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WHAT WE'RE WATCHING

ANOTHER ACTION-PACKED YEAR - Driven largely by opioid litigation against the pharmaceutical industry, class action settlements rose to unprecedented levels in 2022, a new report published by Duane Morris found. Class actions and government enforcement lawsuits against opioid manufactures, retailers and distributors rang up more than $50 billion in settlements last year, according to the Duane Morris Class Action Review, which draws conclusions from the hundreds of rulings in the last year. But, as Law.com's Hugo Guzman reports, the more important takeaway from the report is what all this signals about the year ahead.  "As success often begets copy-cats, corporations can expect the plaintiffs' class action bar will be equally if not more aggressive in their case filings and settlement positions in 2023," the report concludes.

DATA RETENTION TENSION - As many law firms now face tighter budgets coupled with bigger threats of breaches, proliferating data privacy laws and growing regulators' scrutiny, putting in place thorough data retention policies is becoming vital. But, as Law.com's Cassandre Coyer reports, many firms have only just begun the journey down the long and winding road of implementation. Dana Miller, associate director of legal solutions at QuisLex, attorney and e-discovery consultant noted that the focus on data retention policies has been growing, driven in part by the advancements in data privacy laws as well as the increase in potential data breaches. But so too have data retention challenges. "There is a wide range of where people are on the spectrum between not having one [retention policy] at all and being very on top of it. And most people, most firms, most companies are falling somewhere in the middle," Miller said.

ON THE RADAR - The Center for Biological Diversity, a nonprofit conservation organization, sued the Department of Homeland Security and the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) on Wednesday in District of Columbia District Court under the Freedom of Information Act. The lawsuit seeks all records related to FEMA's spending on energy projects, including funding for fossil fuel-related projects as compared to renewable energy alternatives. Counsel have not yet appeared for the defendants. The case is 1:23-cv-00011, Center For Biological Diversity v. Federal Emergency Management Agency et al. Stay up on the latest deals and litigation with the new Law.com Radar. 

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