Hueston Hennigan Obtains U.S. Supreme Court Review In Class Action Appeal

After the district court granted Nutraceutical’s motion to decertify Plaintiff Troy Lambert’s class action suit, the Ninth Circuit reversed, in an opinion that excused Plaintiff’s failure to timely file his petition for permission to appeal within the mandatory 14-day window set forth in Federal Rules of Appellate Procedure 23(f).  In its opinion, the Ninth Circuit acknowledged that its decision to excuse Plaintiff’s failure to timely file conflicted with decisions of the other United States Circuit Courts of Appeals that have considered the issue (including the Second, Third, Fourth, Fifth, Seventh, Tenth, and Eleventh).

Nutraceutical Corp. is represented by John C. Hueston and Joe Reiter of Hueston Hennigan LLP.

The case is captioned Nutraceutical Corp. v. Lambert, Dkt. No. 17-1094.

 

 

Allergan Defeats CoolSculpting Class Action

Granting the motion to dismiss, U.S. District Judge Dolly M. Gee held that Plaintiffs had failed to show why Zeltiq’s claims would mislead consumers, and adopted Zeltiq’s argument that Ninth Circuit law did not require the company to make any additional, affirmative disclosures.

“This is an important ruling, particularly for medical device manufacturers,” said Zeltiq lead counsel.  “We are pleased that the Court adopted our arguments on the case law, and granted dismissal of this putative class action at the pleadings stage.”

Zeltiq was represented by John Hueston, Doug Dixon and Matthew Kaiser

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Law360

 

Chambers USA 2018: Hueston Hennigan a Meteoric Success

Calling Hueston Hennigan a “highly regarded litigation boutique across both plaintiff and defense-side commercial cases,” the premier legal directory cited its bench of expert trial lawyers. With lawyers who are “incredibly responsive, quick, efficient and committed,” Hueston Hennigan is a “go-to firm for bet-the-farm litigation.”

The firm’s “powerhouse white collar criminal defense team” Chambers continued, boasts outstanding trial capabilities, “drawing from a high-quality bench of litigators which includes several former federal prosecutors.”

Name partners John Hueston and Brian Hennigan, who have both been repeatedly ranked as Band 1 attorneys, were singled out as “Notable Practioners.” Mr. Hueston, Mr. Hennigan and Partner Robert Klieger were previously named “Leaders in their Field.”

Mr. Hueston, described as a “dynamo,” is praised for his “intelligence, strategic vision and exceptional ability to see all angles and read human nature in any given situation.” And: “He is the best lawyer of his generation. He is razor sharp in every way. Whether in court, on paper or in his teams, he thinks ten steps ahead and never skips a beat.”

Mr. Hennigan is described by clients as “a real trial lawyer.” He received “considerable praise for his judgment and ability to handle extremely complex cases and achieve great results.” He widely regarded for his ability to apply his “wealth of experience” to individual and corporate representations in both litigations and investigations, achieving “great results.”

Mr. Klieger was ranked this year in the Media and Entertainment category, with Chambers noting that Mr. Klieger “is developing an impressive reputation for his handling of entertainment litigation. Sources describe him as “a really great lawyer and “beyond excellent as a writer.”

Since opening its doors in 2015, Hueston Hennigan has been ranked as a national Top 10 Boutique by Benchmark Litigation, named by Law360 as one of five top national trial boutiques, and one of California’s top boutiques by the Los Angeles Daily Journal. The firm’s clients include T-Mobile, Amazon.com, SpaceX, Tesla, Western Digital, Edison International and Southern California Edison, the Navajo Nation, Amgen, Sumner Redstone, the University of California, PricewaterhouseCoopers and many others.

London-based Chambers and Partners, is one of the World’s preeminent directories of law firms and lawyers, producing annual guides after months of objective, in-depth research.

 

Brian Hennigan Honored with CLAY Award

Mr. Hennigan was cited for his work with former California Supreme Court Justice Carlos R. Moreno in the high-profile investigation into allegations that the University of California’s Office of the President interfered with a state audit.

The UC Board of Regents hired the legal team last summer, after the state auditor publicly accused UC President Janet Napolitano’s office of revising answers on campus surveys.  Auditor Elaine M. Howle maintained that Napolitano’s office altered the answers to reflect more favorably on her performance.

Mr. Hennigan led the independent fact-finding project. The team reviewed more than 427,000 pieces of electronic data and documents, and it conducted dozens of interviews. The report ultimately found that although Napolitano knew surveys were being reviewed, there was insufficient evidence to conclude she knew about her aids’ systematic alteration of unfavorable responses.

Judge Moreno and Mr. Hennigan both said work of Michael Behrens, counsel at Hueston Hennigan, and Kasey Mitchell, an associate at the firm, as instrumental to the investigation.

IMDb Age Law Declared Unconstitutional

From Law360.com

A federal judge ruled Tuesday that a California law requiring IMDb to remove an actor’s age information upon request, an effort to fight age discrimination, was “clearly unconstitutional.” Ruling that “regulation of speech must be a last resort,” U.S. District Judge Vince Chhabria said the state should have tried less invasive options, like beefing up existing discrimination rules, rather than “censor a source of truthful information.”  (more…)

Gold King Contractor to Face Navajo Nation Claims

Environmental Restoration LLC, which contracted with the EPA to work at the Colorado mine and is allegedly partly responsible for the disaster that polluted two rivers that flowed into the Navajo Nation and New Mexico, had asked U.S. District Judge M. Christina Armijo to toss the lawsuits, but the judge found there was enough evidence to proceed with most of the plaintiffs’ claims.

The judge first declined to toss the state and Navajo Nation’s Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation and Liability Act claims for cost recovery and injunctive relief. In particular, she rejected Environmental Restoration’s assertion that is was not a facility “operator” as defined by CERCLA.

She noted that the company was one of the parties present and working at the site on Aug. 4 and Aug. 5, 2015.

Read more in Law360  By Juan Carlos Rodriguez

The Navajo Nation is represented by John Hueston, Moez Kaba, Andrew Walsh, and Kasey Mitchell.

 

DOJ Memo Signals Qui Tam Sea Change

Memo suggests shift in DOJ’s qui tam approach

By Brian Hennigan and Padraic Foran

The Department of Justice issued an internal memorandum this month that signals a shift in its approach to qui tam actions, encouraging government attorneys to act more aggressively to dismiss certain False Claims Act cases. Whether this policy will actually result in more dismissals remains to be seen. But the policy is a welcome one, especially for defendants. It also has immediate and significant implications for all qui tam litigants, especially those in the pre-intervention stage.

In every qui tam action filed under the False Claims Act, 31 U.S. Section 3739, the government is authorized to investigate and decide whether to intervene — that is, take over the litigation. About 75 percent of the time, the government declines to do so. But the scant 25 percent of cases in which it does intervene account for the overwhelming majority of recoveries. In 2017, more than 87% of total qui tam recoveries (3,011,269,763) came from intervention cases. Non-intervention cases accounted for less than 13 percent of recoveries (or $425,767,335). In 2016, non-intervenors fared even worse, accounting for just 4 percent of total recoveries.

Despite the low success rate of non-intervention cases, the government seldom seeks their dismissal. Yet dismissal, according to the memo, is necessary if the DOJ is to perform its “important gateway keeper role in protecting the False Claims Act.” And until this month, there have not been formal guidelines for seeking dismissals.

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