Blawgletter has fussed before about judicial noticing of facts on the basis of wishful thinking. Our prime targets have included the idea that class certification exerts "hydraulic pressure" for settlement and the notion that class actions involve little or no risk for plaintiffs' counsel.
Yesterday brought another instance — although, with the decision pending and therefore in
Arctic Glacier, the U.S. unit of a Manitoban outfit, pleaded guilty to violating section 1 of the Sherman Act. It confessed to conspiring with rival ice-makers not to vie for customers in Detroit and southeastern Michigan. The Antitrust Division of the U.S. Department of Justice said:
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The Judicial Panel on Multidistrict Litigation met in Richmond on September 24. It has so far issued 19 orders — 14 granting transfer and centralization of multidistrict cases and five not.
Blawgletter couldn't help noting that the Panel has lately added a seventh member – bringing it (at last) back to full strength. U.S. District Judge
Attorney Lionel Hutz graduated from Princeton School of Law. He seldom won and cobbled shoes to pay the bills.
The Third Circuit today affirmed orders that awarded about $567 million in "common fund" fees. The money goes to law firms that helped win $6.44 billion in settlement funds. The claims asserted that Wyeth's weight loss drugs, fen-phen (fenfluramine
Their latest portrait.
The U.S. Supreme Court started its October Term 2009 a day ago — although Their Honors did rehear a big case on September 9.
If you've waited the summer long to see how the Court would deal with your cert. petition, your mandamus application, your request for a writ of prohibition, your
Blawgletter visited this building in a hurricane.
Class plaintiffs waited almost a decade — and within six weeks of trial – before asking the district court to delete the main defense firm from the counsel of record list. The district court, we'd all guess, denied the motion. It likely also scolded the lawyers for pushing such a diaphonously
Zoladex® suppresses sex hormones.
AstraZeneca told people it got an average wholesale price of $X for its Zoladex® drug when it in fact received a far lower AWP due to discounts and rebates. The falsely high AWP let Zoladex® fetch more money per dose, enriching doctors who charged the AWP but got discounts and rebates
Blawgletter's firm represents Kivalina, Alaska.
Blawgletter can make a fair guess why Connecticut v. Am. Elec. Power Co., Inc., No. 05-5104-cv (2d Cir. Sept. 21, 2009), came out after Associate Justice Sonia Sotomayor cleared the Senate last month. Had it preceded the event — and had Her Honor joined with her colleagues in the
Last week, the Antitrust Division of the U.S. Department of Justice filed a Statement of Interest of the United States of America Regarding Proposed Class Settlement in the Google Books case, The Authors Guild, Inc. v. Google, Inc., No. 05 Civ. 8136 (DC) (S.D.N.Y. Sept. 18, 2009). The press release says:
WASHINGTON —
You might've thought that, after the dot com bubble popped in 2000 and Enron melted down a year and a half later, Congress might've rued the free passes it gave to Bad Acters under the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995.
But that August Body, a decade beyond the PSLRA, handed out more of the sweet sweet candy.