Facebook May be On the Hook for Scanning Private Messages for Links
This is a privacy lawsuit against Facebook: Plaintiffs allege that Facebook scans the content of their private messages, and if there is a link to a web page contained in that message, Facebook treats it as a “like” of the…
Tweeted Article About Law Grad’s Suit Over Stalking Investigation Isn’t Defamatory
This is a defamation lawsuit brought by a law grad (Enjaian) against the legal press based on a story involving Enjaian’s own (personal) legal matter. (I blogged about the most recent example here: “Legal Blog Faces Defamation Liability for Mischaracterizing Prior…
Criminal Harassment Charges Survive First Amendment Challenge, Even Without The Threat of Personal Injury
This is a criminal harassment case. As recounted by the court, the Johnsons lived on the same street as the victims, the Lyonses. The Johnsons acquired some land adjacent to the Lyonses and sought to develop it, but ended up…
Facebook Putdown Leads to Lawsuit Between Sorority Sisters–Grimes v. Saban
This is an assault case brought by Sarah Grimes against her sorority sister, Kristen Saban. Grimes and Saban went out for a night of partying. Afterwards, Saban and Grimes were allegedly arguing, with Saban telling Grimes “no one liked her…
Stupid Online Teen Banter Isn’t “Disorderly Conduct”–State v. Nelson
We’re revisiting the perennial topic of how to address teens doing stupid teen things online. As we’ve discussed repeatedly, teens constantly test limits online and typically lack the wisdom and perspective of adults. In my era, typical offline teen pranks…
Fair Use Protects Sending Expert Witness’ Resume to Opposing Counsel–Devil’s Advocate v. Zurich Insurance
Most of us probably have never thought about the coprightability of our resumes or curriculum vitae. Most resumes are highly functional documents, i.e., we don’t write them for fun; and they are just an input into a more important output…
Appeals Court: Accepting Lawyer’s Prove-me-Wrong Challenge Does not Form a Contract
This is a great case where a defense lawyer made a passing statement that his client could not have committed a murder he was charged with due to the sheer impossibility of traveling logistics. The Defendant was spotted via surveillance…
Will A ‘Cast Of Thousands’ Become A ‘Cast Of Thousands…Of Plaintiffs’? A Preview of Garcia v. Google (Forbes Cross-Post)
[Note: I wrote the following post on Monday before the oral arguments. I haven’t had a chance to view Monday’s oral arguments, but from the news reports and Twitter feeds, it sounds like Kozinski and McKeown will be squaring off….
eBay Isn’t Liable for Selling Recalled Merchandise–Hinton v. Amazon
Due to Section 230, eBay generally isn’t liable when its merchants sell problematic goods. I believe the earliest ruling establishing this proposition is Stoner v. eBay, a 2000 case over bootleg recordings. More recently, in 2011, a court held that…
First Amendment Bars School Discipline For Student’s Rap Video About School Coaches
Bell was a student at Itawamba Agricultural High School in Fulton, Mississippi. A few female students told Bell that two male athletic coaches had made inappropriate comments toward them. Bell, an aspiring rapper, made a video about the two coaches….