New England Biz Law Update

A college whose financial aid director committed fraud could sue its auditor under the doctrine of in pari delicto, the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court has ruled, finding that because the employee was not a member of senior management, her conduct ...

An arbitration panel erred in awarding attorneys’ fees to a broker in a wrongful termination and defamation case she successfully brought against the securities firm that fired her, a U.S. District Court judge in Massachusetts has decided. The broker, Cheryle ...

A water-treatment company could not sue a blogger for defamation over allegedly inflammatory posts he wrote about the company on his website, a U.S. District Court judge in Rhode Island has ruled. Defendant Brian MacFarland, who blogs about companies that ...

A federal judge has ruled that a cleaning company was not a “joint employer” for purposes of a wage claim under the Fair Labor Standards Act and the Rhode Island Minimum Wage Act. Integral to the summary judgment ruling in ...

Now that the U.S. Supreme Court has settled the question of the enforceability of class-action waivers in employment arbitration agreements, plaintiffs’ attorneys are weighing their remaining options for protecting workers from widespread violations of state and federal law. The Supreme ...

Managing partners at small and mid-size firms aren’t anticipating a trickle-down effect on attorney compensation in the Boston market from Big Law’s scramble to offer first-year associates annual salaries of $190,000 or more. Instead, the consensus is that the smaller ...

The Rhode Island Supreme Court has reversed a Superior Court judge’s decision to dismiss a claim brought under the Rhode Island Whistleblowers’ Protection Act by a plaintiff employee of a defendant Delaware corporation doing business in Rhode Island. The court ...

A jury’s award of unpaid future sales commissions could not be trebled under the Massachusetts Wage Act, a Superior Court judge in the Business Litigation Session has ruled. In an opinion disposing of post-trial motions, Judge Kenneth W. Salinger determined ...

Employers have their work cut out for them if they want to ensure that workers they consider to be independent contractors do not at some point in the future have tenable grounds to claim they should have been classified as ...

An employee could bring a retaliation claim under the federal Family and Medical Leave Act even though his employer was not covered by the statute, a U.S. magistrate judge has ruled. The plaintiff employee, Joseph Reid, took 17 weeks of ...