Corporate Law

How GlaxoSmithKline changed the way it buys legal services (video)

Silvia Hodges Silverstein, adjunct professor at Columbia Law School, and Heidi Gardner, assistant professor at Harvard Business School talk with Bloomberg Law’s Lee Pacchia about how pharmaceutical giant GlaxoSmithKline introduced procurement practices into its retention of outside counsel. Silverstein describes GlaxoSmithKline’s sourcing room events, which firms are invited to after…

Oct 24, 2013 5:00 PM CDT

Goldman Sachs must pay legal bills for programmer it accused in code-theft case, federal judge rules

Goldman Sachs Group accused its former computer programmer Sergey Aleynikov of stealing its confidential source code. Now the company must pay his legal bills, a federal judge in Newark, N.J., has ruled. “Immediate advancement of fees is required, subject only to an unsecured undertaking to repay them if the applicant…

Oct 24, 2013 3:30 PM CDT

3rd Circuit says Delaware Chancery Court’s secret arbitration program trials violated 1st Amendment

A divided federal appeals court Wednesday said a novel attempt by a highly regarded state court to offer an alternative to private arbitration of corporate matters violates the First Amendment because it involves secret trials. Upholding a lower court’s determination but applying a somewhat different line of reasoning to arrive…

Oct 23, 2013 7:05 PM CDT

Black student says he was detained for buying a $349 belt at upscale store, files civil rights suit

Updated: A black engineering student who says he was handcuffed and taken in for questioning by police after purchasing a $349 belt at a well-known New York City store has filed a civil rights suit. Trayon Christian, now 19, contends in the Manhattan Supreme Court suit that he was targeted…

Oct 22, 2013 11:14 PM CDT

Survey says half of in-house law depts have outsourced legal work, most were happy with results

More than half of the corporate law departments that responded to a recent survey said they have outsourced legal work, and over two-thirds said they were satisified or very satisfied with the results. Nearly another third said they were somewhat satisfied. But there was some potential good news for American…

Oct 22, 2013 9:45 PM CDT

Man implements $200M estate plan, but dies before signing will; sons file unjust enrichment suit

Henry Faison already had a will. And, when an accountant suggested the North Carolina real estate developer revise it, he asked a well-regarded law firm to set up a charitable foundation (named after his dog) to minimize estate tax on some $200 million in personal assets. Then, just as he…

Oct 21, 2013 11:20 PM CDT

Baker & McKenzie wins damages retrial in driller’s $103M malpractice case

There was good news and bad news for Baker & McKenzie in a Mississippi Supreme Court opinion issued Thursday. The good news is that a new trial will be held on proximate cause and the $103 million in damages awarded in a legal malpractice and breach-of-contract case that contends the…

Oct 18, 2013 9:40 PM CDT

As laws are passed allowing guns in parked cars at work, attorneys advise employers on safety rules

Last year, 375 people were killed in workplace shootings, according to U.S. Department of Labor statistics. Those at workplaces where employers allow guns and other weapons were five times as likely to be victims, according to a North Carolina study published in 2005. Nonetheless, lawmakers throughout the country have enacted…

Oct 17, 2013 3:15 PM CDT

Billionaire Mark Cuban wins SEC insider-trading case, calls lead trial lawyer for agency ‘a bully’

A high-profile insider-trading case against the billionaire owner of the Dallas Mavericks has ended badly for the government. A federal jury in Dallas deliberated for less than a day before finding Mark Cuban not liable in the civil case brought by the Securities and Exchange Commission, Bloomberg reports. He had…

Oct 16, 2013 9:45 PM CDT

Racketeering case filed by Chevron against lawyer who won $18B enviro award goes to trial

Having won an $18 billion environmental judgment against a deep-pockets corporate defendant after nearly two decades of litigation, attorney Steven Donziger, one might think, would be living high on the hog. Instead, the Harvard Law School graduate is a defendant in a civil racketeering trial brought by Chevron Corp. Trial…

Oct 16, 2013 7:10 PM CDT

Fertilizer company fined $118K by OSHA over April explosion that killed 15

The owner of a fertilizer depot in West, Texas, at which a fatal explosion occurred in April has been cited by the Occupational Safety and Health Administration and fined $118,300. The two dozen alleged violations included unsafe handling and storage of some 540,000 pounds of ammonium nitrate, a fertilizer component…

Oct 11, 2013 6:20 PM CDT

Suit says those with most United frequent flier miles pay more for redeemed hotels and flights

Those with the most frequent flier miles in their United Airlines accounts are charged higher redemption rates for hotels and flights, contends a lawsuit filed Tuesday in federal court in New Jersey. Seeking class action status, plaintiffs Robert Gordon and Melissa Chan said they found out about the double-standard when…

Oct 10, 2013 6:45 PM CDT

Ex-CEO blames lawyer for 20-year prison term in $800M fraud case, seeks do-over

Saying his lawyer misled him about the terms of a potential plea deal, the former CEO of LeNature’s Inc. has moved to vacate his 20-year federal prison term and is seeking to unseal the transcript of a sidebar hearing at sentencing in the Pittsburgh case that he says will prove…

Oct 8, 2013 5:20 PM CDT

$5M gift to University of Chicago Law School paves way for business leadership program

Law students at the University of Chicago who want the option to lead or advise businesses will be able to take special classes to prepare them, thanks to a $5 million gift from a high-profile alum. Bloomberg chief executive Daniel Doctoroff and his wife, Alisa Doctoroff, president of UJA-Federation of…

Oct 3, 2013 12:15 PM CDT

Defense verdict reached in Michael Jackson wrongful death case: No award to singer’s survivors

Updated: A Los Angeles jury has reached a verdict in the wrongful death case filed by Michael Jackson’s family against the concert promoter that paid the salary of the personal physician convicted of involuntary manslaughter for giving him a potent intravenous anesthetic. Announced at approximately 3:35 p.m., California time, on…

Oct 2, 2013 10:25 PM CDT