New England Biz Law Update

In the past year, the media have devoted much attention to cases in which an employer disciplined an employee for making negative comments about the workplace through Twitter, blogs and social networking sites.

Tagged with: Sept. 2011 issue

In a novel effort to support the provision of pro bono legal services by in-house counsel, the Massachusetts Access to Justice Commission, co-chaired by Justice Ralph D. Gants and David W. Rosenberg, convened the In-House Counsel Pro Bono Forum at ...

Tagged with: Sept. 2011 issue

Addressing the standards necessary to prove inequitable conduct in patent cases, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit, sitting en banc, recently added new contours to a doctrine that, in its words, “has plagued not only the courts but also the entire patent system.”

Tagged with: July 2011 issue

The U.S. Supreme Court recently issued three opinions involving intellectual property law. One deals with the extent to which the Bayh-Dole Act controls patent ownership, while the other two address the evidentiary standards needed to prove patent invalidity and inducement ...

Tagged with: July 2011 issue

Love them or hate them, non-competes are a fact of business in all states but California, Oklahoma and North Dakota. Whether your employee left and you need to enforce a non-compete, or you are hiring an employee subject to a ...

Tagged with: July 2011 issue

Many in-house counsel and the law firms they engage to represent their companies continue to self-collect electronic data, even though they recognize the legal issues and potential dangers involved.

Tagged with: July 2011 issue

In a significant decision for employers, the U.S. Supreme Court recently rejected an attempted nationwide class-action sex-discrimination lawsuit against Wal-Mart Stores, Inc.

Tagged with: July 2011 issue

The U.S. Supreme Court’s recent ruling in Matrixx Initiatives, Inc. v. Siracusano held that a company could be liable for a material misstatement that might have affected the “total mix” of information in the marketplace, even when that misstatement lacked ...

Tagged with: July 2011 issue

Hospital risk managers in Massachusetts may be blind-sided by a new wave of tort claims coming their way. The claims are not the malpractice actions that hospitals so often see. They have nothing to do with medical care and don’t arise out of activities in the ER, operating room or radiology lab.

Tagged with: July 2011 issue

Publicly traded companies and their subsidiaries and affiliates would be well-advised to start preparing now for the wave of Sarbanes-Oxley whistleblower claims that is currently sweeping the nation.

Tagged with: July 2011 issue