South Carolina Lawyers Weekly

Where a pharmaceutical company’s interpretation of a complex Medicaid statute was “objectively reasonable,” and there was no authoritative guidance from the government that clarified its interpretation of the statute, the relator failed to show the alleged false statements were “knowingly” ...

Where an electric cooperative brought state law claims against a regional transmission company in an effort to recover certain electric generation costs, but the claims implicated a federal tariff, there was federal question jurisdiction over the suit. Background Following a ...

Where a class of pharmaceutical buyers claimed two manufacturers allegedly reached an anticompetitive settlement in a patent dispute, the district court erred in focusing on whether denial of certification would result in “multiple individual trials” when it certified a class. ...

Where the record showed that Aetna exercised discretionary authority or control over the management of a plan so as to potentially make it a fiduciary, and evidence suggested Aetna breached its fiduciary duties by not disclosing fees, a policyholder’s surcharge, ...

Where the owner of a blood testing laboratory and two lead salespersons were repeatedly warned that paying commissions to independent contractors might violate an anti-kickback statute, but they went ahead and paid physicians for drawing patients’ blood and processing the ...

Because the Virginia legislature has conferred broad authority on local governing bodies to engage in anticompetitive conduct in the EMS vehicle services market, antitrust claims against the City of Richmond, stemming from its denial of an ambulance company’s permit to ...

Where a franchisee failed to show he exercised reasonable due diligence during the three years of litigation to discover and present evidence of unpaid rent, the district court erred by awarding it damages raised for the first time on a ...

Where a direct action brought by the company was resolved in a broad release, and there was no evidence of collusion or bad faith, a derivative action asserting identical or similar claims arising out of the same underlying facts was ...

  The class action settlement with Lumber Liquidators was fair and adequate, as it was the result of arms-length negotiations and included an assessment of available defenses. However, the attorneys’ fee award was vacated because it was error not to ...

The fraud claims of Chinese investors who each invested approximately $500,000 in a start-up car company without reading the underlying investment documents were dismissed because the investors could not have justifiably relied on stray misstatements made by the company’s founders ...