A state appellate court upheld a lower court’s decision that a doctor’s inability to participate in Medicaid was not adequate grounds for a state licensing agency to suspend his license.
A recent U.S. Supreme Court decision discarding strict standards for awarding enhanced damages in patent infringement cases could increase the number of patent cases filed in the U.S., a Chicago intellectual property attorney believes.
The U.S. Supreme Court has denied review of an Illinois Supreme Court decision that cleared tobacco company Philip Morris of a $10 billion judgment. On June 20, the justices rejected a petition from plaintiff Sharon Price, who won the judgment in the court of former Madison County circuit judge Nicholas Byron in 2003. The Supreme Court had denied review of the same case in 2006, after the Illinois Supreme Court reversed Byron.
Nine lawyers – including one convicted of sexually assaulting a young woman in her hotel room, and a former downstate prosecutor who allegedly tampered with official state’s attorneys computer files after learning he wouldn’t be promoted to the top prosecutor job in his county – have been disbarred by the Illinois Supreme Court. The state’s high court also suspended an additional dozen other attorneys for a range of alleged violations.
The Illinois Supreme Court has taken down a special tax break for a western Illinois aviation service, declaring state lawmakers lacked the constitutional authority to extend to the business a property tax exemption held by a public airport authority, costing the local school district and other local governments a tidy sum in unpaid property taxes.
A heated argument with a parking lot security guard at a Chicago Jewel-Osco store, sparked by a man’s anger at how the store was policing who was parked in handicapped parking spaces, did not make the supermarket liable for the customer’s ensuing health emergency, a state appeals panel has said.
Since a broad decision issued by the U.S. Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals in May, employers have become wary of enforcing the arbitration agreements they may have pressured employees to sign, waiving their rights to bring class actions over wage and employment issues. But that isn't the half of it, employment and labor attorneys said.
Supporters of a proposed amendment that would reform how state legislative districts are laid out, have struck back at a lawsuit to block a referendum on the amendment, which was filed by a group aligned with Illinois House Speaker Michael Madigan, saying the amendment – contrary to what opponents claim – would comply with the state constitution.
A Winnetka resident, whose lawsuit challenged whether the stormwater utility fee slapped on property owners by the north suburban village is actually a tax, has clearance to sail on, after a state appeals panel said the legal arguments in the challenge hold enough water to survive the village’s attempt to sink it via motion to dismiss.
The Illinois Supreme Court has strengthened the hand of hospitals in a ruling that took a physician’s suit off life support, because he failed to allege a north suburban hospital system inflicted “physical” harm upon him when it terminated his hospital privileges – which the court said is the necessary standard under state law for the hospital group to enjoy immunity from liability.
The Illinois Supreme Court will weigh in on the question of whether Illinois law can constitutionally exempt hospitals from paying property taxes, and whether the city of Chicago can use curfew laws to keep protesters out of Grant Park over night.
Cable TV sports network ESPN and the network’s prominent on-air pundit Stephen A. Smith have responded to a lawsuit brought by the parents of players of controversy-plagued Chicago Little League baseball team, Jackie Robinson West, asking a Cook County judge to dismiss the litigation because the parents’ lawsuit does little more than attempt to punish ESPN and Smith for reporting news and expressing opinion on prominent events, simply because the parents found the news and Smith’s opinion “upset
The Illinois Supreme Court has shied away from ruling on a question brought by a group of electricity suppliers, who had asked the court to limit the power of the Illinois Commerce Commission to dictate from whom the suppliers must buy their electricity, ruling the question became moot when a largescale coal power plant project folded for lack of funds.
Saying any other conclusion would place a potentially “unreasonable” burden on the state’s home builders, a unanimous Illinois Supreme Court has ruled a man whose patio collapsed cannot sue the builder who built the home, because the previous owner from whom he purchased the home had waived her rights to an implied warranty and so could not pass the warranty to future owners of the home.
While American Family Insurance may have intentionally chosen to pay less than the full cost of repairing vehicles damaged in collisions with its insured drivers – even when the driver insured by American Family was entirely to blame for a crash – that does not mean the insurer has committed fraud, or that motorists stuck with the remainder of the repair bill should be allowed to sue the insurer under Illinois law, a Chicago federal judge has ruled.
A group that sold its interest in one of Wrigley Field’s famed rooftops remains on the hook for a six-figure tax bill, after a state appeals panel said a lower court was correct to determine the former business owners had an obligation to pay the unpaid city amusement taxes owed by their rooftop entertainment business, and not just taxes owed on the real estate itself, to allow the sale of the property to truly be free and clear.
With just days left in the Illinois General Assembly's spring legislative session, there has been almost no movement on a bill that would reinstate the so-called public duty rule, a legal principle protecting police, firefighters, paramedics and other emergency responders from lawsuits brought by people who may believe those responders didn't provide the level of care the accusers thought was appropriate.
An Illinois appeals panel has upheld a lower court’s ruling that the Episcopal Church must pay penance, by picking up the tab for the legal fees of a breakaway downstate diocese fighting a frivolous suit by the church and further refraining from making any further claims on the diocese’s $3.6 million treasury.
CHICAGO – While disciplinary complaints among Illinois attorneys are down overall for the third year in a row, a trend likely to continue, more than half of such complaints in 2015 were aimed at older, seasoned attorneys, a newly released report says.
The Supreme Court ruled in favor of a former Paterson, New Jersey, police officer who claimed he was unjustly demoted after his boss mistakenly believed he was involved in a political campaign.
