SOUTHEAST TEXAS RECORD

New York’s surprising decision to drop half its case against ExxonMobil in the closing arguments of a closely watched trial over climate-fraud claims was unusual and probably indicates the state never had the evidence it needed, said an experienced litigator who has handled environmental lawsuits for government clients.

BOSTON (Legal Newsline) - The sweeping lawsuit Massachusetts Attorney General Maura Healey has filed against ExxonMobil represents a serious attack on the First Amendment by accusing the company of expressing views about science the state disagrees with, said a law professor prominent in the field of freedom of expression and corporate speech.

Compounding the state’s problems is a series of courtroom miscues by its lawyers that have led Supreme Court Judge Barry Ostrager to criticize and belittle them multiple times since trial began Oct. 22.

BOSTON (Legal Newsline) - The federal judge who ordered a wide-ranging investigation into the fee practices of Labaton Sucharow and a Massachusetts law firm in the $300 million State Street Bank & Trust case isn’t done asking questions yet.

BOSTON (Legal Newsline) - Purdue Pharma is asking a Massachusetts court to dismiss the state’s lawsuit against it, calling sensational allegations of wrongdoing by company executives and members of the founding Sackler family “oversimplified scapegoating based on a distorted account of the facts.”

A small group of highly paid experts, one of whom recently testified his firm has made $30 million offering mostly pro-plaintiff testimony, are the key ingredient for more than 10,000 lawsuits claiming talcum powder is laced with deadly asbestos, forming the tip of an inverted pyramid upon which the rest of the cases depend.

May 15 was a busy day for the name partners at the Tyler, Texas-based Martin Walker law firm. Each billed 14.5 hours at $750 an hour, for a total of $21,750, to review lawsuits six Texas counties were preparing to file against opioid manufacturers and distributors that day.

CLEVELAND (Legal Newsline) - Plaintiffs in bellwether trials blaming the opioid industry for the nation's addiction crisis have allowed a Monday deadline to pass, apparently without turning over any proof of specific prescriptions that were made in error.

ST. LOUIS (Legal Newsline) - Partway through a trial over allegedly asbestos-tainted baby powder that ended with a $4.69 billion verdict against Johnson & Johnson in St. Louis earlier this year, attorney Mark Lanier whipped a knife from out of his pocket and held it over a large block of yellow cheese.

Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton has found that a Texas County has violated state law by refusing to comply with a request for the billing records of private attorneys the county hired to sue opioid manufacturers and distributors

When it hired outside lawyers to represent it in lawsuits against the opioid industry, Harris County agreed to pay a contingency fee of 35%, more than double the rate in Dallas County and equal to the highest in the state.