Keith Ecker

March 24, 2006 | Inside Counsel

The U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Illinois granted class-action status March 23 to a lawsuit accusing a Chicago Niketown store of racial discrimination against African-American employees. Eighteen current and former Niketown employees originally filed the suit in 2003, but District Court Judge Milton Shadur expanded the pool...

By Keith Ecker

3 minute read

March 17, 2006 | Inside Counsel

Carrie Anne Lucas, Debbie Lane and Julie Reiskin all have a couple things in common. Despite their various debilitating conditions, they have led productive, mobile lives thanks to their wheelchairs. All three also encountered difficulties shopping at Kmart stores because of aisles blocked by merchandise, limited parking spaces for the...

By Keith Ecker

3 minute read

March 10, 2006 | Inside Counsel

A five-year-old case against Wall Street mogul Mario Gabelli and his companies, including Lynch Interactive, is picking up momentum after the Justice Department requested to take over the suit on March 8. The suit accuses Gabelli of creating fraudulent bidding entities that defrauded the U.S. Treasury by improperly participating in...

By Keith Ecker

1 minute read

February 28, 2006 | Corporate Counsel

If you ever miss law firm life, one look at the "Anonymous Lawyer" Web log will remind you why you made the switch. With satirical tales of partner brutality and associate groveling, you'll wonder why anyone puts up with life at a major firm.

By Keith Ecker

2 minute read

February 28, 2006 | Corporate Counsel

Negotiations between the Congress Plaza Hotel in Chicago and UNITE HERE Local 1 have been at a standstill for the past two years. The union, which comprises nearly 130 housekeepers, cooks, dishwashers and other hotel employees, went on strike in 2003. The sudden lack of workers left the hotel in...

By Keith Ecker

22 minute read

February 28, 2006 | Corporate Counsel

When Evanston, Ill.-based Northfield Laboratories Inc. entered into agreements with the University of California?? 1/2 San Diego (UCSD) and San Diego County in 2003 to help test one of its pharmaceutical products, it never imagined that doing so would compromise its trade secrets. The pharmaceutical company had invented a blood...

By Keith Ecker

17 minute read

February 28, 2006 | Corporate Counsel

Unified messaging presents one more worry in the e-discovery quagmire.

By Keith Ecker

7 minute read

February 24, 2006 | Inside Counsel

The recent revelation that the National Security Agency (NSA) has been conducting secretive wiretapping operations on American citizens raised shouts of protest from privacy advocates across the country. But now the covert government operation is causing problems for the corporate community as well. New York attorney Michael Pascazi filed suit...

By Keith Ecker

3 minute read

February 17, 2006 | Inside Counsel

Within the past century, the federal government has had what some may call an obsession with pornography. Its attempt to shut down magazine mogul Larry Flynt, its requests for Google's search-term records and the racy Ken Starr report are all testaments to this fascination. But a regulation the DOJ recently...

By Keith Ecker

3 minute read

February 10, 2006 | Inside Counsel

With the music and film industries harping on peer-to-peer networks for illegal file sharing, it's almost refreshing to hear about a copyright suit over illegal duplicates created the old-fashioned way - with a copy machine. On Feb. 9, six book publishers filed suit against Kenneth R. Roberts, the president of...

By Keith Ecker

2 minute read