The BLT: The Blog of Legal Times

The Morning Wrap

Objections Withdrawn: Three objectors to the $9.6 billion Deepwater Horizon oil spills settlement have voluntarily withdrawn their appeal, Amanda Bronstad of The National Law Journal reports.

Voice Missed: One key voice is missing from the debate on Capitol Hill on major reforms to the patent system—the head of the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office. That’s because there hasn't been a director for more than 10 months—and patent attorneys are highlighting the void, Todd Ruger of The National Law Journal reports.

Concussions Litigated: Ten former National Hockey League players have filed in a class-action lawsuit related to concussions, just three months after the National Football League agreed to pay $765 million to settle lawsuits from thousands of former players, The Associated Press reports.

Brent Snyder to Lead DOJ Antitrust Criminal Enforcement

Brent Snyder was named Monday a top prosecutor in the U.S. Department of Justice's antitrust division, where he will oversee criminal enforcement efforts, the department announced.

Snyder, who spent a decade a trial attorney in the antitrust division, was named a deputy assistant attorney general. He replaces Scott Hammond, who joined Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher in Washington as a partner earlier this month.

Snyder, a former Perkins Coie partner in Seattle, has been involved in many key criminal investigations since joining the Justice Department in 2003, the department said. He participated in the successful prosecutions of companies and executives in the LCD industry—including U.S. v. AU Optronics Corporation and U.S. v. Steven Leung.

Snyder secured the conviction of a high-level executive as a lead prosecutor in U.S. v. Frank Peake, a trial involving the coastal water freight transportation industry. He also was lauded for his work in an air transportation price-fixing investigation, the department said.

Iran Not Open to U.S. Businesses Under Nuclear Deal

Despite loosened trade sanctions against Iran following a historic nuclear deal with the country, U.S. companies will have few, if any, opportunities to cash in, according to international trade lawyers.

The six-month agreement the United States and other world powers made with Iran Saturday to curb the Islamic republic's nuclear program temporarily suspends various sanctions on precious metals, petrochemicals and the country's auto industry, allowing some non-U.S. companies to profit. The accord doesn't lift decades-long sanctions that prohibit most U.S. trade with Iran, except for medicine and food. The United States, however, pledged to make it easier to purchase U.S. food and medicine under existing rules that allow such humanitarian transactions.

Ferrari & Associates principal Erich Ferrari, whose Washington, D.C., firm specializes in U.S. economic sanctions matters, said the deal was a "symbolic step forward." The agreement didn't force the United States to cede much ground to Iran and is unlikely to have a major impact on the Iranian economy, he said.

Williams & Connolly Defeats Disqualification Attempt

Williams & Connolly can continue to represent the son of one of the firm’s partners in a business dispute in court, a Washington federal judge has ruled.

Brendan Sullivan III, the son of Williams & Connolly partner Brendan Sullivan Jr., sued his former business partner Robert Elwood in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia after the two had a falling out over management of a multimillion-dollar youth sports program.

Sullivan accused Elwood of stealing from the business—Headfirst Baseball LLC and related entities—and interfering after he was fired. Elwood, in his counterclaims, said Sullivan knew about and approved of his spending practices, and claimed Sullivan was trying to push him out to avoid sharing profits as the company became more valuable.

This Week in The National Law Journal

Views Telegraphed: U.S. Supreme Court justices don't only speak through formal decisions, instead they are using a range of other vehicles to influence the court's agenda and telegraph their views to lower court judges, practitioners and to each other, Tony Mauro reports.

Pasts Escaped: The National Law Journal took a look back at eight scandals that rocked the legal profession—including with John Edwards' return to practice last week—and what the lawyers involved are up to today, Zoe Tillman reports.

Arguments Lost: Of all the intractable, unwinnable positions that U.S. Department of Justice lawyers are bound to defend, few can rival the fight over the storage of spent nuclear fuel, Jenna Greene reports.

The Morning Wrap

Iran Deal: Secretary of State John Kerry in media interviews Sunday defended a deal that the United States and other world powers reached with Iran over its nuclear program, The Washington Post reports. The agreement, which stops pivotal parts of Iran's nuclear program in exchange for temporary relief on some economic sanctions, doesn't recognize an Iranian "right to enrich" uranium, Kerry said on ABC's "This Week."

NSA Case: Lawyers for the American Civil Liberties Union Friday urged a federal judge in New York to stop the National Security Agency's phone call monitoring, the New York Law Journal reports.

Bird Settlement: Duke Energy Corp. has agreed to pay $1 million to resolve allegations that its wind energy facilities broke environmental laws protecting birds, The Associated Press reports. Duke Energy is the first wind energy company to face charges for the death of an eagle or other protected birds.

Limiting Menu Labeling Rules for Pizzerias, Grocery Stores

Sens. Roy Blunt (R-Mo.) and Angus King (I-Maine) have served up legislation that aims to limit or eliminate upcoming U.S. Food and Drug Administration menu labeling rules for grocery stores, corner markets and pizzerias, winning rave reviews from the food industry.

The Common Sense Nutrition Disclosure Act [PDF], which the senators introduced Thursday, intends to exempt grocers and convenience store operators from proposed FDA regulations that would require food retailers with at least 20 locations to reveal the number of calories in the products they sell. Under the bill, retailers that receive less than 50 percent of their revenue from food meant for immediate consumption or made on-site wouldn't have to post calorie information.

The measure also would provide pizzerias with menu labeling options such as using an average or a range in recording their pies' calorie tallies, instead of determining the number of calories in each of their pizzas. And the bill wouldn't require pizza delivery outposts to install menu boards that display calorie counts.

Appeals Court Orders New Trial in 2006 Slaying

The District of Columbia Court of Appeals ordered a new trial for three men convicted of plotting a 2006 murder, saying the trial judge was wrong to deny their lawyers time to rebut testimony from a key government witness.

Brian Gilliam, John Daniels and Ronald English were charged with first-degree murder, conspiracy to commit murder and several related charges in connection with the fatal shooting of Anthony Knight in January 2006.

The government's case, according to the appeals court's Nov. 21 opinion, relied heavily on testimony from Byron Holmes, who pleaded guilty to being involved in the shooting and named Gilliam, Daniels and English as co-conspirators. Gilliam, Daniels and English denied killing Knight and said Holmes was covering for the real killers.

Obama Nominates Two to D.C. Superior Court

A public defender and administrative law judge are President Barack Obama's picks to fill open seats in the District of Columbia Superior Court.

Sherry Trafford of the Public Defender Service for the District of Columbia and Steven Wellner, an administrative law judge in the D.C. Office of Administrative Hearings, were nominated last night. Trafford and Wellner will go before the U.S. Senate for confirmation proceedings.

The Senate has been kind to the president's Superior Court nominees this year. The three nominees to go before the Senate so far this year sailed through committee. Two of the nominees—Judges Michael O'Keefe and Robert Okun—were confirmed soon after. Superior Court Magistrate Judge William Nooter is waiting for a vote by the full Senate. A committee earlier this month approved his nomination.

The Morning Wrap

Nuked: The Senate's rule change restricting filibusters smooths the path to the powerful U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit for President Obama's picks to fill three vacancies. Democrats resorted to the "nuclear option" to curb the minority's power to filibuster. "It's time to change the U.S. Senate before this body becomes obsolete," Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid said. The Washington Post reports: "Senate’s filibuster rule change should help Obama achieve key second-term priorities."

Awarded: A jury in San Jose, Calif., has awarded Apple $290 million in damages against rival Samsung over iPad and iPhone patent infringement claims, The Recorder reports. The award at the closely watched retrial brings the total owed to $930 million. Coverage here in Bloomberg and here in Reuters.

Seized: The District of Columbia now owns a strip club, The Washington Post reports. "The District's Office of Tax and Revenue has seized the Stadium Club, a steakhouse and gentleman's club popular with professional athletes and hip-hop artists and the home for a reality show called "Strip Club Queens," in order to pay off the debts of owner James Redding," according to the report.

Resigned: "Utah’s embattled attorney general, John Swallow, resigned Thursday amid persistent questions about whether he had committed widespread ethics violations, saying the legal fight had become too costly," The New York Times reports.