A Guide To Electronically Stored Information (ESI)

On August 21, 2026, the Tenth Circuit granted the NCAA’s stay request in Wisne v. NCAA, temporarily restoring the NCAA’s age-based eligibility rules pending resolution of the appeal. Three weeks earlier, Judge Sweeney of the District of Colorado had issued a nationwide injunction that permitted athletes in the Class of 2022 to pursue a fifth year of eligibility.

The top ten largest class action settlements in securities cases in the U.S. have recouped tens of billions of dollars in damages.

This monthly newsletter examines critical developments in product liability and mass tort litigation, including FDA guidance on PFAS in medical devices, state-level AI regulation in legal practice...

A Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals ruling harshly criticizes a federal district judge for relying on AI-generated content in legal orders, revealing fabricated facts and poor legal analysis. The decision raises critical questions about the use of generative AI in legal practice and whether lawyers who adopt such technology are compromising their ethical obligations of competence, confidentiality, and integrity.

Two federal courts have reached opposing conclusions on whether expert witnesses must disclose their AI prompts during discovery. While one court treats prompts as discoverable methodology, another protects them as mental impressions while requiring disclosure of AI-generated outputs the expert consulted.

On the morning of July 4, 2025, catastrophic flooding on the Guadalupe River took 135 lives across the Texas Hill Country. Twenty-eight of them—25 school-aged campers, two young counselors and the camp's co-executive director—were at Camp Mystic, a century-old girls' camp near Hunt.

A federal court in California denied preliminary approval of a $2.3 million data breach settlement affecting over 220,000 individuals, finding seven critical deficiencies in the proposed agreement. The decision highlights the rigorous scrutiny courts apply to class action settlements, particularly regarding claims-made distribution processes, inadequate documentation of settlement value, and unexplained disparate treatment among class members.

A federal court rejected TikTok's attempt to use two prior nationwide class action settlements—totaling over $93 million—to dismiss new privacy claims brought by minors alleging violations of the Children's Online Privacy Protection Act. The ruling hinged on whether the current plaintiffs were demonstrably members of the earlier settlement classes based solely on the pleadings, raising critical questions about the scope and enforceability of broad settlement releases in successive privacy litiga

The U.S. Supreme Court will review a constitutional challenge to an 1868 federal law banning home distilleries, creating an opportunity to resolve a circuit split between the 5th and 6th Circuit Courts of Appeals. The case centers on whether the prohibition violates the Constitution's Taxation Clause or represents a legitimate exercise of congressional power to prevent tax evasion.

An ICC tribunal has ruled in favor of Galp in its dispute with Venture Global over the Calcasieu Pass LNG facility, finding that Venture Global breached its obligation to declare the facility operational in a timely manner. This decision adds to a series of contrasting outcomes in similar disputes involving other buyers, with damages yet to be determined in a hearing scheduled for 2027 or 2028.

On December 31, 2021, New York Governor Kathy Hochul closed the year by signing into law the Comprehensive Insurance Disclosure Act (S7052) to impose sweeping changes to the rules embodied...

Although being challenged by an injunction filed on August 20, 2026, by a coalition of 17 states, California’s SB 54 Plastic Pollution Prevention and Packaging Producer Responsibility Act is now in effect, and companies that sell, distribute, import, or ship packaged products into California should be evaluating whether they have compliance obligations.

Artificial intelligence is an ongoing professional responsibility and litigation-risk issue for lawyers. The California State Bar recently published new guidance. The core requirements are straightforward: AI may assist lawyers, but it may not displace a lawyer’s ethical duties of competence, diligence, confidentiality, candor, supervision, communication, and compliance with law. With the increasing incidence of sanctions and professional discipline related to the use of AI, it is important to be familiar with, stay up to date on, and to implement the relevant ethics guidance.

In Snyder v. Virginia Mason Medical Center, No. 104136-5 (Wash. Oct. 1, 2026), the Washington Supreme Court held that corporate defense counsel, risk managers, and claims adjusters may not communicate ex parte with a hospital’s former employee health care providers about patient care. The Court reaffirmed Loudon v. Mhyre, 110 Wn.2d 675, 756 P.2d 138 (1988) prohibiting ex parte communication by defense counsel with a plaintiff’s treating physicians, held that prejudice is presumed when Loudon is violated, and ruled that a quality improvement (QI) committee member’s involvement in defense strategy waives the committee’s statutory privilege under Wash. Rev. Code § 70.41.200.

On September 27, 2026, Governor Gavin Newsom signed Senate Bill 923 (Chapter 482, Statutes of 2026), known as the Expanding Privacy Rights Act. The law amends two provisions of the California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA): (1) the right to delete (Civil Code § 1798.105); and (2) the methods for submitting consumer requests (Civil Code § 1798.130). The legislation was authored by Senator Josh Becker (D-Menlo Park) and sponsored by the California Privacy Protection Agency (also known as CalPrivacy). This amendment takes effect January 1, 2027.

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Humanoid robots are entering American homes at an unprecedented pace, with companies like Figure AI, Unitree, and Tesla deploying AI-powered machines capable of learning and adapting in real time. As these autonomous devices become commonplace, outdated legal frameworks governing product liability, privacy protections, and insurance coverage face mounting pressure to address novel risks ranging from physical injuries to unauthorized biometric data collection.

In late 2025, Figure AI placed its third-generation humanoid robot into homes for alpha testing. The Figure 03 has hands with 16 degrees of freedom...

There are currently 19 states that legally require employers to permit employees (and sometimes former employees) to view and/or obtain a copy of their personnel file. As of November 8, 2026, that number will increase to 20, when New York’s recently enacted Personnel Records Access Law goes into effect. The majority of states have no law requiring access to personnel files and there is no federal law that confers on current or former employees a statutory right to access their personnel files.

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