On June 27, 2014, the Appellate Court of Illinois, First District, held that a plaintiff’s common-law negligence action against her decedent’s employer was not barred by the exclusive remedy provision of Illinois’ workers’ compensation statutes[1] because her work comp claim would have been non-compensable as untimely under the law’s repose provisions.
The Decedent was allegedly exposed to asbestos at a plant owned by defendant Ferro Engineering (“Ferro”) from 1966 to 1970. Folta v. Ferro Engineering, 2014 IL App (1st) 123219, ¶ 1, (Ill. App. Ct. 1st Dist. June ...
In an attempt to placate those individuals who relish purchasing tickets and seating themselves in the stadium seats, professional sports teams have been mixing ingredients to concoct new forms of side entertainment. Sports enthusiasts are hard pressed to attend a sporting event where mascots aren't launching T-shirts into the stands, where the "kiss-cam" isn't plastered on the Jumbotron, or where remote control blimps aren't dropping coupons.
The Kansas City Royals ("Royals") baseball team is no exception. However, little did the Royals—or any professional sports ...
We’ve all heard the story of the Three Billy Goats Gruff—the one in which three goats need to cross a bridge in order to reach the lush meadow on the other side. But a hungry troll lived under the bridge, waiting to eat all those who dared to pass. The troll wasn’t very smart, though. After being tricked by three goats (you can find the full story here), the bridge troll was never heard from again.
Unfortunately for many US companies, that’s not the case with the modern-day patent troll. Although patent trolls may be smarter than the bridge troll of the children’s story, they are still ...
In United Fire and Casualty Co. v. Titan Contractors Service, Inc., No. 13-1307 (8th Cir. May 13, 2014), the Eighth Circuit weighed in on just how broad the pollution exclusion in a commercial general liability insurance policy is under Missouri law – which is, according to the Eighth Circuit, rather broad. In doing so, the Eighth Circuit declined to adopt the more narrow interpretation previously applied by the Court of Appeals for the Southern District of Missouri.
United Fire’s insured, Titan, provided construction-cleanup services. Part of these services included ...
“The Best Fans in Baseball” (or BFIB). That moniker long has been attributed to fans of the St. Louis Cardinals baseball team, or at least has been attributed by fans of that team to themselves. The original author of BFIB with respect to Cardinals’ fans remains something of a mystery-- with stories pointing to players such as Mark McGwire and Jim Edmonds, baseball commentators like Peter Gammons, former manager Tony LaRussa, or fellow manager (and Friend of Tony) Jim Leyland. The labeling of Cardinals’ fan as the BFIB has caused quite a backlash among fans from other teams ...
“Where did you go to high school?” is a peculiar St. Louis question that perplexes newcomers to the area. For the insurance savvy traveler here, a new question may replace it: “Where do you garage this vehicle that you propose to carry me and others for compensation or a fee?”
That sort of question may gain relevance due to the introduction of two new transportation networking companies in cities across the country, Uber and Lyft. These two companies offer mobile applications for iPhone, Android and Blackberry devices that connect consumers to drivers in select cities ...
A New York trial judge’s recent decision in Zurich American Insurance v. Sony Corporation of America has set the legal blogosphere aflutter with arguments and counter-arguments as to whether cyber liability and data breach claims fall within the “Personal and Advertising Injury Liability” coverage section (Coverage B) afforded by most commercial general liability (CGL) policies. A new set of data breach exclusionary endorsements, however, filed in many jurisdictions by Insurance Services Office, Inc. (ISO) and set to take effect this month, May 2014, appear poised to ...
In Sandifer et al. v. U.S. Steel Corp., No. 12-417 (Jan. 27, 2014), a unanimous Supreme Court recently affirmed a grant of summary judgment in favor of U.S. Steel Corp. (“Defendant”). The Court held that time spent by Plaintiffs, former and current employees of Defendant’s steelmaking facilities, donning and doffing protective gear at the beginning and end of each workday was not compensable under a collective bargaining agreement (“CBA”) between Defendant and Plaintiffs’ union. This holding was based on the Court’s finding that Plaintiffs’ donning and doffing ...
On April 9, 2014, the Seventh Circuit issued its opinion in Johnson v. Pushpin Holdings, LLC, No. 14-8006 (7th Cir. April 9, 2014). In Pushpin, the Seventh Circuit held that before a class is certified, a statement by the named plaintiff in the complaint does not limit the amount of potential damages that the class would be able to recover and, therefore, that named plaintiff could not thereby avoid removal under the Class Action Fairness Act (“CAFA”) by indicating that the complaint sought less than $5 million. In so ruling, the Seventh Circuit followed the binding precedent set by ...
The qualifications for a clerkship with a federal circuit judge are steep: high class ranking from a top law school, significant law review experience, recommendations from well-respected faculty, etc. Now another qualification may be added to that list: the ability to don and doff poultry sanitary gear in less than two minutes.
Such was the “experiment” performed by court staff at the United States Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit to help decide a case styled Mitchell v. JCG Industries, Inc. The majority opinion in that case, written by Judge Posner and joined by Judge ...
