Amazon and Epson sued two dozen entities and 10 John Does for selling counterfeit Epson products on Amazon from January 2023-February 2024, said a trademark infringement lawsuit Monday (docket 2:24-cv-00616) in U.S. District Court for Western Washington in Seattle.
A Fort Worth, Texas-based company that claimed to have favorable contracts with electricity providers to operate cryptocurrency asset mining machines profitably lied to investors about how it would operate the machines, alleged the SEC Wednesday in a securities fraud complaint Wednesday (docket 4:24-cv-00365) in U.S. District Court for North Texas in Fort Worth. The suit names as defendants Geosyn Mining and founders CEO Caleb Ward of Smyrna, Georgia, and Chief Operating Officer George McNutt of Weatherford, Texas.
Section 3 of the Federal Arbitration Act (FAA) “unequivocally forecloses” a court’s authority to dismiss rather than stay cases subject to arbitration provisions, said petitioners Wendy Smith, Michelle Martinez and Kenneth Turner in their U.S. Supreme Court reply brief Friday in Smith v. Spizzirri (docket 22-1218).
An organization’s information security team, led by its chief information security officer, “stands on the front lines against cyberattacks,” said roughly four dozen current and former CISOs in an amicus brief Friday (docket 1:23-cv-09518) at the U.S. District Court for Southern New York in Manhattan in support of SolarWinds’ motion to dismiss the SEC’s amended securities fraud complaint (see 2403250039).
Internet Archive's theory that its controlled digital lending (CDL) program is protected by fair use under the Copyright Act would have “devastating consequences” for the music, movie and news media industries if the 2nd U.S. Circuit Appeals Court reversed a lower court's decision, said an amicus brief Friday (docket 23-1260) from the Recording Industry Association of America, National Music Publishers’ Association, Motion Picture Association and the News/Media Alliance.
T-Mobile’s response is due Friday to a Roswell, Georgia, motion to appoint Ben Levitan as its substitute RF engineering expert in its long-standing cell tower fight with the carrier, said an order signed Friday (docket 1:10-cv-01464) by U.S. District Judge Amy Totenberg for Northern Georgia in Atlanta. The lawsuit turns 14 years old on May 13.
U.S. Magistrate Judge Susan Van Keulen for Northern California in San Jose denied plaintiff Bradford Clements’ motion for sanctions against T-Mobile for flouting the court’s Aug. 2 discovery order (see 2401040011), said the judge’s signed order Monday (docket 5:22-cv-07512). The request for sanctions is “procedurally improper” under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 37 and untimely under the Northern District of California Civil Local Rules, said the order. If Clements believed he was entitled to discovery responses that were more substantive, “then the appropriate next step would have been to bring a motion to compel,” it said. Such a motion would have provided the court with a timely understanding as to how and where T-Mobile’s responses were incomplete and evasive, as Clements contends, it said. Rule 37(a) “speaks to motions to compel discovery responses and the sanctions available if such a motion is granted," it said. But Clements didn’t move to compel responses and therefore can’t avail himself of Rule 37(a)’s remedies, it said. T-Mobile served written responses to Clements’ discovery requests, and Clements’ complaints about those responses should have come to the court “via a timely motion to compel,” it said. His complaint that T-Mobile refused to meet and confer following the Aug. 28 round of discovery responses “is well taken,” said the order. T-Mobile’s behavior in this regard “is in no way condoned” by the court by denial of this motion, it said.
The Republican attorneys general of Missouri and Louisiana, plus five individual social media users, are asking the U.S. Supreme Court to “rewrite” the constitutional boundary between the public and private sectors by affirming the 5th U.S. Circuit Appeals Court’s “sweeping and unprecedented” social media injunction against Biden administration officials (see 2309110001), said DOJ’s reply brief Monday in Murthy v. Missouri (docket 23-411). Oral argument is March 18.
CR Fitness seeks Rule 11 sanctions against plaintiff Ben Davis and his counsel for pursuing a “frivolous” Telephone Consumer Protection Act lawsuit, said its motion Friday (docket 8:23-cv-02333) in U.S. District Court for Middle Florida in Tampa. Davis alleges that CR Fitness, the largest U.S. franchisee of Crunch Fitness gyms, embarked on an aggressive marketing campaign to sell club memberships by placing unsolicited, prerecorded telemarketing robocalls to consumers (see 2310140001). Davis alleges that he received a single unsolicited voicemail from CR Fitness in violation of the TCPA, but the “fatal flaw” to his case is that CR Fitness “never called him,” said the defendant's motion. Davis and his counsel by now “are well aware that the alleged voicemail was not made directly by CR Fitness, on behalf of CR Fitness, or at CR Fitness’ direction,” it said. The company provided its call records showing it never called Davis, it said. Notwithstanding the evidence of “non-liability,” the plaintiff “refuses to dismiss this baseless action, a failure that is magnified by the nature of class action claims where ascertainability is crucial,” the motion said. “This action is frivolous and should be dismissed," with sanctions being imposed against Davis and his counsel “for bad faith pursuit of these claims,” it said.
U.S. District Judge Elizabeth Wolford for Western New York in Rochester found in favor of Crown Castle, Extenet and Verizon on their consolidated claim that Rochester violated Sections 253 and 332 of the Telecommunications Act in the unlawful manner in which it assessed fees for telecom deployments within its jurisdiction, said her signed decision and order Tuesday (dockets 6:19-cv-06583, 6:20-cv-06866 and 6:20-cv-07129). A two-day bench trial was convened in early June (see 2212200065).