Litigation

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit decided that a Florida federal district court, rather than a Mexican court, should hear a suit by one Spanish-language broadcaster against another for tortious interference with a soap-opera actor's contract.

Recent rulings of interest to you and your practice.

Recent cases in e-commerce law and in the e-commerce industry.

LJN's Entertainment Law & Finance Editor-in-Chief Stan Soocher is scheduled to appear on Court TV on Tuesday, May 22, from 11 a.m. to 1 p.m. EDT on the "Best Defense" segment to talk about Phil Spector's music litigations.

In a major patent law development, the Supreme Court on April 30 adopted a new, flexible standard that will make it easier for patents to be denied or challenged on the grounds that the invention at issue is too obvious to deserve patent protection.

More and more often insureds are being forced to litigate with their insurers to protect rights under insurance policies, while at the same time those insureds must actively defend against the very litigation for which they seek insurance coverage. Indeed, insurers often will pursue litigation against their insureds to establish the absence of any coverage obligation if there appears to be a question regarding the existence of a defense or indemnity obligation with respect to underlying litigation. Alternatively, due to potentially applicable statutes of limitation, or a need to seek judicial intervention to force an insurer to assist in an underlying defense for which the insurer has refused coverage, an insured may be required to file coverage litigation before underlying litigation is concluded.

Section 326 of the USA PATRIOT Act requires financial institutions to implement a written Customer Identification Program (CIP) that is appropriate for the size and type of business and that includes minimum requirements. The CIP is intended to enable the institution to form a reasonable belief that it knows the true identify of each customer. The CIP must include account opening procedures that specify the identifying information to be obtained from each customer. It must also include reasonable and practical risk based procedures for verifying each customer's identity.

The Supreme Court recently changed the longstanding rules for obtaining a permanent injunction in patent infringement cases. eBay Inc. v. MercExchange LLC, 126 S.Ct. 1837 (2006). Prior to the Supreme Court's ruling in eBay, it was generally accepted that a successful plaintiff in a patent infringement trial was entitled to a permanent injunction virtually automatically. The Federal Circuit's rule was 'courts will issue permanent injunctions against patent infringement absent exceptional circumstances.' The few exceptions to this rule were generally limited to situations where public health would be affected by enjoining the infringer.