T-Mobile’s opening brief is due March 8 at the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit for review of an unfavorable ruling from the National Labor Relations Board over the company’s attempt to combat unionization efforts at a Kansas call center, said a Thursday clerk’s order (docket 22-1275). The NLRB’s response is due April 7, followed by intervenor Communications Workers of America’s brief April 14. The court set a May 5 deadline for T-Mobile’s reply brief.

Plaintiffs Qwest, Level 3 and Global Crossing and defendant Peerless Network affiliates in eight states hired Frank Lamancusa of Morgan Lewis as a private mediator in their interconnect agreements dispute, said the parties in a joint status report (docket 1:21-cv-03004) posted Thursday in U.S. District Court for Colorado in Denver. Lamancusa is a former DOJ and FCC attorney who also is a professional mediator and arbitrator for the International Center for Dispute Resolution, said the report. The parties scheduled a mediation session Feb. 7-8, “with additional discussion or negotiation to follow if necessary,” it said. The case involves negotiated interconnect agreements and the access tariffs associated with them. Qwest, Level 3 and Global Crossing sued the Peerless affiliates in November 2021, alleging they engaged in a scheme of avoiding mandatory switched access charges, thereby giving them an unfair competitive advantage in the toll-free marketplace (see 2211030043). The defendants countersued in March, alleging the telecom companies used unfair and unsupported billing methods, to the detriment of the Peerless affiliates.

Good cause exists for a confidentiality order that’s “appropriately tailored” for governing the pretrial phase of Verizon’s legal fight with its debt collector, CBE Customer Solutions, said a protective order signed Tuesday (docket 1:22-cv-08703) by U.S. District Judge Jed Rakoff for Southern New York. Any witness exposed to confidential discovery materials must first sign a nondisclosure agreement, said the order. Counsel will hold the NDA in escrow and produce it for opposing counsel before a witness is permitted to testify at deposition or trial or at the conclusion of the litigation, whichever comes first, it said. Verizon’s complaint alleges CBE won’t honor an indemnification agreement between the parties to repay nearly $6.1 million in damages and court costs the carrier spent in negotiating, finalizing and executing a Telephone Consumer Protection Act class-action settlement (see 2210140026). CBE countersued in November, alleging any negligence that mushroomed into a TCPA class action and settlement was of Verizon’s own doing, not CBE’s (see 2211210034).

U.S. Magistrate Judge Jeffrey Gilbert granted in part, denied in part and in part held under advisement motions by plaintiffs Craigville Telephone and Consolidated Telephone to compel production of documents and to compel with related interrogatories in their class action against T-Mobile over false ringtones, said a Monday order (docket 1:19-cv-07190) in U.S. District Court for Northern Illinois in Chicago (2212270012). Gilbert denied requests for production (RFPs) involving internal discussions between T-Mobile and Inteliquent, saying the RFPs were “overbroad” and sought documents not relevant to the needs of the case. Documents about calls placed by T-Mobile customers in rural areas in the same manner as local ring back tone (LRBT) issues cited in plaintiffs’ complaint “may or may not” contain relevant information; the court needs more information to make that determination, it said. Gilbert granted plaintiffs’ motion for RFP No. 58, saying plaintiffs are entitled to discover more about the economics of the T-Mobile-Inteliquent relationship than simply the end result of master service agreement negotiations. An RFP seeking all instant messages that mention the letter of intent or the FCC during a one-month period isn’t relevant or proportional to the needs of the case, Gilbert said. T-Mobile already produced a “substantial volume of responsive discovery," but plaintiffs did establish at least the relevance and proportionality of discovering any communications that occurred between T-Mobile and Inteliquent about the letter of inquiry or FCC investigation, “notwithstanding TMUS’s protestations that no such communications exist,” he said. Gilbert ordered the parties to meet within 30 days to confer about a narrow list of search terms on the alleged conspiracy between T-Mobile and Inteliquent, and T-Mobile “shall produce responsive documents, if any” within a reasonable time. Gilbert denied the motion to produce Form 480 requirements of the 2013 rural call completion order, saying information already provided by T-Mobile is adequate. The defendant agreed to produce a written description of the methodology it used to arrive at LRBT call estimates, and the data used to calculate them, but only if plaintiffs would agree production of the information doesn’t constitute a subject matter waiver of T-Mobile’s claims that the attorney-client privilege and work product doctrine cover information and documents on call estimates, Gilbert said. Plaintiffs don’t have to accept the terms. If the parties can’t agree on TMUS’ response to plaintiffs’ interrogatories within 21 days, the court will consider whether to appoint a special master to help work through claims, the order said.

RediBag seeks an order compelling AT&T to produce emails relevant to a lawsuit it’s pursuing against a former sales broker for misappropriating RediBag’s trade secrets, said its motion Friday (docket 1:23-mc-00028) in U.S. District Court for Delaware. RediBag, which supplies plastic and paper bags to supermarkets, learned through discovery that the former broker, John Maierhoffer, communicated with RediBag’s competitors through his AT&T-owned BellSouth email address, said the motion. RediBag subpoenaed AT&T Dec. 9 for copies of Maierhoffer’s emails, including those he admitted to deleting, plus the metadata of those emails, it said: “RediBag wants to see the content of the emails and to determine when they were deleted (including whether they were deleted when Maierhoffer knew or should have known that litigation was underway or imminent).” RediBag’s motion alleges AT&T is dragging its feet on the subpoena, citing the referral of one AT&T representative to Yahoo as the company that’s in possession of the missing emails. An internet search reveals that Yahoo “is under contract with AT&T to provide certain services to AT&T customers with various types of email addresses,” including BellSouth email addresses, it said. “In an abundance of caution, RediBag also has subpoenaed Yahoo, which has not yet responded,” it said. “In other words, publicly available evidence suggests that AT&T has the practical ability to obtain the requested documents.” Several websites visited by RediBag attorneys as recently as Friday show “a relationship between Yahoo and AT&T that almost certainly provides AT&T with the practical ability to obtain the emails of users” with BellSouth email addresses, including Maierhoffer’s, it said. AT&T didn’t comment Monday.

Plaintiff Brian Youngblood reached a settlement with Amazon on Youngblood’s class-action allegations that Amazon violated the Magnuson-Moss Warranty Act (see 2212210062|), said a joint stipulation Friday (docket 2:22-cv-09220) in U.S. District Court for Central California in Los Angeles. The parties agreed Youngblood would voluntarily dismiss his claims with prejudice and that each side would bear its own court costs, said the stipulation. Amazon denies it violated the MMWA or any other law, and denies “a class can be certified,” it said. “Amazon nonetheless has agreed to implement certain practice changes” that Youngblood believes “adequately address his concerns in this action,” said the stipulation, without specifying those changes. Amazon didn’t respond to requests for comment Monday about the specific changes it agreed to implement and when. Youngblood’s class action alleged Amazon failed to give consumers presale access to written product warranties, and claimed its MMWA noncompliance was designed to steer consumers to buy its own extended warranty packages.

Though lead plaintiff Walleye Group alleged in its second amended complaint (SAC) that the securities litigation it brought involving Intelsat stock was “the quintessential insider trading case” (see 2211290056), the SAC “adds nothing” about the Silver Lake defendants, “literally, not a word,” said the defendants’ motion to dismiss Thursday (docket 4:20-cv-02341) in U.S. District Court for Northern California in Oakland. Though the court previously dismissed Walleye’s claims against the Silver Lake defendants for three independent reasons, but provided leave to amend, the SAC gave the court “no reason to revisit its prior ruling,” said the defendants. “The SAC should be dismissed with prejudice.” U.S. District Judge Jeffrey White told Walleye in his Sept. 29 that if it chose to amend, it needed to address its theory of how four of the six Silver Lake defendants who never held shares of Intelsat stocks could be held liable for insider trading, said the defendants. Walleye’s response to that directive “is short on words but long on meaning,” they said. Walleye added “not one word to any of its allegations regarding Silver Lake,” declining the opportunity to address any of the facts and documents already highlighted by the court, they said. Walleye “did not, and apparently could not, add a single word that might address why Silver Lake belongs in this case at all,” they said.

The Superior Court of California in San Diego County granted most of DirecTV's motion to strike Herring Network's complaint over Herring's One America News being dropped from the MVPD, per an order last week (docket 37-2022-00008623) by Judge John Meyer. Surviving is a breach of contract claim on DirecTV disclosing the expiration date of the affiliation agreement when it told news media about OAN being dropped. Meyer said DirecTV's decision about what channels to carry "is conduct in furtherance of its constitutional right of free speech in connection with issues of public interest." He said nothing in the confidentially agreement between the two covers agreements that the parties may or may not enter in the future. He overruled a demurrer by DirecTV about the surviving claim, saying Herring could be entitled to "nominal damages" for the breach of the confidentiality provision agreement. “We are grateful that the Court has ruled in One America News’ favor by allowing our Breach of Contract claim to proceed against DirecTV in earnest," Herring outside counsel Eric Early of Early Sullivan emailed us Tuesday.

A U.S. District judge for Southern New York signed an order Wednesday (docket 1:22-cv-10119) staying briefing on Jiakeshu Technology’s petition to vacate an arbitration ruling in Amazon’s favor pending resolution of Jiakeshu’s motion to remand the petition to New York Supreme Court where the petition originated. Amazon sought the clarification Tuesday (see 2301110005). Judge Ronnie Abrams’ Dec. 22 order sets a Feb. 10 deadline for Amazon to oppose Jiakeshu’s motion to remand. Jiakeshu seeks recovery of $50,000 in sales proceeds that an arbitrator let Amazon keep after Amazon deactivated Jiakeshu’s third-party store for improperly paying customers to submit positive reviews.

Nexstar and Charter settled their legal battle over a retransmission consent agreement for Mission Broadcasting’s WPIX New York, according to a filing Monday in the superior court of Delaware. Nexstar reached a settlement in a related court proceeding with Comcast in the U.S. District Court for Southern New York last month (see 2212200057). Both breach of contract cases began after Nexstar sought to apply clauses to WPIX’s retransmission consent contracts after Mission acquired WPIX. Nexstar operates all of Mission's stations through sharing arrangements. In Monday’s filing, Nexstar and Charter asked the court to stay the proceeding in anticipation of the companies requesting a voluntary dismissal in the wake of the settlement. Nexstar and Charter didn’t comment on the terms of the settlement.