Minnesota Litigator
News & Commentary
Do not consider the blog to be a substitute for obtaining legal advice from a qualified attorney licensed in your state.
Appeal to the U.S. Senate on behalf of S.R. Nelson
UPDATE: CONFIRMED. Original Post, 12/14/2010: Dan Gustafson, of Gustafson Gluek PLLC, and former FBA-Minnesota Chapter President, appeals to Minnesota Senators for action on U.S. Mag. Judge Susan Richard Nelson’s nomination to the district court and asks others to urge action as well.
“Bricks & Mortar May Break My Bones, But Name-Calling Can Come Back to Hurt You…”
On-line or remote sales (that is, sales via telephone or mobile phone) continue their steep rise, putting the squeeze on your friendly neighborhood ________ (fill in the blank). Small businesses across the country have already had their hands full over the past 20-30 years with the advent of the big nationwide/worldwide chains (Walmart, Costco, Minnesota’s […]
MIND THE GAP: Federal Jurisdiction & Gap Insurance
“Mind the gap” is a memorable warning to London underground travelers. It is also an appropriate warning to civil litigators regarding federal jurisdiction. And U.S. District Court Judge Richard H. Kyle issued the warning this week in a class action removed from state court involving “gap insurance,” as it happens.
“Hate to say I told you so…..”
Perhaps on some level it is gratifying for a district court to be “vindicated” by the U.S. Supreme Court after reversal by the intermediate appellate court? This past week, U.S. District Court Judge Donovan W. Frank (D. Minn.) reinstated his 2007 ruling in the Gallus v. Ameriprise case in light of Jones v. Harris Associates […]
The District of Minnesota Backlog
Readers of Minnesota Litigator know that U.S. District Court Judge John R. Tunheim has been presiding over a multi-week trial in a Levaquin bellwether trial. He has another substantial trial on the calendar soon. Of course, he has many additional cases assigned to him as well. Meanwhile, a seat on the district court […]
Levaquin Trial: Big Win for Plaintiff John Schedin
The jury awarded John Schedin $700,000 in compensatory damages (with 75% liability assigned to J&J, 25% shared between Schedin and his personal doctor). $1.115 million in punitive damages. The Johnson & Johnson shareholders do not seem overly concerned.
A $14.7 Million Summary Judgment: The Legal Shockwaves of “The Great Recession” Expand Outward
A casino construction project goes bust. The financing lender is shut down by the FDIC. The FDIC and an entity that became a successor to some of the assets spun off of the shut-down bank moved against the guarantors on the loan. The guarantors did what they could defensively. They had to concede that the […]
Can These Parties Agree on Anything? (ACLU v TiZA)
One aspect of civil litigation appreciated by many practitioners if not more broadly by the public at large is that, though adversarial, there is often a considerable degree of cooperation between adversaries in litigation. Lawsuits are fought over weeks, months, and, often, years. Logistics to facilitate the exchange and review of documents and electronic data, […]
District of Minnesota’s Latest Application of the First-Filed Rule (The Rule’s Fairly Dependable)
Novo Nordisk is familiar to many as a National Public Radio sponsor but is familiar to Minneapolis-based Paddock Laboratories as a competitor in “pharmaceutical combinations” for the treatment of Type2 diabetes. In fact, Paddock apparently submitted an abbreviated new drug application to the FDA (an “ANDA”) for generic repaglinide and, in connection with that, sent […]
Schedin v. Johnson & Johnson, et al. Heading to The 12-Person Jury
UPDATE: John Schedin’s “bellwether” Levaquin case is heading to the jury… November 30, 2010 P0st: John Schedin took the medicine Levaquin in 2005 and soon after suffered injury to both his achilles tendons, a known risk of the drug for a relatively small number of users of the drug, an antibiotic. Levaquin included a warning […]