The National Law Journal

The 2024 NLJ Awards: Professional Excellence—DC Managing Partner of the Year

The Adam Smith Institute said, "At a time when the U.K.'s future prospects are already uncertain, U.K. plc simply cannot afford to stand by and allow the rise of lawfare." https://lnkd.in/gdFxg6h7

A Conversation with NLJ Lifetime Achievement Award Winner Jeff Smith

'Opaque and Unfair': 9th Circuit Rejects Live Nation's Rules for Mass Arbitrations

'Systemic and Pervasive'?: DiCello Levitt Alleges WWE Child Sexual Abuse Scandal

Wickard AI Partners With Law School to Bring Legal AI Training to Ethiopia

In Blow to Labor Board, Court Sides With Elon Musk Over Tweet

U.S. District Judge Yvonne Gonzalez Rogers, who is overseeing the social media addiction multidistrict litigation in the Northern District of California, allowed negligence claims brought by school districts and local governments to move ahead against Meta Platforms, which owns Facebook and Instagram, and the parent companies of TikTok, Snapchat and YouTube. "Defendants principally contend the school district and local government entities' alleged injuries are too remote or attenuated for the law to redress," she wrote in a Thursday opinion. "In most ways, the court disagrees." The economic impact on schools of students becoming addicted to social media was foreseeable, she concluded. Concerns from the social media companies that allowing such claims would create a "limitless pool of potential plaintiffs," she wrote, is "a dramatic overstatement." "Today's ruling is a significant victory for schools, teachers, and administrators who are on the front lines of the nation's youth mental health crisis," wrote co-lead plaintiffs' counsel Lexi Hazam, of San Francisco's Lieff Cabraser Heimann & Bernstein, and Motley Rice's Previn Warren in Washington, D.C. "Because of the addictive design of Instagram, Snapchat, TikTok, and YouTube, students are struggling. That means schools are struggling—their budgets are stretched and their educational missions are diverted as they shoulder the added responsibility of supporting kids in crisis." Full story from Amanda Bronstad: https://lnkd.in/eu6Ugd5R

Duane Morris and Blank Rome have reached a $102 million settlement with the U.S. Department of Justice on behalf of the operators of the Dali cargo ship that struck and destroyed an iconic Baltimore bridge in March. U.S. attorneys and counsel for Singapore-based Grace Ocean Private Ltd. and Synergy Marine Group filed the notice of settlement late Thursday afternoon in Maryland federal court. "This resolution ensures that the costs of the federal government's cleanup efforts in the Fort McHenry Channel are borne by Grace Ocean and Synergy and not the American taxpayer," Benjamin C. Mizer, principal deputy associate attorney general, said Thursday in a press statement. Another Justice Department official, Brian M. Boynton, described the settlement as a "tremendous outcome that fully compensates the United States for the costs it incurred in responding to this disaster." The Justice Department said the settlement resolves its claims seeking more than $103 million in civil damages and that the settlement funds will go to the U.S. Treasury and the federal agencies directed affected by the bridge collapse. Full story from Sulaiman Abdur-Rahman: https://lnkd.in/eB2PYEfQ

A Conversation with NLJ Lifetime Achievement Award Winner Karen Popp