that the firm’s members elected Kathryn Cameron Atkinson, member and immediate past chair of the International Department, as chair of the firm effective July 1, 2019. Atkinson succeeds Marc J. Gerson, who will continue to lead the firm’s federal tax policy practice.

The firm said Atkinson, who has spent her entire 27-year legal career at Miller & Chevalier, focuses her practice on international corporate compliance and investigations with an emphasis on the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA), economic sanctions and export controls, and anti-money laundering laws. She has twice been selected as an Independent Compliance Monitor by the Department of Justice and the Securities and Exchange Commission. Atkinson is recognized for her work by various lawyer ranking publications, including Chambers USA and Chambers Global for her FCPA work, Global Investigations Review, which named her one of the top Women in Investigations (2015), and Latinvex, where she is ranked as one of Latin America’s Top 100 Female Lawyers for FCPA and Fraud (2017 – 2019).

She has served on the firm’s Executive Committee as chair of the International Department since 2012 after several years as vice chair of that department. She has also held positions on the firm’s Compensation, Hiring, Lawyer Development, and Pro Bono Committees.

In addition to Atkinson, the firm’s Executive Committee includes vice chair Adam P. Feinberg, Tax Department chair Kevin L. Kenworthy, Litigation Department chair Andrew T. Wise, International Department chair James G. Tillen, and at-large members Maria O’Toole Jones and Preston L. Pugh.

Peter J. Willsey and Vincent J. Badolato have joined Brown Rudnick LLP. Willsey joins as chair of the global Trademark, Copyright & Advertising Practice Group and as a partner in the Intellectual Property Practice Group. Badolato joins as counsel in the Trademark, Copyright & Advertising Practice Group. Both Willsey and Badolato, formerly with Cooley LLP, will be based in the firm’s Washington, D.C. office.

Inn a release, the firm said Willsey focuses his practice on litigation, counseling, and prosecution in the fields of trademark and copyright law. He advises companies ranging from startups to global corporations on the entire life cycle of a trademark, beginning with the inception of a product or brand name and advising on branding strategies, to registering the trademark and enforcing intellectual property rights. His clients span all industries, including technology, pharmaceutical, biotechnology and consumer products.

Willsey has handled matters in federal courts throughout the country and before the US Patent and Trademark Office Trademark Trial and Appeal Board. He also counsels on domestic and foreign trademark prosecution efforts.

The firm said Badolato focuses his practice on the selection, clearance, adoption and use of trademarks, domestic and international trademark prosecution and enforcement, trademark portfolio management and the development of comprehensive branding strategies. Extensively experienced in counseling, prosecution, licensing and litigation in the field of trademark and copyright law, Badolato has also handled trademark and advertising litigation matters in federal court.

Willsey earned his J.D. from University of Richmond School of Law and his B.A. from University of Virginia. He is an adjunct professor teaching trademark law and unfair competition at Georgetown University Law School, and previously taught a trademark course at the University of Virginia Law School.

A federal court in Seattle has appointed Christopher J. Cormier and a legal team at Burns Charest LLP as co-lead counsel in a proposed federal class action against a group of manufacturers of cedar shakes and shingles, and the industry’s trade association.

The lawsuit, filed in the U.S. District Court for Western District of Washington, alleges that the companies conspired to artificially inflate the price of Certi-Label cedar shakes and shingles sold to indirect reseller plaintiffs, such as contractors, construction companies and roofers, in the U.S. The litigation includes detailed evidence of improper pricing discussions among the defendants as well as detailed economic analysis showing that the price of the materials has increased substantially since early 2011.

“The public must be protected when companies conspire to fix prices because this conduct harms not only cedar shake and shingle purchasers in particular but also fundamental principles of fair competition in general,” said Mr. Cormier. “We allege that the proposed class we represent has been forced to pay inflated prices for already expensive building materials for a number of years, and we are eager to roll up our sleeves and get to work in seeking recovery for them in this case.”

The class action claim, originally filed in April 2019, alleges that the price increases cannot be explained by ordinary market forces and instead are a result of the defendants’ anticompetitive pricing conspiracy. The lawsuit also claims that the companies conspired with the Washington-based Cedar Shake & Shingle Bureau, the industry’s trade association, to muscle out upstart and discount competitors from the market, thus preserving the defendants’ ability to charge artificially high prices for their products.

U.S. District Judge Marsha Pechman has also appointed the firm of Portland-based Stoll Berne to serve as co-lead counsel for the plaintiffs with the Burns Charest team.

The case is Fraser Construction Company et al v. Cedar Shake & Shingle Bureau et al. Case No. 2:19-cv-00451-MJP in the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Washington.

The firm has offices in Dallas, Denver, and New Orleans.

Krista Schwartz and Patrick Michael have joined Hogan Lovells‘ San Francisco office as partners in the firm’s Intellectual Property, Media, and Technology (IPMT) practice. They both joined the firm from Jones Day.

In a release, the firm said Krista Schwartz is a first-chair trial partner focused on IP litigation. She handles patent, copyright, trade secret, and complex technology cases for the world’s largest technology companies. Her cases involve technologies ranging from search engines, semiconductors, cellular devices, and medical devices to EDA and operating systems software. Prior to law school, she worked for AT&T Bell Labs, where she was an inventor on more than 20 patents relating to desktop video conferencing. Schwartz graduated with J.D. from Chicago-Kent College of Law with high honors; Order of the Coif. She received her M.S. from Northwestern University and her B.S. from the University of Illinois.

Patrick Michael is an IP/technology litigator who has tried multiple cases to verdict. His practice focuses on patent, copyright, and trade secret litigation, along with technology-related disputes. His clients include integrated circuit makers, electronic design automation, software companies, semiconductor fabrication process and tool designers, computer networking, and medical devices. Michael graduated from Pepperdine University with his J.D., cum laude, and received his B.A. from the University of California, Santa Barbara.

They are joining the firm after the addition of Christopher Cox in April. A five-partner strong M&A and technology transactions team including Richard Climan, Keith Flaum, Jane Ross, John Brockland, and Chris Moore, as well as the addition of Executive Compensation and Employee Benefits partner Mike Frank, who joined the firm in 2017.

John (“Jack”) H. Chassaing has joined Greensfelder, Hemker & Gale, P.C.’s Belleville office as an associate in the Litigation practice group.

The firm said Chassaing’s corporate litigation experience includes toxic tort, asbestos and insurance-related disputes. He has managed hundreds of matters for toxic tort and general litigation clients and has conducted and defended depositions, negotiated in mediations, and drafted responsive pleadings and dispositive motions in asbestos-related litigation.

Prior to joining Greensfelder, Chassaing was an associate at Segal McCambridge Singer & Mahoney. He also formerly practiced at Reed, Armstrong, Mudge & Morrissey P.C.

During law school, Chassaing interned for the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Cape Girardeau, Mo.; the St. Louis County Prosecuting Attorney’s Office; and the Union County State’s Attorney’s Office in Jonesboro, Ill.

Chassaing received his J.D. from Southern Illinois University School of Law and his Bachelor of Science in business administration from the University of Missouri.

Eliot B. Peace, an attorney in Bradley Arant Boult Cummings LLP’s Tampa office, has been appointed by Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis to the Judicial Nominating Commission for the Second District Court of Appeal.

Florida’s Judicial Nominating Commissions (JNCs) select nominees to fill judicial vacancies within the state court system. The state’s 27 separate JNCs include one for the Florida Supreme Court, five for each of the district courts of appeal, 20 for each circuit court and the county courts contained in that circuit, and one Statewide Commission for Judges of Compensation Claims. JNC members serve four-year terms, except when an appointment is made to fill a vacant, unexpired term.

The firm said that Peace, as a member of Bradley’s Litigation Practice Group, represents business and commercial clients in complex litigation across a variety of industries and in state and federal courts across the country

Peace previously served as a federal prosecutor and in-house counsel in the U.S. Air Force JAG Corps.

The Houston Chronicle reports that a Houston oil executive was sentenced to state prison for defrauding investors who thought they were paying for the drilling and testing of wells — but instead paid the executive’s mortgage.

Daniel Walsh, a Galveston oilman, was sentenced to 18 years in state prison on Friday in Wichita County, according to the Chronicle‘s Erin Douglas.

The former CEO of Houston-based Western Capital Inc. had pleaded  guilty to money laundering Wednesday after raising money for the drilling and testing of oil wells in Galveston between 2007 and 2009, but spent the money on his personal expenses instead.

Read the article.

The 2018 death by suicide of Sidley Austin partner Gabe MacConaill has drawn attention again after Financial Times featured his death in an article about mental health issues in the workplace. In that same article, his widow, Joanna Litt, voices her anger at the firm for the events that led up to her husband’s death and for the firm’s lack of a robust response since MacConaill died.

Above the Law tells the story of how MacConaill’s death has become part of a larger conversation.

“The two managing partners of the bankruptcy division did not call me, email me, send me a letter,” she says. “I still haven’t heard from either partner. I also didn’t hear from the slightly senior partner who Gabe was working [on the bankruptcy case] with. None of them.”

Read the article.

The overwhelming majority of contracts and purchase orders are fulfilled without a major issue, but contractual limitation on liability can have significant impact for a business, warns Glen W. Price of Best Best & Krieger.

He discusses the two types of limitation of liability.

“The first limitation is on the type of damages you can claim if there is a breach of contract. The most common damages to be waived or limited in contracts are indirect or consequential damages and lost profits,” Price writes.

The second type of limitation on liability he discusses is a dollar limitation or cap.

Read the article.

Jeffrey Neuburger of Proskauer writes that two recent web scraping disputes highlight some important issues regarding whether a website owner may successfully allege a breach of contract action against a commercial party that has scraped website content contrary to “clickwrap” and “browsewrap” website terms of use.

Writing in the New Media and Technology Law Blog, West describes a Texas case in which a court declined to dismiss Southwest Airlines Co.’s breach of contract claim against an entity that scraped airfare data from Southwest’s site in violation of the website terms of use.

He also discusses a similar case in the Southern District of New York, in which the court granted the plaintiff’s request for a default judgment on some scraping-related claims.

Read the article.

Delta Air Lines scored a victory when a California federal court granted the company’s motion to dismiss a putative class action based on a data breach, primarily by arguing that its publicly posted privacy policy is not a contract and Delta did not have any enforceable obligation to keep the plaintiff’s data secure, reports Manatt, Phelps & Phillips.

A Delta passenger sought to represent a nationwide class of consumers alleging breach of contract after the airline suffered a data breach, explains Jesse M. Brody.

The court found that the plaintiff could not assert a breach of contract based on Delta’s privacy policy, because it expressly disclaimed that it constitutes a contract, stating, “This Privacy Policy is not a contract and does not create any legal rights or obligations.”

Read the article.

The Supreme Court of Texas delivered a reminder that when drafting contracts, you should say what you mean and mean what you say, and reliance on oral representations directly contrary to the terms of a written agreement between sophisticated parties is not justifiable, reports Carrington Coleman Sloman & Blumenthal’s Sua Sponte blog.

Derrick Ward explains that the case considered a farmout contract between Barrow-Shaver Resources Company and Carrizo Oil & Gas for Barrow-Shaver to build a well on a lease held by Carrizo in exchange for an interest in the mineral rights. When Barrow-Shaver raised  concerns about the consent-to-assign provision and sought to add language that would prohibit Carrizo from withholding consent unreasonably, Carrizo’s representative allegedly offered assurances that Carrizo would work cooperatively if the assignment became an issue.

When it became an issue, litigation resulted. The court ultimately concluded the consent-to-assign provision “unambiguously allowed Carrizo to refuse its consent for any reason,” Carrizo’s refusal to consent to the assignment could not constitute a breach of contract as a matter of law.

Read the article.

A new guide published by Zapproved details a series of real-world best practices for getting ediscovery costs under control. The new guide can be downloaded from the Zapproved website.

The company says the cost of ediscovery is skyrocketing as data volumes and complexity expand. At the same time, your team is being asked to do more with less.

“Driving Down the Cost of Ediscovery” will show readers how to create a comprehensive litigation response plan, preserve and collect the right data from the right places, conduct early case assessment (ECA), reduce the volume of documents for review, and improve the efficiency of the process from end to end.

Download the guide.

PactSafe’s legal experts — after studying more than 1,000 cases from 2002 to 2018  — have identified trends and best practices for defending clickthrough terms of service in court.

The results of that research are available from PactSafe in a free download from the company’s website.

As the rate of litigation around terms of service increases (notably 626% from 2002 to 2018) businesses are increasingly aware of what they need to cover, PactSafe says on its website. While the content of online legal terms may be bulletproof, the way that companies currently track acceptance may leave them at risk.

The report covers:

• Aggregate data complied from the last 15 years of clickthrough cases
• The three different ways of forming online contracts and the success rate of each type.
• The factors that influence the court’s decision as to the validity of an online agreement.
• The types of evidence you should be prepared to bring to court

Download the report.

The NACD Risk Oversight Advisory Council has published a complimentary briefing of “Current and Emerging Practices in Cyber-Risk Oversight.”

The briefing can be downloaded from the National Association of Corporate Directors website.

“Cyber events have become so prevalent in today’s business world that it’s not a matter of if a company is affected, it’s a matter of when,” the association warns. “In a recent NACD survey, directors selected cybersecurity threats as one of the trends most likely to have the greatest effect on their companies in the next 12 months.”

This resource will help directors stay on their toes in the global cybersecurity struggle—ensuring that they are prepared to respond to cyber events, fulfill corporate risk oversight expectations, and reduce overall risk exposure.

Download the briefing.

Law firm Sidley Austin was one of the professional services firms that reached a proposed $234 million settlement July 10 in a class-action case alleging links to Aequitas Securities LLC’s “Ponzi-like” scheme, reports Bloomberg Law.

A plaintiff’s firm said the settlement is the largest ever for a securities lawsuit in Oregon.

The case was brought by investors in Aequitas Securities, which unraveled in early 2016 when the Securities and Exchange Commission said the once high-flying investment management firm was operating “in a Ponzi-like fashion.” Rather than investing clients’ funds in new assets, new clients were found to pay out older ones, the SEC’s complaint said.

Plaintiffs said Sidley provided legal advice for Aequitas’ securities offerings since as early as 2014.

Read the Bloomberg Law article.

A Texas judge faces decades in prison after a federal jury convicted him Thursday of taking bribes from an attorney, including a $15,000 pickup truck and an envelope stuffed with $5,500, according to a Courthouse News Service report.

Rodolfo “Rudy” Delgado, 65, of Edinburg, resigned from the 93rd District Court in Hidalgo County after a federal grand jury returned a six-count indictment in February 2018, according to Courthouse News reporter Cameron Langford.

The Brownsville Herald reported that Edinburg attorney Noe Perez testified during Delgado’s five-day trial that after a client paid for his services with a $15,000 pickup truck in 2008, Delgado learned of the deal and asked him about the truck’s condition, then took the truck and never paid for it.

Read the Courthouse News article.