“H&M will pay $36 million to settle accusations that the fashion retailer illegally kept millions of dollars in gift cards that customers never used, New York Attorney General Letitia James said on Thursday. The Swedish company, whose full name is H&M Hennes & Mauritz AB, will pay $28.26 million to,” reports Nicholas Peck And Thomas Feeney in The Hill.

“There are ways, however, to get to the truth while respecting the court’s singular and delicate ecosystem. Supreme Court Marshal Col. Gail A. Curley has been charged with investigating the leak, and she has an admirable and impressive record of service to our country.”

Read the article.

“A newly proposed law in the South Carolina Statehouse would make it a criminal offense for your employer – or anyone – to ask about your vaccination status. Under the new proposed law, even just asking if someone is vaccinated could be considered a misdemeanor crime. It’s something those who are for it are calling a “don’t ask” bill” reports MATT KAUFAX in Fox Carolina.

“The government has no place in making you or telling you to take the vaccination, or threatening your livelihood if you don’t,” said Upstate representative William “Bill“ Chumley (R, District 35), one of the co-sponsors of the bill. House bill H.4848 now heads to committee after being filed just days ago. It states: “…any representative of a public, private, or nonprofit entity…who inquires about Covid-19 vaccination status…must be fined not more than $14,000 or imprisoned not more than one year.”

Read the article.

“An Ohio judge has been removed from two upcoming criminal trials after a lawyer for the defendants alleged that the judge was failing to implement COVID-19 precautions,” reports Debra Cassens Weiss in ABA Journal’s Daily News.

“Ohio Supreme Court Chief Justice Maureen O’Connor removed Judge Mark Fleegle of Muskingum County, Ohio, from the trials last week.”

“Columbus, Ohio, lawyer Harry Reinhart, 69, had alleged in a November affidavit that Fleegle conducts all hearings in person and does not require facial coverings. Reinhart said he is at higher risk if he contracts COVID-19, and his clients fear that he will be distracted at trial by his own health concerns, O’Connor said in her disqualification order.”

Read the article.

The annual Compliance & Ethics Institute (CEI) is our largest event of the year, focusing on providing insights and practical solutions to strengthen your organization’s compliance and ethics program.

This year’s virtual conference provides 100+ educational sessions across all compliance and ethics industries and will provide you with the opportunity to earn a maximum od 23.4 live Compliance Certification Board (CCB)® continuing education units (CEUs) from the convenience of your home or office.

Throughout the 3 days of sessions, you will have the ability to choose from a variety of sessions to attend, some of those included are discussion groups. These are sessions lead by the speaker as well as participants and you will have the opportunity to be on camera and interact in small group discussions. (note preregistration is required and session attendance is limited to 40 people per session.)

Get more information or register.

“Former Crestline police chief Joe Butler has been awarded a $380,000 settlement in a lawsuit he filed against the village,” reports Lou Whitmire in Mansfield News Journal.

“In the suit, Butler sought $1.6 million in compensatory and punitive damages, alleging the actions of the defendants were a direct effort to retaliate against him for his effort to expose then-mayor Allen Moore’s racially discriminatory remarks. The suit claimed they did so by attacking Butler’s public reputation, interfering with his public duties and ultimately depriving him of his position and his career in law enforcement.”

Read the article.

“A lawyer representing Jennifer Dulos’ family has filed a federal complaint seeking to require the state Judicial Branch to foreclose on Fotis Dulos’ former Farmington residence even though housing proceedings have been halted due to the coronavirus pandemic,” reports Lisa Backus in Stamford Advocate’s Local News.

“Attorney Richard Weinstein, representing Gloria Farber and the estate of her late husband, Hilliard, wants the proceedings to move forward on the 14,000-square-foot home that was already in foreclosure when Fotis Dulos died Jan. 30 from an apparent suicide.”

“In March, Gov. Ned Lamont issued an executive order, putting a moratorium on foreclosures and evictions as the pandemic spread throughout Connecticut. Weinstein filed the complaint against Judge Patrick Carroll, chief court administrator for the state Judicial Branch, out of ‘sheer frustration,’ the attorney said. ‘Judges are precluded from entering into foreclosures and evictions even in non-COVID-related cases,Weinstein said. ‘My client is paying all this money every month and nothing is happening. I did not want to sue the judge, but every day that goes by, it costs the estate money.'”

Read the article.

“When defending a Lanham Act claim brought by a competitor, the doctrine of unclean hands—the lawyerly version of ‘But they did it too!’—can be a case-dispositive argument. Last month, the Ninth Circuit made it a bit easier to establish this defense, holding that a defendant arguing unclean hands need not prove that the plaintiff’s unclean conduct caused ‘actual harm,'” write Michael Sochynsky and Jonah M. Knobler in Patterson Belknap’s blog.

“The unclean hands defense is based on the equitable maxim that ‘he who comes into equity must come with clean hands.’ … Its roots lie in the English Court of Chancery—a royal ‘court of conscience’ that was able to grant relief in situations where the hidebound courts of law could not. Chancery’s unique focus on conscience and morality meant that plaintiffs seeking its aid were held to a high standard of behavior.”

“Unclean hands remains a viable defense today in the context of equitable claims.”

Read the article.

“Legal marketing is a relatively new concept. It wasn’t until the late 1970s that the ethics rules began to change, thanks to the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision in Bates v. State Bar of Arizona, in which attorney advertising was deemed to be commercially protected speech.” discusses Nicole Black in ABA Journal’s Web First.

“Since then, ethics regulations have been modified to permit attorney advertising, and the vast majority of lawyers now advertise their services in one way or another.”

“With online advertising leading the way, there is an increased need to track and manage legal marketing efforts. That’s where legal client relationship management tools come in.”

“Typically, this software streamlines the lead intake process and then provides tools to manage communications and appointments with potential clients. Other features often included are the ability to run analytics and create reports that provide insight into lead sources and the lead management process.”

Nicole discusses some legal-specific CRM options.

Read the article.

The Consumer and Governmental Affairs Bureau of the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) has ruled faxes sent to “online fax services” are not faxes to “telephone fax machines,” a major victory declaring online fax services outside the scope of statutory provisions within the Telephone Consumer Protection Act of 1991 (TCPA) and the Junk Fax Protection Act of 2005.

In its petition for this declaratory ruling, Amerifactors Financial Group, LLC is represented by RumbergerKirk attorneys Douglas B. Brown and Samantha Duke, along with Steven A. Augustino of Kelley Drye.

A release from the firm outlined the case:

“With the evolution of modern business communications at the forefront of its decision, the FCC’s declaration provides much needed clarification for businesses and consumers who rely on the security of online fax services for sensitive communications that cannot be transmitted by email or other means. Furthermore, the ruling distinguishes online fax services as ‘a cloud-based service consisting of a fax server or similar device’ that allows users to access ‘faxes’ the same way as email and asserts Amerifactors’ arguments that online faxes do not result in the harm that Congress sought to avoid in the TCPA and, among other arguments, ‘would be a first step toward curbing abusive litigation practices.’

“The FCC concludes ‘in short, online fax services differ in critical ways from the traditional faxes sent to telephone facsimile machines Congress addressed in the TCPA’ and refutes commenters suggesting ‘other inconveniences necessitate that all computers and devices being sent faxes be deemed telephone facsimile machines.’ In doing so, the FCC further underscores the ‘more general harms that such commenters point to – such as time spent monitoring unwanted faxes stored by online fax services – are more general harms that go beyond the specific harms Congress identified in enacting the TCPA.’

“This decision of the Bureau has broad implications to all TCPA-fax class actions. First, according to the Hobbs Act, federal district courts are bound to follow the FCC’s rules, regulations, and orders relating to the TCPA. Thus, this declaratory ruling is now the law of the land when it comes to this issue in all district courts in the country.

“Second, this ruling now makes the method by which the fax was received key to determining whether any particular unsolicited facsimile violates the TCPA. This individualized determination will most certainly complicate any attempt to certify a TCPA-fax class action as the question of whether the facsimile was sent to an online fax service will predominate over any common issue.”

Exterro has published a comprehensive guide to the California Consumer Privacy Act and made it available for downloading from the company’s website.

“Recent reports suggest that somewhere between 45% and 86% of companies will are not ready for the California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA),” the company says. “Organizations preparing for the CCPA must ready themselves for Data Subject Access Requests from consumers, have an organized data management system that allows them to find and remediate that data within 45 days.”

The Exterro guide covers:

• Why the changing regulatory landscape means that getting your data house in order is of the utmost importance
• Tips from subject matter experts for complying with the law based on the regulations that were published
• Answers to major questions that GCs and corporate legal departments that could mean the difference between confident compliance and fines

Download the free guide.

Newsweek reports that the New York City Bar Association has asked congressional leaders to launch a formal inquiry into Attorney General William Barr’s conduct, claiming it threatened the public’s confidence in the “fair and impartial administration of justice.”

“Mr. Barr’s recent actions and statements position the Attorney General and, by extension, the United States Department of Justice (DOJ) as political partisans willing to use the levers of government to empower certain groups over others,” the letter to the congressional leaders stated.

The letter to the leaders highlighted four public statements the AG made that the association found troubling.

Read the  Newsweek article.

Fitch, Even, Tabin & Flannery LLP will present a free webinar, “American Axle: Does Patent Subject Matter Eligibility Depend on Enablement?,” featuring Fitch Even attorneys Stanley A. Schlitter and Andrew C. Wood.

The event will be on Thursday, January 30, 2020, at 9 am PST / 10 am MST / 11 am CST / 12 noon EST. It will also be available as an on-demand webinar after the presentation.

In American Axle & Mfg. Inc. v. Neapco Holdings LLC, the Federal Circuit affirmed a district court ruling that American Axle’s drive shaft patent is ineligible under 35 U.S.C. § 101 because the claims covered an application of a law of nature. American Axle’s petition for rehearing en banc has attracted several amicus briefs, some of which argue that this decision places in jeopardy the validity of many process patents for making physical structures and adds a § 112 enablement requirement to § 101 subject matter eligibility. In general, the decision has created further uncertainty about what a patentee needs to do to meet the requirements of § 101.

During this webinar, the presenters will discuss the following:
• The district court and Federal Circuit decisions in this case
• Arguments presented in the amici briefs
• How American Axle comports with the USPTO’s patent eligibility guidance
• Strategies for litigators and prosecutors regarding Alice in view of American Axle

Register for the webinar.

The U.S. Justice Department says the Equal Rights Amendment can no longer be ratified because its deadline expired decades ago, throwing a barrier in the path of activists who want the amendment enacted if ­Virginia’s new, majority Democratic legislature approves it, reports The Washington Post.

Thirty-eight states are required to pass a constitutional amendment, and only 35 had approved it before the 1979 deadline and a subsequent extension to 1982, explains the Post‘s Patricia Sullivan. Two more states ratified the ERA since 2017, and Virginia would be the 38th.

The ERA Coalition said it “strongly disagrees” with the DOJ’s memo.

Read the Washington Post article.

The Supreme Court will hear a slate of highly charged disputes when the justices return to the bench in the new year and resume one of the most politically volatile terms in recent memory, reports The Hill.

The court already has heard high-profile fights over LGBT rights in the workplace, the scope of the Second Amendment and the deportation status of nearly 700,000 young undocumented immigrants. But the remaining cases on the court’s docket are no less explosive, write The Hill‘s John Kruzel and Harper Neidig.

The top seven cases to be heard this session involve a separation of powers fight over President Trump’s financial records, Louisiana’s abortion law, religious school scholarships, religious exemptions from discrimination suits, the future of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, a fight over how copyright law treats software interfaces, and Bridgegate and public corruption.

Read the Hill article.

Faegre Baker Daniels is being sued for legal malpractice by a company that says the firm provided “erroneous” legal services relating to the launch and operation of a fund set up to acquire and manage crypto assets, according to a Bloomberg Law report.

Digital Capital Management’s complaint alleges that the law firm provided “inaccurate analysis and advice” to Digital Capital’s predecessor, Crypto Asset Management, LP, regarding how to register under the Investment Advisers Acts of 1940.

Crypto Asset Management alleges the firm advised the plaintiffs that “Crypto Assets are not securities” and to thus structure the fund’s business “accordingly.” The advice was “erroneous,” the complaint says, resulting in a censure and penalty from the SEC.

Read the Bloomberg Law article.

A financial tug-of-war is emerging over the $13.5 billion that the nation’s largest utility has agreed to pay to victims of recent California wildfires, as government agencies jockey for more than half the money to cover the costs of their response to the catastrophes, reports Insurance Journal.

Pacific Gas & Electric had acknowledged that  its power lines ignited some of the 2017-2018 fires that caused billions in damages. The company declared bankruptcy nearly a year ago as it faced about $36 billion in claims.

“Those claims were settled as part of the $13.5 billion deal that PG&E reached last month with lawyers representing uninsured and underinsured victims,” explains the Journal‘s Daisy Nguyen.

But the settlement leaves open just how much would be used to compensate victims, their lawyers and federal and state agencies for the money they spent on rescue and recovery operations.

Read the Insurance Journal report.

The ABA Journal reports that a Biglaw partner who relied on her assistant to create first-draft billing records based on her work product has been suspended for six months for overbilling.

The Massachusetts Board of Bar Overseers sought a two-year suspension for Boston lawyer Doreen Zankowski for her billing practices when she was at Saul Ewing Arnstein & Lehr. The firm had opened an investigation after Zankowski told her department chair that she worked 3,173 billable hours and more than 720 nonbillable hours in 2015, according to the opinion of the Supreme Judicial Court justice hearing the case.

Zankowski conceded to a hearing committee that “her billing practices were inadequate, careless, rushed and error-prone,” according to the justice’s finding.

Read the ABA Journal article.

The University of Phoenix — a for-profit college chain that has been under scrutiny for years — has reached a landmark settlement agreement with the Federal Trade Commission following accusations of unfair and deceptive practices that will result in widespread student loan forgiveness, Forbes reports.

“Too often, students would graduate from the University of Phoenix with dismal career prospects, minimal ongoing support, and a lot of student loan debt that could be impossible to repay,” writes Adams S. Minsky, a Forbes contributor. “The University allegedly specifically targeted people of color and military veterans.”

Under the settlement, the university will pay $191 million, of which $141 million will be used to forgive some student loans for certain borrowers who attended the university.

Read the Forbes article.

Schiff Hardin’s Environmental Group took a look prospects for renewable energy in 2020 and determined that development is expected to continue through 2020 and beyond.

Authors of the post in the Energy & Environmental Law Adviser blog are Alex Garel-Frantzen, Amy Antoniolli and Brett Cooper.

They discuss three key issues facing the industry for the coming year: waning federal government incentives; siting renewable energy projects at such locations as retired power plants and landfills can lower costs; and local communities can be slow to get on board with renewable energy initiatives.

See the article.

The Lowenstein Center for the Public Interest has created a Summary Survey of State Charity Registration Requirements in All 50 States and the District of Columbia to help nonprofits comply with state law across the country. This resource gives nonprofits the information they need to understand their legal obligations when they solicit funds from donors throughout the United States, the firm said in a release.

Prepared for Pro Bono Partnership, a center client, the survey provides guidance for nonprofits whose online fundraising brings in money from parts of the country where they do not otherwise have a presence and where they may not be aware of state-specific registration obligations.

Nancy Eberhardt, executive director of pro bono partnership, noted that compliance with charitable registration requirements in the 40-plus states that require registration and reporting “is a daunting task for nonprofits. Lowenstein Sandler’s survey provides the nonprofit community a concise guide to compliance.”

The survey is available on the Pro Bono Partnership website.