Page 2 - Jared Foretek News Today

A D.C. federal judge hinted that he was considering granting a collective of environmental groups' request to undo the transfer of a key environmental permitting step from the federal government to Florida state regulators, a move the groups say threatens protections for endangered species.

A cable television and internet industry group told the Federal Communications Commission that it broadly supports the commission's proposal for mandatory participation in the Disaster Information Reporting System, but asked that service providers be allowed more time to report the status of their networks when the disaster system is activated.

A split Ninth Circuit panel on Tuesday confirmed a $5.79 million arbitration award for the founders of now-defunct chemical technology firm called Novoform Cos., ruling that an investor, film producer James G. Robinson, had taken inconsistent positions and engaged in litigation gamesmanship by flipping on where the case should be heard.

The Federal Communications Commission is threatening to remove a New Jersey telecom company from its Robocall Mitigation Database, potentially requiring that voice service providers stop accepting its traffic if the company doesn't demonstrate its compliance with agency requirements to block illegal robocalls.

Federal Circuit judges expressed skepticism at arguments that the former CEO of Trading Technologies International Inc. is entitled to nearly $1 billion damages because IBG LLC infringed the company's dynamic trading display patents, with one panelist going so far as to call the former CEO's arguments "Jedi mind tricks."

Both sides of an antitrust class action against RealPage and a group of large landlords won victories in Tennessee federal court last week, as a group of multifamily housing renters beat the property management software company's motion to dismiss, but a separate group of student housing renters had their case tossed for failing to plausibly state a Sherman Act claim.

Three former U.S. attorneys general are backing a Cincinnati city councilor's appeal of his bribery conviction, arguing in a new amicus brief that the Supreme Court requires an explicitly stated quid pro quo to convict an elected official for bribery through campaign contributions. Otherwise, they say, commonplace solicitations from politicians can be considered criminal.

Caterpillar is moving for sanctions in its long-running antitrust dispute with International Construction Products, telling a Delaware federal judge that the now-defunct equipment supplier, which is accusing Caterpillar of tortious interference and boycott claims, failed to preserve important documents as employees left and the company shuttered.

New York-based private equity firm Welsh Carson Anderson & Stowe has been hit with new antitrust claims over its Texas anesthesia physicians group, this time by a Houston workers benefit fund in a proposed class action alleging the firm has effectively monopolized hospital anesthesia services in Texas to drive up costs.

The U.S. Department of Justice announced a settlement with Coffeyville Resources Refining & Marketing in Kansas, over allegations that the company's petroleum refinery violated a 2012 consent decree and the Clean Air Act, that includes $13 million in fines and a slate of other requirements.