“Three recent decisions demonstrate how the legal landscape continues rapidly to change and evolve in response to COVID-19. These decisions highlight certain developing uncertainties in the law, including the impact of COVID-19-related executive and administrative orders on the rights of private parties,” report Jonathan P. Wolfert, Eddy Salcedo, Owen R. Wolfe, and Sarah Fedner in Seyfarth’s News & Insights.

The takeaways from these recent decisions are that “These decisions reflect the importance of staying up to date not only on various executive and administrative COVID-19 orders and anticipating the effects of those orders on pending litigation, but also Court decisions interpreting such orders or otherwise dealing with the effects of COVID-19. The legal landscape will continue to be affected as courts grapple with the continuing fallout from the pandemic.”

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“Holland & Knight is facing a lawsuit alleging that it failed to prevent the transfer of more than $3 million to a fraudster’s account in Hong Kong,” reports Debra Cassens Weiss in ABA Journal’s News.

“The lawsuit, filed in June in Utah state court, was removed to federal court this week, the American Lawyer reports.”

Holland & Knight is accused of failing to investigate after the fraudster intercepted emails regarding a stock sale, posed as the seller, and instructed the law firm to wire $3.1 million from the stock buyer to another account. The new fraudulent account was identified as Wemakos Furniture Co. Limited.”

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“Judge Klausner, sitting in the Central District, dismissed a claim brought by a class of Princess Cruise Line passengers premised on their exposure to COVID-19 while aboard the now-infamous cruise ship that departed San Francisco for Hawaii on February 21, 2020,” reports Patrick Hammon in McManis Faulkner’s Blog.

“Plaintiffs, Ronald and Eva Weissberger, while still on the ship, filed suit against the cruise line on March 9, as the Grand Princess docked at the Port of Oakland alleging a claim for negligence. Although the Weissbergers did not test positive for COVID-19 (or suffer symptoms of the disease), they sought to recover damages for the emotional distress they suffered based on their fear of contracting coronavirus while quarantined on the ship.”

“Defendant, Princess Cruise Lines, moved to dismiss, arguing Plaintiffs failed to state a claim. The district court explained, as an initial matter, that Plaintiffs’ negligence claim had to be considered as a claim for negligent infliction of emotional distress (NIED), since Plaintiffs did not seek to recover for any physical harm, instead alleging only that they suffered emotional distress and mental anguish associated with their ‘of developing COVID-19’ on the ship.”

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“A trucking lawsuit against carrier New Prime that has lasted five years and prompted a decision by the U.S. Supreme Court could be nearing an end,” reports Mark Schremmer in Land Line.

“A $28 million settlement agreement in truck driver Dominic Oliveira’s class action lawsuit against New Prime was filed in Massachusetts federal court on Monday, July 20. The lawsuit alleged that the Springfield, Mo.-based trucking company violated the Fair Labor Standards Act. According to Oliveira, New Prime paid him less than minimum wage. After deductions for fuel and lease payments on the truck, Oliveira said he was occasionally left owing the company money at the end of the pay period.”

“If approved, funds will be distributed to the named plaintiffs, as well as about 40,000 potential class members who leased their trucks through New Prime at any time from Oct. 2, 2012, through May 8, 2020, or those who attended training in Missouri to become New Prime truck drivers at any time since March 4, 2010, through May 8, 2020.”

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“As the COVID-19 pandemic continues with no certain end in sight, courts and lawyers alike must come to terms with the possibility that the conduct of trials may require dramatic changes to keep the wheels of justice turning,” write Thomas B. Fiddler and Vincent N. Barbera in White and Williams’ News & Resources.

“While bench trials (by video, and in some instances, live) present their own logistical challenges and strategic considerations, the prospect of video trials by jury adds additional layers of complexity. One threshold factor that must be carefully considered is the impact of video jury trials on the jury pool itself.”

“Significant change to any longstanding practice has consequences, both good and bad, and a shift to conducting jury trials remotely is no exception. Replacing the need to report to court for jury duty with the need to report to one’s personal computer may help remove barriers associated with transportation, but invariably presents a host of new questions and challenges. What about potential jurors who do not own or have access to the necessary technology to participate? What about potential jurors who do not possess the necessary skills to operate the technology required to fully and appropriately participate? These and similar questions highlight an unintended, but likely consequence: the de facto exclusion of jurors who do not own the requisite assets or possess the necessary technical skillset to qualify for remote jury service. In turn, there is a realistic possibility that neither plaintiffs nor defendants will have access to the jury of their choosing or a jury of ‘their peers.'”

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“The city of Oakland has settled a lawsuit with the victims of the 2016 ‘Ghost Ship’ fire that killed 36 people. The total settlement is for $32.7 million — $23.5 million will go to families of people who died, and $9.2 million will go to Sam Maxwell, who survived the fire with lifelong injuries,” reports Andrew Limbong in NPR’s Arts & Life.

“Oakland’s City Council wrote in a statement the ‘The City continues to assert, as the agreement provides that it is not liable for these tragic losses. The City decided to settle this case because of the cost-benefit analysis.'”

“Paul Matiasic, an attorney representing five of the victims families, said in a statement that the case has always been about more than just money.”

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Lawyers for Facebook are “trying to convince a judge they should be allowed to settle a class action lawsuit that accuses the company of violating users’ privacy,” reports Bobby Allyn in NPR’s Technology.

“Facebook agreed earlier this year to pay $550 million to settle the case, which claims that the tech giant illegally used facial-recognition technology in its ‘tag suggestions’ service.”

“The deal was the largest-ever payout as the result of a class-action lawsuit alleging online privacy violations.”

“…under the settlement, people who have had their face data harvested in Illinois are expected to receive checks of just $150.”

“U.S. District Judge James Donato of California, who is overseeing the case, says that payout is woefully inadequate.”

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“Tens of thousands of former Werner student trucker drivers won’t see a dime of a six-figure verdict in a wage lawsuit after a federal court determined a report from a key witness for the plaintiffs is inadmissible,” reports Tyson Fisher in Land Line.

“On June 22, a judge for the U.S. District Court for the District of Nebraska denied the Werner student drivers a new trial. The case was remanded to the district court after Werner received a favorable ruling from the Eight Circuit Court of Appeals. The appellate court ruled that a key expert witness cannot be used by the drivers since the plaintiffs missed the disclosure deadline. With that turn of events, the district court determined that the drivers have no case without that expert’s report.”

“The nearly 10-year-old class action lawsuit is based on Werner’s eight-week training program. Former student drivers accuse the company of violating federal and state wage laws. The complaint alleges that Werner failed to compensate trainees for short-term breaks or for time spent resting in the sleeper.”

“The original complaint was filed in September 2011. Although a jury trial was initially scheduled for October 2014, litigation kicked the can down the road for several years. A trial and verdict was finally reached in May 2017. A jury found that Werner owed drivers for breaks of 20 minutes or less. However, the jury also relieved Werner of wages owed for sleeper berth time.”

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“New York Attorney General Letitia James announced … that a group of female construction workers who experienced years of sexual harassment at a Long Island contracting firm will receive a $1.5 million settlement, after James’ office discovered not only harassment but retaliation for reporting it,” reports Rebecca Baird-Remba in Commercial Observer.

“James’ office found that the 18 women, the majority of whom are Black, endured a hostile and discriminatory work environment while working as general laborers for TradeOff, a Lynbrook, Long Island-based firm which provides nonunion labor for major construction sites across the city, including Hudson Yards.”

“Union representatives from Local 79 referred to TradeOff as a ‘body shop’ because it recruits most of its workers through prison reentry programs and pays them a fraction of what union laborers earn.”

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“ERISA litigation continues to flourish thanks to veteran plaintiffs’ attorneys refining their strategies, newcomers entering the ERISA arena using traditional arguments and lawsuits being filed against smaller plans,” reports Robert Steyer in Pensions & Investments’ Courts.

“For the veteran plaintiffs’ attorneys, their lawsuits ‘generally are sophisticated and appear to respond to roadblocks from decisions that have gone against plaintiffs,’ Thomas E. Clark Jr., a St. Louis-based partner and chief operating officer of Wagner Law Group who represents sponsors, wrote in an email.”

“For the new crop of law firms filing suits, “these complaints appear to generally be cookie cutter and borrow from legal theories from earlier lawsuits,” he wrote.”

“Recent defendants include Costco Wholesale Corp., Paychex Inc., KeyCorp, Land O’ Lakes Inc., Estee Lauder Inc., Oshkosh Corp., Automatic Data Processing Inc., MedStar Health Inc., Astellas US LLC, Quest Diagnostics Inc., Universal Health Services Inc., Schneider Electric Holdings Inc., CDI Corp., and CommonSpirit Health.”

“And that’s only since Memorial Day.”

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“Deutsche Bank AG agreed Tuesday to pay a $150 million penalty to settle ‘significant compliance failures’ in its dealings with convicted sex offender and financier Jeffrey Epstein,” reports VOA News.

“The New York State Department of Financial Services said the bank did not properly monitor Epstein’s transactions, despite widespread public knowledge about his sexual misconduct.”

“It said Deutsche Bank’s failure led to its processing of hundreds of Epstein’s transactions that should have been more closely scrutinized, including payments to victims and law firms representing him and his accomplices.”

“The state regulator said Deutsche Bank also failed in its relationships with Danske Bank Estonia and FBME Bank by not properly monitoring their correspondent and clearing operations.”

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“Florida’s largest nursing home provider is again facing a quarter-billion-dollar judgment for fraud,” reported with updates in The St. Augustine Record by Ryan Mills Naples of the Naples News.

“An appeals court last week affirmed part of a jury’s finding that Consulate Health Care, which operates a tenth of all Florida nursing homes, systematically defrauded the government by providing medically unnecessary treatments to patients.”

“While calling the judgment ‘huge,’one industry watcher predicted that Consulate homes will continue operating, even if the company continues to appeal the ruling or files for bankruptcy.”

“Consulate, based in Maitland, a suburb of Orlando, owns about 70 of Florida’s 693 nursing homes, and operates in every metro area. In all, the privately held company owns and controls about 150 nursing homes and assisted living facilities, mostly in the Southeast and the Mid-Atlantic states.”

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“Drug company Hoffmann-La Roche (OTCMKTS – RHHBY) falsified scientific conclusions and mounted a high-powered marketing and lobbying campaign to deceive the government about the effectiveness of Tamiflu (oseltamivir) for fighting a flu pandemic, according to new filings in a federal False Claims Act lawsuit. The case seeks to recover more than $1.4 billion of taxpayer dollars that the federal government wrongly spent to add Tamiflu to the Strategic National Stockpile,” reports Lanier Law Firm in Herald Mail Media’s State News.

“In a highly anticipated response to Roche’s motion to dismiss the lawsuit, whistleblower Dr. Thomas Jefferson alleges that Roche was aware that studies didn’t show that Tamiflu could protect individuals from acquiring influenza, reduce contagiousness of those infected or treat secondary symptoms. At best, studies have found that Tamiflu might slightly shorten the duration of flu symptoms.”

“The federal Food and Drug Administration repeatedly denied Roche’s efforts in the early 2000s to approve Tamiflu for pandemic use. According to the latest filings by whistleblower lawyers at The Lanier Law Firm and Halunen Law, once thwarted by the FDA, Roche began a campaign to fund, produce and publish misleading medical journal articles to create the appearance that Tamiflu would be effective at responding to a flu pandemic. The global conglomerate then used those studies and articles to create a false narrative for marketing and to lobby the CDC and Congress. As alleged, federal and state governments purchased tens of millions of doses of Tamiflu for the Strategic National Stockpile based on Roche’s misrepresentations.”

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“The court opined that a $1.1 million judgment for Vernon and Donyell Walters was too high and that the trial court will have to try to find a more appropriate figure,” reports John O’Brien in Legal Newsline.

“The $1.1 million figure, itself, was a reduction from the jury’s original $2.8 million verdict, which the trial judge noted was more than what the Waters had asked for.”

“Vernon Walters hired Tadd Parsons to represent him and his wife in a lawsuit against Kansas City Southern Railway Company, but it was dismissed with prejudice in 2010 for failure to prosecute, failure to comply with discovery obligations and fraud upon the court.”

“Parsons did not relate what had happened with the case to his clients. Three years after its dismissal, with the Walterses believing the case was still pending, Parsons fabricated a settlement offer of $104,000 from KCSR and advised them to take it.”

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“The unexpected deaths of two lawyers and a series of tornadoes don’t excuse the late filing of an expert report on damages, a federal judge in Dallas has ruled,” reports Debra Cassens Weiss in ABA Journal’s News.

“Ruling on Friday, U.S. District Judge Ada Brown said the prejudice to defendant ADT Inc., a security company, outweighed the risk of harm to the plaintiff seeking to admit the late report.”

“The expert initially estimated damages for interference with current and prospective contracts at about $673,000 but later contended that ADT’s wrongdoing caused total damages of about $4.2 million. The later report will not be admitted, Brown ruled.”

“The plaintiff, Premier Electronics, claims that ADT conspired to take over its contract to provide security alarm monitoring services to a new housing development and interfered with prospective contracts in other developments, according to Brown’s opinion.”

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“For years, Johnson & Johnson has vowed to appeal each talc verdict it lost, and the company cited a ‘fundamentally unfair process’ and ‘multiple errors’ when jurors in St. Louis ordered the company to pay $4.69 billion to 22 women with ovarian cancer,” reports Eric Sagonowsky in Fierce Pharma’s Pharma.

“Now, an appeals court has reduced that award—but only to $2.11 billion, thanks to J&J’s ‘outrageous’ and ‘reprehensible’ defense of the product.”

“J&J brought 10 arguments in appeals, but the court found that plaintiffs ‘proved with convincing clarity that defendants engaged in outrageous conduct because of an evil motive or reckless indifference.'”

“After reviewing the arguments, the judges found that J&J ‘discussed the presence of asbestos in their talc in internal memoranda for several decades; avoided adopting more accurate measures for detecting asbestos and influenced the industry to do the same; attempted to discredit those scientists publishing studies unfavorable to their products; and did not eliminate talc from the products and use cornstarch instead because it would be more costly to do so.'”

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“A federal judge has denied a request by American women’s soccer players to allow an immediate appeal of his decision to throw out their claim of unequal pay against the U.S. Soccer Federation,” reports Ronald Blum in StarTribune’s Loons.

“Lawyers for the women had asked him to enter a final judgment on his decision to dismiss the pay claim, which would have allowed them to take the case to the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco.”

“Klauser ruled May 1 the women could not prove discrimination over pay and granted in part the USSF’s motion for a partial summary judgment. He said the union for the women’s national team rejected an offer to be paid under the same pay-to-play structure as the men’s national team’s collective bargaining agreement and the women accepted guaranteed salaries and greater benefits along with a different bonus structure.”

“He also refused to let go to trial allegations the women were discriminated against because they played more games on artificial turf.”

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“A no bail arrest warrant has been issued for a prominent immigration attorney in Utah whose increasingly erratic behavior, according to police and prosecutors, culminated with him making terroristic threats against his wife in addition to making several bizarre statements,” reports Pat Reavy in KSL’s Utah News.

“Aaron Tarin, 40, of Herriman, was arrested three times over two weeks in late May through June. On Thursday he was charged in 3rd District Court with making a terroristic threat, a second-degree felony, and stalking, a third-degree felony.”

“According to charging documents, Tarin’s ex-wife reported to police that Tarin was engaging in ‘concerning behavior’ from May 18 to May 29, including sending her ‘multiple angry emails and videos … that talked about a ‘leprechaun chase’ and that ‘everybody needs to be ready for it.'”

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“A coalition of 34 state attorneys general announced on May 19, 2020, that it had secured a settlement with one of the nation’s largest subprime auto financing companies for alleged violations of state consumer protection laws. Under the settlement agreement, the terms of which are discussed in detail below, the auto financing company is required to provide significant monetary relief to consumers, $550 million in total, and substantially adjust its lending practices moving forward,” report Anthony E. DiResta and David L. Haller in Holland & Knight’s Insights.

“Without admitting any liability and to resolve the allegations without litigation, the auto financing company agreed to the entry of a consent judgment with each of the 34 state attorneys general participating in the multistate investigation and resulting enforcement actions. Collectively, those consent judgements require the auto financing company to provide $550 million in monetary relief to consumers, including $478 million in deficiency balance waivers, $65 million in restitution and $7 million in restitution management. The consent judgments do not stop at monetary relief. They also require considerable changes to the auto financing company’s lending practices.”

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“A new lawsuit filed in Kansas state court by propane supply company Ferrellgas Partners, an ex-client of Biglaw firm DLA Piper, alleges the firm engaged in ‘strident double-dealing’ that was only revealed when the wrong invoice was mistakenly sent to Ferrellgas,” reports Kathryn Rubino in Above the Law’s Biglaw.

“In July of 2018, the company hired DLA Piper for debt restructuring advice. According to the suit, the work on that matter naturally tapered off by November of that year, but the representation was not formally terminated. However, in November of 2019 Ferrellgas received a $14,000 invoice, signed by Thomas Califano — the same restructuring partner they’d previously worked with — for research about Ferrellgas. During that same time, the company was fielding hostile takeover threats.”

“The lawsuit says that after inquiries from Ferrellgas, DLA returned their client file and that the firm says an internal investigation revealed the client information was not used in connection with work for any other client. But the lawsuit draws the conclusion that the invoice revealed DLA was working for adverse interests.”

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