Under the Administrative Procedure Act (APA), an agency may designate as “precedent” a decision or part of a decision “that contains a significant legal or policy determination of general application that is likely to recur.” (Government Code §11425.60(b)). Precedent decisions can be used to clarify the agency’s interpretation of the Read more…
On August 24th, a nine-person jury in California awarded Apple Inc. (maker of the iPhone and iPad product lines) over $1 billion in damages, holding that Samsung Electronics Co. Ltd. (creator of the Galaxy S and Galaxy Tab lines) had willfully infringed six Apple patents. Although this huge award is being appealed, Read more…
In the August 2012 issue of the ABA Journal, G. M. Gilisko penned an article, Where the Buck Stops: Lawyers Need to Verify All the Nice Things Being Said About Them Online. The article goes on to examine the alarming trend of “spam” reviews proliferating on third party attorney search Read more…
(This article first appeared in the January/February 2008 issue of the Sacramento Lawyer, the bi-monthly publication of the Sacramento County Bar Association. The article is the copyrighted property of the Sacramento County Bar Association.) This article discusses two of the main tools government and administrative law practitioners use to challenge a Read more…
California consumers have a legal right to immediately cancel contracts under a variety of contractual law theories. Contracts can be terminated for fraud, fraudulent executon (Jones v. Adams Financial Services (1999) 71 Cal.App.4th 831, 839), mistake, undue influence, breach, illegality,nonconformity, and unconscionability. (Civ. Code §§ 1670.5(a), 1689(b), 1793.2(d), 1793.22(b)). However, in a number Read more…
The California State Bar recently adopted new Rules of Court and State Bar Rules that reserves the right to suspend an attorney’s license to practice law in the State of California if the attorney owes a large delinquent tax liability. The rule only applies to attorneys who are on the Read more…
Will ignorance of or the failure to adopt certain technological tools, such as e-discovery, be considered an ethical violation in the future? An interesting discussion of the implications of this issue can be found in A Discovery: Study tech-aided review before it’s an ethics issue by Joe Dysart. It is Read more…
The California Contractors State License Board (CSLB) recently announced that it has joined forces with the contracting boards from Arizona, Nevada and Oregon, as well as the National Association of State Contractors Licensing Agencies (NASCLA) to issue a nationwide consumer alert regarding the excessive illegal and deceptive ad postings on Read more…
Many companies rely upon unpaid interns as a way to minimize costs and provide opportunities to eager workers who are willing to work for free in hopes of ultimately securing a paid position. However, such an approach is risky, and more than likely, illegal in the state of California. The Read more…
In California, “expungement” of a record (under Penal Code section 1203.4) does not mean that the conviction never happened. It simply relieves a person from the criminal penalties of their actions. What are some other options? Sealing the Record of a Minor Unlike expungement of a record (under Penal Code Read more…