This post was written by Adam M. Masin. The American Dialect Society named “truthiness” as the word of the year for 2005 and Merriam-Webster followed suit in 2006. Popularized by political satirist Stephen Colbert’s character “Stephen Colbert,” truthiness is generally defined as “knowledge” based on emotion and gut instinct rather than on information, facts, evidence, … Continue Reading
Yesterday, May 18th, the United States Supreme Court issued Ashcroft, Former Attorney General v. Iqbal, and confirmed the pleading standards it announced in Bell Atlantic Corp. V. Twombley, 550 U. S. 544 (2007), an anti-trust case. Although Ashcroft also dealt with other significant legal issues, it is quite possible that its broadest impact will come from its pronouncements regarding pleading standards in federal court...… Continue Reading
A recent Virginia federal court decision demonstrates the powerful effect of the Riegel v. Medtronic precedent in product liability cases where PMA-devices are subject to claims-sounding in negligence or breach of duty related to the design, manufacturing, and labeling of the device. According to this court, however, the preemption defense of Riegel reaches only those allegations … Continue Reading
