In Chapman v. All American Painting, Inc., the Seventh Circuit today overruled a string of decisions, including Damasco v. Clearwire Corp., and held that a rejected offer of judgment that would have provided a plaintiff with complete relief does not moot the plaintiff's claims. The court adopted the analysis of Justice Kagan's dissenting opinion in Genesis […]
Author Archives: Scott Nelson
You may know that H.R. 1599, the "Safe and Accurate Food Labeling Act of 2015" passed the House of Representatives a couple of weeks back and has been referred to committee in the Senate. You may also know that the bill would ban states from requiring labeling of foods containing genetically engineered (GE) ingredients, and that […]
In a decision issued Monday in a case called Sanchez v. Valencia Holding Co., the California Supreme Court rejected arguments that a class-action ban in an arbitration clause, together with a few other provisions that were unfavorable to a consumer, rendered the arbitration clause unconscionable. The opinion emphasized that an arbitration clause, like any other […]
The FTC's press release is here.
News reports in the last day reveal that Facebook has obtained a patent on a method for "authenticating an individual for access to information or service based on that individual's social network." What exactly does that mean? Among other things, the patent says, the invention could be used by lenders as follows: "When an individual […]
Asserting that other courts of appeals have misread one of its precedents, the Eleventh Circuit has insisted that its law differs from that of other circuits on the question whether the pendency of a failed class action tolls the statute of limitations for a class member who attempts to file another class action. In yesterday's […]
This past Friday, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit held that class claims against Netflix for alleged violations of the Video Privacy Protection Act and a similar California statute had to be dismissed because neither statute applies when a disclosure of information about a consumer's video-viewing history is the result of the consumer's decision […]
Brian Wolfman blogged yesterday about a Washington Post story pointing out that fish oil supplements are being marketed to consumers to lower the risk of heart disease despite the absence of scientific evidence bearing out their effectiveness. The FDA allows manufacturers of the supplements to get away with making a "qualified health claim" that "supportive […]
In an opinion yesterday called Imelhoff Investments v. Alfoccino, Inc., the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit rejected arguments that would limit the liability of senders of junk faxes under the Telephone Consumer Protection Act (TCPA). First, the court held that a plaintiff's standing in a junk fax case doesn't depend on whether […]
Yesterday, in what otherwise might have been a garden-variety opinion enforcing an arbitration agreement, Judge Richard Posner of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit had some striking things to say about arbitration. His opinion sarcastically pooh-poohed the idea that arbitration agreements are "darlings" of the law and went on to question whether […]