New England Biz Law Update

With today’s increased focus on diversity and inclusiveness in the workplace, some employment attorneys are reporting that employees are raising more concerns about so-called “reverse discrimination.” “People are generally more aware now that they may have legal rights in employment, ...

Plaintiffs who brought a class action accusing their former employer of breaching its fiduciary duties by mismanaging its employee retirement plan were not entitled to a jury trial, a U.S. District Court judge in Massachusetts has found. The plaintiffs sought ...

The CVS Pharmacy corporation was entitled to a preliminary injunction blocking the executive who ran its Caremark retail network from working for Amazon’s new online pharmacy, a U.S. District Court judge in Rhode Island has decided. Defendant John Lavin, who ...

Reversing its own precedent on the issue, a three-judge panel of the 1st U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals has held that the federal False Claims Act’s first-to-file rule is nonjurisdictional, thereby limiting a court’s analysis of competing first-to-file claims to ...

A manufacturer that alleged another company breached the implied warranty of merchantability by selling it defectively designed parts was not required to prove the defect was foreseeable by reasonable testing in order to sustain its claim, the 1st U.S. Circuit ...

A contract between two companies to develop renewable energy projects was not orally modified by a “mutual understanding” allegedly reached during mid-project conversations between the parties, a U.S. District Court judge in Rhode Island has ruled. Under a master agreement ...

California forum selection clauses in preliminary agreements for the acquisition of an eyewear company bound a non-signatory buyer that stepped in and purchased the target before the original deal could be closed, a U.S. District Court judge in Massachusetts has ...

Massachusetts’ Supreme Judicial Court in a recent decision refined its guidance for employers trying to assess whether a vacationing employee is abusing medical leave, practitioners say. DaPrato v. Massachusetts Water Resources Authority also reaffirms that a mistaken “honest belief” that ...

Summary judgment should not have been granted to an insurer that claimed an employer knowingly and intentionally deceived it into retroactively reinstating a canceled policy so as to cover a claimed workers’ compensation injury, the Workers’ Compensation Court Appellate Division ...

A former worker for a Chinese restaurant chain could satisfy the numerosity requirement for certification of a class action claim for unpaid “reporting pay,” even though the number of putative class members was unclear, the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court has ...