Bricker & Eckler invites you to attend our annual Ethics & Professionalism Seminar. This year's event features the following presentations and speakers: The Year in Review - Joseph Caligiuri, Ohio Disciplinary Counsel...more
A recent trend in discussions in the international arbitration industry involves the arbitrator’s role in suggesting settlement to the parties or even mediating the dispute. In some civil law countries, the practice of having...more
The IRS Independent Office of Appeals (“IRS Appeals”) was established to provide an “independent” IRS function that is separate and independent from the IRS’s compliance functions that maintain responsibility for collecting...more
Bricker & Eckler invites you to attend our annual Ethics & Professionalism Virtual Seminar. This year's event features the following presentations and speakers: The Year in Review - Joseph Caligiuri, Ohio Disciplinary...more
Problems, disagreements and claims arise in most large and complex construction projects regardless of the project delivery method — design-build, design-bid-build, construction manager at risk, construction manager not at...more
Communications with a party represented by another lawyer absent consent (sometimes called “blitzes”) are permitted in putative class actions, a federal court has ruled in a case brought under the Class Action Fairness Act...more
More than thirty years ago, the Washington Supreme Court ruled defense counsel may not engage in ex parte communications with a plaintiff’s treating physician. Loudon v. Mhyre, 110 Wn.2d 675, 676 (1988). The Loudon rule, as...more
A court of appeal held that a plaintiff did not have public interest standing to sue Coastal Commissioners for violating disclosure obligations concerning ex parte communications because the lawsuit was not brought as a...more
The Washington Supreme Court decided that a corporation's attorney-client privilege may protect communications with independent contractors and other non-employee agents in a recent decision styled Hermanson v. MultiCare...more
Bricker & Eckler invites you to attend our Ethics & Professionalism Virtual Seminar. This year's event features the following presentations and speakers: The Year in Review - Joseph Caliguiri, Ohio Disciplinary Counsel -...more
Affirming a Patent Trial and Appeal Board (Board) non-obviousness determination, the US Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit found that the Board did not abuse its discretion in sanctioning a patent owner who engaged in...more
On January 9, 2020, the Supreme Court of Virginia approved Legal Ethics Opinion (“LEO”) 1890, which comments on a number of issues under Virginia Rule of Professional Conduct 4.2, “Communication with Persons Represented by...more
The First Amendment guarantees the right to petition the government, which includes the right to participate in elections. These protections apply to individuals and businesses involved in paid and unpaid advocacy. ...more
Finding that several of the patent owner’s communications were improper ex parte communications, the Patent Trial and Appeal Board (PTAB) entered an order granting in part the petitioner’s motion for sanctions. Apple Inc. v....more
Under 37 C.F.R. § 42.5(d), communications with a Board member regarding a specific proceeding are not permitted “unless both parties have an opportunity to be involved in the communication.” This prohibition, however, does...more
In its recent decision in Hunt v. The Owners, Strata Plan LMS 2556, the British Columbia Court of Appeal (BCCA) held that private communications between an arbitration panel and only one party to the arbitration can give rise...more
At the end of 2017, the California Public Utilities Commission issued Resolution ALJ-344 which implements statutory amendments pursuant to Senate Bill (SB) 215, reflects changes in the Commission’s administration, streamlines...more
In the case of Weaver v. Myers, a sharply divided Florida Supreme Court recently struck down part of the 2013 amendments to Fla. Stats. §§766.106 and 766.1065, which govern the informal discovery process of the medical...more
The CFPB’s Ombudsman’s Office has issued its sixth annual report covering the Office’s activities during fiscal year 2017 (October 1, 2016 through September 30, 2017). The role of the Ombudsman’s Office is to assist in the...more
The Surface Transportation Board has taken a significant step in modernizing its regulatory processes by proposing to eliminate its long-standing prohibition on ex parte communications in its informal rulemaking proceedings....more
We are pleased to provide you with this edition of the firm’s Product Liability & Complex Litigation Update. This edition contains several articles by our attorneys that we hope you find interesting and informative from...more
The CFPB’s Ombudsman’s Office has issued its fifth annual report covering the Office’s activities during fiscal year 2016 (October 1, 2015 through September 30, 2016). The role of the Ombudsman’s Office is to assist in the...more
Anyone with business before the California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC) needs to be familiar with the CPUC’s rules governing ex parte communications. “Ex parte communications,” or “ex partes,” are direct, nonpublic...more
The Sixth Circuit recently held that a lower court erred by refusing to vacate an arbitration panel’s interim and final awards due to ex parte communications between one of the arbitrators and the attorney for the appellee,...more
A key tool for the defense of medical providers in Tennessee facing malpractice liability has been held to be not preempted by federal law. On June 3, 2016, the Tennessee Court of Appeals, in Caldwell v. Baptist Memorial...more