Bit Parts
February 27, 2007
Stan Soocher's roundup of the news you need to know.
Music Report Meets Rule 702 Requirements
February 27, 2007
The U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York decided that opinion testimony of a copyright-infringement musicologist that was consistent with his infringement-analysis report would be admissible expert evidence, if needed. <i>Velez v. Sony Discos</i>, 05 Civ. 0615(PKC).
Powerhouse Industry Firm Divorces
February 27, 2007
Marshall Grossman and Stanton 'Larry' Stein may be in for some awkward elevator rides. The two heavyweights at L.A.'s Alschuler Grossman Stein & Kahan officially divorced Jan. 1, after a year-long tug-of-war over the future of the 90-lawyer firm they'd fused together seven years ago. Now they've got their own firms, but they're just one floor away in Santa Monica's Water Garden building.
Cameo Clips
February 27, 2007
Recent rulings of interest.
State Consumer Protection Law: A New Path to Medical Monitoring Class Actions?
February 27, 2007
Medical monitoring is often pursued as a claim in class actions against corporate defendants based on exposures to environmental pollutants or products that allegedly have the potential to cause future health problems. Because medical monitoring is an exception to the general requirement that the plaintiff must have a present injury in order to pursue a claim, many jurisdictions have adopted strict elements that a plaintiff must satisfy in order to succeed on a medical monitoring claim. These elements often require the court to consider issues specific to individual plaintiffs, particularly aspects of each plaintiff's medical history that have an impact on the need for or the extent of the proposed medical monitoring. As a result of these individual medical issues, many courts in recent years have refused to certify medical monitoring class actions. <i>See, e.g., Ball v. Union Carbide Corp.</i>, 385 F.3d 713, 727-28 (6th Cir. 2004); <i>Zinser v. Accufix Research Inst., Inc.</i>, 253 F. 3d 1180, 1195-96, <i>amended,</i> 273 F.3d 1266 (9th Cir. 2001); <i>Barnes v. Am. Tobacco Co.</i>, 161 F.3d 127, 143 (3d Cir. 1998); <i>Boughton v. Cotter Corp.</i>, 65 F.3d 823, 827 (10th Cir. 1995).
Sarbanes-Oxley Act Offers Recording Artists Potent Tool for Challenging Label Operations
February 27, 2007
Armed with a 'blue sky' law passed in 2002, new Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) regulations and a general shareholder mood of discontent that is turning into activism, artists have an unprecedented opportunity to seek meaningful corporate reform and oversight of the music industry through the corporate boardroom. What they couldn't accomplish as disgruntled artists, they may be able to accomplish as disgruntled shareholders.
The Consumer Expectation Test: Fostering Unreasonable Expectations of Safety
February 27, 2007
Automakers have implemented an incredible amount of safety features into vehicles over the past century. For as long as automakers have been implementing those features into vehicles, however, they have had to defend themselves against critics and purported safety advocates wanting to know why a particular safety innovation was not implemented sooner and why it was not more effective, as consumers 'expected.' On their face, many safety-related criticisms appear valid, given that in 2005 alone, more than 2.7 million people were killed or injured in more than six million police-reported traffic accidents. <i>See</i> NHTSA's National Center for Statistics & Analysis, <i>Motor Vehicle Traffic Crash Fatalities and Injuries — 2005 Projections</i>, DOT HS-810-583 (2006), available at <i>www-nrd.nhtsa.dot.gov/ pdf/nrd30/NCSA/PPT/2006/810583.pdf.</i>
