Litigation

The most recent verdicts for you and your practice.

Expert analysis of recent rulings.

The Supreme Court of California determined in January that the state Mobilehome Residency Law (MRL), codified at Civ. Code, ' 798 et seq., does not preempt local rent control ordinances that allow mobilehome park owners to separately charge park residents for property taxes imposed on park land. Cacho v. Boudreau, 40 Cal.4th 341 (Cal.,1/11/2007) (Kennard, J.). The opinion clarified an apparent conflict between the MRL and the mobilehome rent control law then in force in the City of Chula Vista ' a local law similar to many rent control ordinances throughout the State. The decision also resolved a split among the Appellate Divisions as to which items may be considered components of 'rent' for which landlords may raise monthly rents without violating the anti-gouging provision of the MRL.

Although the marital exception to rape and forcible sodomy remained on the legislative books, the New York Court of Appeals in People v. Liberta, 64 NY2d 152 (1984), held that the exception ' which had previously shielded men from criminal liability for raping their wives ' was unconstitutional. It was a hard-won victory at the time for victims of such abuse and the feminist advocates behind them, but the extent of the protection the decision offered was limited; it applied only to rape and not to other sexual contacts that would be treated as crimes if perpetrated by anyone other than the victim's husband.

A liability insurer's promise to defend its insured is at the core of the protection purchased by policyholders and, in most states, the insurer will be required to defend any suit alleging facts that possibly could result in a judgment against the insured that would be covered by the policy's duty to indemnify. A duty to defend will be found where the undisputed facts surrounding a claim — typically the language of the policy and the allegations of the complaint — permit proof of a claim potentially covered by the duty to indemnify. The complaint-allegations test, or what some jurisdictions term the eight-corners rule, results in the duty to defend being easily found by courts, commensurate with the broad contract language, and the policy's intention to afford the insured 'litigation insurance' protecting against the risk and burden of litigation.

Reversing established precedent, a Fourth Department panel has ruled that when a parent is deemed unable to care for a child due to the parent's mental illness or retardation, the Family Court may determine whether 'some form of posttermination contact' is nonetheless in the child's best interests.

Pure self-interest seemingly motivates parties in the adversarial system; but insurance presents a twist on that common understanding when it comes to litigation over coverage. That is because courts have held that a coverage action does not terminate certain obligations existing between an insured and its insurer ' even with respect to the particular claim at issue in the coverage dispute. With increasing frequency, aggressive attorneys representing policyholders argue that, despite traditional common law or statutory litigation and settlement privileges and protections, an insurer's conduct during a coverage lawsuit should be scrutinized with the aim of identifying evidence of 'bad faith' that can be used against the insurer.

In litigation involving computers and information systems, some technical knowledge can deliver real power. With knowledge of how data sets relate to one another, a lawyer can find caches of relevant data.