The Supreme Court, in Minerva Surgical, Inc., v. Hologic, Inc., et al., Case No. 20-440, recently upheld the doctrine of assignor estoppel, but severely limited its reach. The Court limited assignor estoppel to not apply in the cases of a “common employment arrangement” with an employer and employee, when there is a change in law, and when the issued patent has “materially broader” claims than the assigned invention ...
The United States Supreme Court yesterday significantly limited the federal government’s ability to bring an action for civil penalties more than five years after the alleged misconduct occurred. In Gabelli v. Securities and Exchange Commission, the Court held that the five-year limitations period governing most enforcement actions begins to run when the underlying violation occurred – not when the government discovered the violation ...
In an opinion issued last week, Morrison v. National Australia Bank Ltd., 559 U.S. __ (2010), the Supreme Court held that foreign plaintiffs cannot use the U.S. Securities laws to sue foreign issuers based on foreign stock purchases: a ruling that sounds the death knell for these so-called “foreign cubed” cases. Rejecting decades of lower-court case law on the extraterritorial reach of the U.S ...
Last month, the Supreme Court decided TC Heartland LLC v. Kraft Foods Group Brands LLC, which narrowed the definition of where a corporate defendant "resides" for the purpose of suing it for patent infringement. In doing so, it overturned the 1994 holding of the Federal Circuit of what constitutes proper venue in patent infringement cases. Federal law allows a Plaintiff to bring a patent infringement suit against a defendant in any district where one of two conditions are met ...
Key Points A permitting agency's blanket designation of an entire category of permit decisions as ministerial for purposes of the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA) may be held to be improper if the agency has the ability to modify or deny the permit based on any concern that may be examined under CEQA review. Courts will afford a larger degree of deference to an agency’s designation of a single permit decision as ministerial on a case-by-case basis ...
On April 19, 2024, the Supreme Court of Canada rendered its decision in Société des casinos du Québec inc. v. Association des cadres de la Société des casinos du Québec, marking the end of an almost 15 year-long debate on the freedom of association of managers and their exclusion under the Labour Code ...
On February 19, 2020, The Supreme Court of Pennsylvania, Eastern district, issued its opinion in Roverano v. John Crane, Inc. and Brand Insulations, Inc. on two critical questions: 1. the applicability of the Pennsylvania Fair Share Act, 42 Pa.C.S. Section 7102, to strict liability asbestos cases pending in the Commonwealth’s courts; and 2. Inclusion of bankrupt entities on the verdict sheet for purposes of liability only ...
On June 21, 2018, the United States Supreme Court, in South Dakota v. Wayfair, Inc., held that a state can now require companies not physically present in that state to collect tax on internet sales made to its residents. The explosive growth of e-commerce combined with the states’ eroding tax base convinced the Supreme Court to turn back a half century of jurisprudence ...
On May 15, 2017, the U.S. Supreme Court reaffirmed the long-standing federal policy favoring arbitration agreements. In a lawsuit brought against skilled nursing provider Kindred Nursing Centers, LP, the Court held that states cannot single out arbitration clauses for “disfavored treatment,” because doing so violates the Federal Arbitration Act (FAA). The case involved two wrongful death lawsuits that were consolidated in the Kentucky Supreme Court ...
In a unanimous opinion issued this week, Matrixx Initiatives, Inc. v. Siracusano, 563 U.S. __ (2011), the Supreme Court declined to adopt a proposed bright-line rule for materiality and reaffirmed the Basic “total mix” test. Specifically, the Court rejected Matrixx’s argument that adverse incident reports are never material unless they are statistically significant - overturning several lower court decisions to the contrary, including one written by then-Judge Alito ...
In a unanimous opinion issued yesterday in Erica P. John Fund, Inc. v. Halliburton Co., 563 U.S. __ (2011), a securities class fraud action, the Supreme Court held that class certification had been improperly denied by the Fifth Circuit based on the absence of “loss causation.” The Court’s holding rejected Fifth Circuit case law dating back to 2007, which had required securities fraud plaintiffs to prove loss causation in order to obtain certification of a class ...
The Twenty-first Amendment—which repealed Prohibition—gives states broad authority to regulate alcohol within their borders. But can states impose residency requirements on alcohol retail licensees? The U.S. Supreme Court, by a vote of seven to two in Tennessee Wine and Spirits Retailers Ass’n v. Thomas, answered no. As state alcohol regulators adjust their licensing processes to comply with the ruling, retailers and wholesalers may see changes in the alcohol market ...
On June 17, the Supreme Court rejected another court challenge to the Affordable Care Act (“ACA”), holding that the plaintiffs lacked standing to challenge its minimum essential coverage provisions. For the third time, the Supreme Court upheld the ACA. More than a decade after the ACA was enacted, the long and winding road of ACA challenges may be over and healthcare industry participants may finally be able to rely on the ACA as settled law moving forward ...
On June 18, 2020, the Supreme Court of the United States ruled that the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) did not follow appropriate administrative procedures to terminate the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program and, therefore, was unauthorized to do so. The decision was a 5-4 ruling, written by Chief Justice John Roberts and joined by Justices Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Elena Kagan, Stephen Breyer and Sonia Sotomayor ...
Supreme Court Ruling Sets the Foundation for GST on Secondment of Employees AUTHOR: Reena Asthana Khair Senior Partner and Head International Trade & Indirect Taxation Kochhar & Co. EMAIL: [email protected] Japanese Multinational companies often share their talent pool across borders and jurisdictions by secondment of Japanese nationals ...
Minerva Surgical, Inc. v. Hologic, Inc., et al, No. 20-440 (S. Ct. June 29, 2021) The Supreme Court issued a decision today upholding the validity of the doctrine of assignor estoppel and clarifying its proper limits. The Court held that the doctrine only applies when “the assignor’s claim of invalidity contradicts explicit or implicit representations he made in assigning the patent ...
United States v. Arthrex, Inc., et al, Appeal No. 2019-1434 (Fed. Cir. June 21, 2021) The Supreme Court issued its long-awaited decision today on the constitutionality of the Patent Trial and Appeal Board (PTAB). The Court held that the Administrative Patent Judges (APJs) who make up the majority of the PTAB are not constitutionally appointed under the Appointments Clause of the U.S. Constitution ...
The Supreme Court in CIGNA Corp. v. Amara held that plan terms cannot be reformed under Section 502(a)(1)(B) of ERISA based on a misleading summary plan description (SPD). Despite this narrow ruling, six justices further stated that reformation may be an appropriate equitable remedy under Section 502(a)(3) of ERISA. Background In 1998, CIGNA replaced its defined benefit plan with a cash balance plan ...
A month after nixing the “objectively reasonable interpretation” (Safeco) defense under the False Claims Act, the Supreme Court has vacated and remanded two other cases for further consideration of the defendant’s subjective state of mind when it filed payment claims with the government. The Fourth Circuit in Sheldon and the Eleventh Circuit in Olhausen will provide the first tests of the High Court’s newly minted FCA intent standard ...
The Supreme Court will decide if historic holiday pay claims can be brought where there are gaps of three months or more between a series of underpayments. The outcome could have significant implications for employers across the UK ...
Today, the Supreme Court issued decisions in the COVID mandate cases that have had employers across the country on the edge of their seats. In aper curiam6-3 decision, the Court stayed the OSHA Emergency Temporary Standard that required all employers with 100 or more employees to require COVID vaccination or weekly testing ...
On Monday, June 11, 2012, the Supreme Court granted a writ of certiorari in Connecticut Retirement Plans and Trust Funds v. Amgen Inc., 660 F.3d 1170 (9th Cir. 2011) to clarify the standards for certifying a class in a securities fraud suit under the fraud-on-the-market theory. The Court’s decision to revisit class certification in securities fraud suits only a year after deciding Erica P. John Fund, Inc. v. Halliburton Co., 563 U.S ...
[!<CDATA[ This term the Supreme Court is set to resolve a circuit split over the extent of a federal district court’s power to order a person “who resides in or is found” in its district “to give testimony or statement or to produce a document or other thing for use in a proceeding in a foreign or international tribunal” pursuant to 28 U.S.C Section 1782(a) ...
In a much anticipated opinion, the Supreme Court on Monday held that class action waivers in arbitration agreements are enforceable. In a 5-4 decision written by Justice Neil Gorsuch, the Court stated that “Congress has instructed in the Arbitration Act that arbitration agreements providing for individualized proceedings must be enforced, and neither the Arbitration Act’s saving clause nor the NLRA suggests otherwise ...
In an opinion issued last week, Merck & Co. v. Reynolds, 559 U.S. __ (2010), the Supreme Court significantly curtailed the ability of defendants to assert the statute of limitations as a defense to a securities fraud claim under § 10(b) of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934. The decision makes it less likely that courts will dismiss, on statute of limitations grounds, cases filed within five years of the alleged fraud ...
