Episode 322 -- Checking in on Caremark Cases
Delaware court declines to enforce restrictive covenants in LLC agreement but grants interlocutory appeal. In Sunder Energy v. Jackson, et al., a company, Sunder, sued a former employee, Jackson, for breaching a...more
Nearly a decade ago, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit issued three decisions clarifying and tightening the standard for asserting plausible overtime claims under the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) in the...more
The Ending Forced Arbitration of Sexual Assault and Sexual Harassment Act of 2021 (the “EFAA”) has been law for just over a year. The bill was signed by President Biden on March 3, 2022, and amended the Federal Arbitration...more
On November 30, 2022, the Third Circuit Court of Appeals vacated dismissal of a retaliation action brought by Don Ascolese (“Ascolese”) under the False Claims Act (“FCA”). See United States ex rel. Don Ascolese v. Shoemaker...more
The False Claims Act encourages whistleblowers to come forward when they suspect their employer is committing fraud. This post provides a general overview of the False Claims Act’s anti-retaliation provision, which protects...more
This week, the Court tackles the jurisdictional implications of California’s attempt to limit the abusive filing of Unruh Act claims with heightened procedural requirements applied only in state court. ARROYO JR. v....more
On September 21, 2020, in a published 2-1 opinion in Doe v. Google Inc., the California Court of Appeal (Dist. 1, Div. 4), permitted three current and former Google employees to proceed with their challenge of Google’s...more
This week, we take a look at two Ninth Circuit decisions concerning the employer-employee relationship. In the first, the Court let the lawsuit against the NFL for its negligent handling of drug distribution to its injured...more
Section 1981 of the Civil Rights Act of 1866 prohibits discrimination on the basis of race in the making of contracts, including employment contracts. Section 1981 is often used by employees suing for race discrimination as...more
Editor's Overview - Happy New Year. We wrap-up 2019 with an article that reflects on significant developments in ERISA litigation during 2019, and takes a look at what's on the horizon for 2020. The courts (at all levels)...more
On May 23, 2019, the Illinois Supreme Court issued a ruling in Kenrick Roberts v. Board of Trustees of Community College District No. 508, reaffirming the pleading standards for both common law retaliatory discharge and...more
Employment law is full of burden-shifting, prima facie standards and evidentiary hurdles. Sometimes, even the courts apply the wrong standard at the wrong stage of a case. That appears to be what happened in the case of...more
April was a red-hot month for independent contractor misclassification cases. We report below on 11 cases in the courts and two before administrative agencies involving...more
A Second Circuit panel recently revived a former employee’s racial discrimination suit against New York City, reversing in part the Southern District of New York’s dismissal of her case. In Littlejohn v. City of New York,...more
On February 6, 2015, the Supreme Court of the Virgin Islands issued a decision that addresses several aspects of territorial laws prohibiting discrimination and limiting the permissible reasons for discharging employees....more
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit makes pleading Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) violations more difficult by applying the heightened standard in Bell Atlantic Corp. v. Twombly, 550 U.S. 544 (2007), and Ashcroft...more
“You have been sued.” Upon reading these first few words of a state court citation, most Texas employers—indeed, most employers—make it their first order of business to remove the case to federal court if at all possible....more
The New York Court of Appeals recently ruled that a whistleblower need not plead the specific “law, rule or regulation” that the employer purportedly violated to state a cause of action under the New York whistleblower...more