Litigation
'Take home' exposure to asbestos ruling raises new questions
By Christine D. Calareso
The issue before the court was whether traditional negligence liability claims should include "household members" who had no d...
California Courts of Appeal
Real estate duty decision could have big impact. Or not
By Gary A. Watt
The California Supreme Court recently held that salespeople, working on behalf of a real estate broker acting as a dual agent,...
Slashing syllables, cutting commas and weighing words — in other words, picking nits — is what makes one a professional appell...
OK, so the Earth is not flat. But do we really get heat from the Sun? Hear me out. By David M. Balabanian ...
The Supreme Court's first merits decision of this term is important for the larger picture that it points out: inconsistency i...
December. Wish I could title this column "Peace on Earth." But this prosaic, yet laudable, aspiration seems more elusive than ...
Superior Court Judge Orange County (Santa Ana) ...
Civil Litigation, Alternative Dispute Resolution
The evolution of arbitration in the US: 1925-present
By Lawrence Waddington
When the California Supreme Court approved arbitration in the California Arbitration Act, the justices assumed, as had Congres...
Although almost a year has passed since the new California Fair Pay Act became effective, the dialogue about its standards and...
While mediations are all the rage, directly negotiating with opposing counsel can bring useful insights and information to you...
Chief executive officers often pay too little attention to the role of privately held company boards, often leading to CEO and...
If FinTech is to dominate the world of banking, financing, money transfers, payments and other financial transactions, the ind...
Technology cases are often well served with alternate dispute resolution, which better ensures privacy and confidentiality tha...
Judges and Judiciary, Books
A flawed account of a towering jurist
By Corbin K. Barthold
Posner's first biographer, William Domnarski, deserves some applause for completing the precursory but epic task of reading ev...
Speculation about the future of Dodd-Frank must consider two realities: In the Senate, the Republicans do not have a filibuste...
Ethics/Professional Responsibility, Contracts
More contract attorney complications
By J. Randolph Evans, Shari L. Klevens
Law firms should carefully consider whether their policies and procedures are sufficient to allow the firm to reap the benefit...
This includes equity investments, mergers, acquisitions or asset purchases, and even initial public offerings. Regardless of t...
Intellectual Property
US practitioners in an international patent portfolio world
By Patrick Jewik
Despite the increasing number of worldwide patent filings, foreign patent prosecution decisions are often made based upon a de...
Regular folks ask Santa for cashmere sweaters and over-the-knee suede boots. Patent practitioners pray the Federal Circuit bri...
Labor/Employment
Texas overtime ruling directly affects California employers
By Arthur F. Silbergeld
A federal district court in Texas recently enjoined the implementation of the Department of Labor minimum salary guideline for...
Government, Constitutional Law
First Amendment in Trump's cross-hairs
By Eric B. Kingsley
On Tuesday, President-elect Donald Trump tweeted out the following: "Nobody should be allowed to burn the American flag -- if ...
Kozinski takes on anti-SLAPP in federal court, redux
By James Azadian
On its surface, a recent 9th Circuit decision is a sleeper. Court observers may wonder why the judges chose to publish their o...
Civil Litigation, Appellate Practice
Discovery sanctions appeals can be tricky business
By Alana H. Rotter
When it comes to appeals, 1 plus 1 does not necessarily equal 2 -- or, more precisely, an order that imposes one sanction of $...
Given Trump's platform, does any environmental hope remain? Counterintuitively, our recent political history suggests that th...
U.S. Supreme Court, Constitutional Law
Property law and the Scalia legacy
By Michael M. Berger
Let others worry about the impact of a new justice on issues of race, marriage or bathroom access, I'd like to focus your atte...
Securities, Government, Corporate, Administrative/Regulatory
The SEC after Obama and White
By Nicolas Morgan, Thomas A. Zaccaro
There has been much speculation about how the Securities and Exchange Commission might operate differently during the Trump ad...
Government, Family, Administrative/Regulatory
Child abuse records and strict confidentiality
By Karen A. Feld
Learn about confidential police reports, specifically those involving allegations of child abuse and neglect. ...
What are you to do if you owe tens of thousands of dollars and most (if not all) of that accrued at an amount that was incorre...
GC Email
If the 'Cadillac tax' falls, entire health care law could be next
By Robert W. Wood
Long before Donald Trump blew past rivals in the Republican Primary and then took an unexpected path to victory in the general...
Antitrust & Trade Reg.
Deal will give early test of Trump on antitrust
By Steven N. Williams
The Trump administration's approach to the proposed AT&T/Time Warner merger will provide an early test of whether the admi...