2016-07-12

• Israeli lawyers filed a $1 billion lawsuit that accuses Facebook of knowingly allowing the Palestinian group Hamas to use its service as tool for terrorism. (Bloomberg)

• A group of investors that claimed it was conned out of over $11.25 million in pre-initial public offering Facebook shares won its bid to revive securities fraud claims against Venable LLP, which represented the alleged scheme mastermind during negotiations. (Big Law Business/Bloomberg BNA)

• Quarles & Brady announced Monday that Milwaukee-based Dan Radler, an intellectual property specialist, will become the firm’s second managing partner in December. In an interview with BLB, Radler among other things discussed why he’s not a fan of across-the-board associate pay raises. (Big Law Business)

• Top Republican officials called for the Justice Department to investigate whether Hillary Clinton committed criminal perjury by lying to Congress in her testimony last fall about her private email server. (New York Times)

• Bill Cosby has switched from Quinn Emanuel Urquhart & Sullivan lawyers to entertainment law firm Liner LLP for his representation in civil litigation he faces around the country linked to accusations that he drugged and sexually assaulted women. (Washington Post)

Legal Market

• Lawyers for U.K. firms Allen & Overy and Latham & Watkins advised on the $3.55 billion sale of Thomson Reuters’ intellectual property and science business to Onex Corporation and Baring Private Equity. (The Lawyer)

• An investment adviser who protested an SEC enforcement action by not showing up was hit, along with her firm, with multimillion dollar penalties by an agency judge. (Big Law Business/Bloomberg BNA)

• Beer brewers are increasingly suing rivals to protect beer and brewery names from trademark theft. (Wall Street Journal)

• Fox News Network Chairman and CEO Roger Ailes will have to beat a husband-and-wife legal team with a 90 percent win record in employment cases if he is to fight off the sexual harassment lawsuit filed against him by Fox News Channel anchor Gretchen Carlson. (Law.com)

• The U.S. Justice Department urged a Washington federal judge to throw out a challenge to a new Labor Department rule that obligates investment advisers to work in their clients’ best interests. (National Law Journal)

• A decision by presumed Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump to pick Newt Gingrich as his running mate would vault the former U.S. House speaker back onto the political stage while raising several upsides and downsides for both Dentons and Gingrich. (American Lawyer)

• A messy breakup of New York mass torts and personal injury firm Napoli Bern is forcing a court-appointed referee to make some difficult decisions. (American Lawyer)

• A federal judge ruled Monday that pharmaceutical companies that outsource manufacturing of a new product do not start the Patent Act’s one-year clock on filing a patent application. (Law.com)

• Many law firms are advising in the $4 billion sale of the Ultimate Fighting Championship. (Law.com)

Brexit

• Britons’ vote to exit the European Union has some British law graduates considering the idea of taking the New York bar exam. (The Lawyer)

• In the aftermath of Brexit, law firms, like their clients, find themselves wondering about the long-term impact and how to plan for what’s next. But law firms enjoy certain benefits from the uncertainty. (Big Law Business/Bloomberg BNA)

SCOTUS and other courts

• U.S. Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg faced criticism for her recent comments regarding Donald Trump. (Washington Post)

Laterals and Moves

• Paul Hastings Monday acquired Los Angeles-based securities litigation boutique Zaccaro Morgan, whose six lawyers had a practice defending clients facing cases filed by the Securities and Exchange Commission, the Federal Trade Commission and the Commodities Futures Trading Commission. In an interview with BLB, Nicolas Morgan, who like fellow name partner Tom Zaccaro had worked at the SEC before joining a major law firm, talked about what drove him back to Big Law. (Big Law Business)

• Robert Coughlin II, a former official in the U.S. Department of Justice who was convicted in 2008 in charges linked to the Jack Abramoff lobbying scandal, was reinstated to District of Columbia Bar and can practice law again. (National Law Journal)

• As it prepares for a flood of Brexit-related litigation, DWF hired a team away from PwC Legal in London, including head of commercial disputes Jonathan Isaacs and two associates. (The Lawyer)

Technology

• Advances in artificial intelligence technology are pushing U.S. tech giants toward a huge legal and cultural showdown with European privacy regulators. (Wired)

• As the world waits for details on the fatal crash in Florida of a Tesla car on “autopilot,” Google has hired a general counsel to oversee its own self-driving car project. (Big Law Business)

• Tesla Motors Inc.’s Autopilot technology continues to draw scrutiny, with drivers claiming it was engaged during accidents and a news report that federal regulators are probing a possible securities law violation. (Bloomberg)

• The United Kingdom Monday began a consultation on changes to the country’s insurance rules and highway regulations as part of its plans to allow driverless cars on its roads by 2020. (New York Times/Reuters)

•  BlackBerry Ltd. won’t rule out another handset running its own operating system even as it pushes ahead with new “hybrid” Android-based smartphones and its hardware sales keep slipping. (Bloomberg Technology)

• Toyota Motor Corp. is getting flak from Japan’s taxi drivers over its strategic alliance with ride-hailing leader Uber Technologies Inc. (Bloomberg Technology)

• Twitter plans to stream the Republican and Democratic presidential conventions. (Wired)

Legal Education

• A Rutgers law professor says he has decided to ban students from using laptops during his lectures because the devices make it more difficult to teach. (WSJ Law Blog)

• An updated free tool from legal education non-profit Access Group makes it possible to calculate schools’ costs of attendance and estimated living expenses, and to compare costs and the amount of loans a student would need to attend different institutions. (Big Law Business)

Miscellaneous

• Two Texas attorneys’ YouTube hit song “Don’t Eat Your Weed” warns listeners that, although possession of less than two ounces of marijuana is a Class B Misdemeanor in Texas attempting to conceal or destroy the pot in front of an officer can get the charge elevated to a felony. (WSJ Law Blog)

• Lawyers at Shearman & Sterling are working pro bono on a civil wrongful death suit seeking to hold Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s regime responsible for the murder of veteran war correspondent Marie Colvin, whose sister, a plaintiff in the suit, they know as a former associate at the firm. (American Lawyer)

• A Virginia federal judge ruled that the state can’t require Republican National Convention delegates to back Donald Trump, in a decision that did not address whether the party can itself obligate its delegates to vote for a candidate. (WSJ Law Blog)

• Bank of America Corp. said a managing director who accused the bank of being a “bro’s club” and filed a gender-bias lawsuit only came up with the inflammatory term after meeting with her lawyers. (Big Law Business/Bloomberg News)

Compiled by Rick Mitchell and edited by Gabe Friedman.

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