[UPDATE:  U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit affirmed trial court dismissal of replevin action as barred by the statute of limitation,  issuing the opinion on June 2, 2010.] On April 17, 1939, the Delaware, Lackawanna and Western Railroad gave retired, historic (1905) “Camelback” steam locomotive #952 to the Railway & Locomotive Historical Society […]

[UPDATE: Faegre wastes no time in moving for summary judgment.] Faegre & Benson has been sued in U.S. District Court (D. Minn.) on a claim under the fair debt collection practices act (FDCPA), which regulates “debt collectors” (complaint: here; exhibits: here). Without taking a position on the merits of that lawsuit (tempting though it is), […]

Back in 2000, U.S. Bancorp Piper Jaffray Inc. offered certain high net worth employees the opportunity essentially to borrow money and, with that borrowed money, invest in a U.S. Bancorp Piper investment fund.  The loans were to be 50% “recourse” and 50% “non-recourse,” meaning that some of the debt would be repayable only from proceeds […]

In reporting today on the U.S. Supreme Court’s ruling on an issue of a criminal defendant’s Miranda rights, the Wall Street Journal mentioned at the end of the piece that the Court granted a petition for writ of certiorari of the Mayo Clinic and the University of Minnesota appealing from a U.S. Court of Appeals […]

As covered previously by Minnesota Litigator, Mary Lickteig brought a complaint in 2007 against her brother in which she alleged that in 2005 she recovered repressed memories of sexual abuse in the 1970’s. Sr. U.S. District Judge Paul A. Magnuson threw the case out in July of 2008, holding that Minnesota provided Ms. Lickteig with […]

Litigation can sometimes make for some interesting reversals of positions as in the case of Percic v. European Autowerks, dba Autopia, in which plaintiffs brought their putative TCPA class action (federal Telephone Consumer Protection Act) in Minnesota state court, defendant removed it to federal court, then defendant changed its mind and sought to have the […]

As a member of the Heins Mills law firm, Plaintiff Brian Williams (now with Gustafson Gluek P.L.L.C.) participated in the shareholder lawsuit headed by the Heins Mills law firm against AOL.  The case made Williams a millionaire, but it made Defendants Sam Heins and Stacey Mills MILLIONAIRES (that is, the case made something like $4.5 […]

An unpublished Minnesota Court of Appeals decision this week in Afremov v. AGA Medical Corp., et al, has some good lessons for litigators and those who work with them. Litigators:  when a case settles, don’t forget to tell your service providers (for example, the e-discovery vendor who has been hosting your gigabytes of data) to […]

In countless westerns and action movies, there comes a scene where guns are drawn and the characters and audience are all puzzling over who is “on the good guys’ side”  and who is on the other side.   In almost every case involving white-collar wrong-doing, there is a similar drama of “who knew what when” […]

U.S. District Court Judge Richard Kyle, Sr. (D. Minn.) has issued an order of preliminary approval of a class action settlement in this case, filed in late 2008, arising out of a tuberculosis outbreak at the Ramsey County Workhouse.  Terms of the settlement are here (see page 20 and following). Plaintiffs’ class was represented by […]