Amazon owed Homesite Insurance's customer Adam Long “no duty of care” for a battery that allegedly caused a fire that damaged Long's New York home, said Amazon’s answer (docket 6:23-cv-00981) to Homesite’s Aug. 11 complaint in U.S. District Court for Northern New York in Syracuse. The insurer, as Long's subrogee, seeks recovery of damages of at least $356,644, said the complaint, which Amazon removed from New York Supreme Court to federal court (see 2308150068). No act or omission on Amazon’s part caused the alleged damages, it said. Plaintiff’s alleged damages were “proximately caused by the acts and omissions of others over whom Amazon had no control or right of control," said the answer. The complaint’s causes of action are barred by Long’s assumption, either express or implied, “of the risks and dangers, if any, associated with the alleged products, circumstances, conduct, or injuries,” said Amazon, saying it's an “improper party” to the lawsuit because it had no involvement in the underlying event. To the extent that any alleged representations or warranties were made to Long, they were made by entities other than Amazon “and over whom Amazon has or had no control or right of control.” Homesite’s claims are barred because Amazon had no knowledge of any purported defects in the replacement battery before the incident. Plaintiff’s alleged losses, damages, injuries, harm, expenses, diminution, or deprivation “may have been caused in whole or in part” by Long’s failure to exercise reasonable care and to mitigate damages," said the answer. Some or all of Homesite’s claims and available damages “may be barred by or subject to reduction for prior settlements,” it said. Amazon requests dismissal of all claims, plus attorneys’ fees and legal costs.
Two T-Mobile customers allege the carrier’s “gross negligence in hiring, training, and supervising its employees” enabled a SIM card swap that led to a loss of $130,000, said a Wednesday complaint (docket 1:23-cv-06159) in U.S. District Court for Eastern New York in Brooklyn.
“Partial input foreclosure,” such as if Microsoft were to curtail the flow of Activision Blizzard video game titles to competing console platforms if its Activision buy closes, but without cutting off supply completely, “is harmful to competition,” said 18 antitrust law professors in an amicus brief Wednesday (docket 23-15992) supporting the FTC’s appeal to block the transaction (see 2307110031).
The “vast breadth” of centralization plaintiff Bruce Bailey sought in his Friday reply (see 2308140020) means parties in cases associated with MOVEit Customer Data Security Breach Litigation that don't name multidistrict litigation (MDL) defendants Progress Software Corp. (PSC), Ipswitch or Pension Benefit Information (PBI), and who aren't monitoring the MDL docket, “had no way of knowing that their cases are at risk of being swept up in a sprawling MDL,” said plaintiff Carlos Harding in a Monday interested party response (docket 3083) before the U.S. Judicial Panel on Multidistrict Litigation (JPML). Harding urged the JPML to deny Bailey’s motion for transfer and centralization of related actions filed July 6.
The plaintiffs' allegations of actual identity theft in the Samsung data breach multidistrict litigation are “implausible, insufficiently pled, and not a cognizable injury absent economic loss,” said Samsung’s notice Friday (docket 1:23-md-03055) of its motion to dismiss in U.S. District Court for New Jersey in Camden.
The May 19 fraud complaint in which investor Locust Group alleges JMBT Live, owner of the Tilt entertainment platform, and its CEO, Michael Russell, “misrepresented” the status of the company’s contracts and negotiations with prospective content partners (see 2305220037), “should have never been filed,” said JMBT’s memorandum of law Tuesday (docket 1:23-cv-04203) in U.S. District Court for Southern New York in Manhattan in support of its motion to dismiss the complaint.
DLA Piper, counsel for Progress Software and Ipswitch, filed a notice of related action (docket 3083) Monday in MOVEit Customer Data Security Breach Litigation. The Diana White v. Pension Benefit Information class action (docket 0:23-cv-2254), filed in U.S. District Court for Minnesota Friday, asserts claims of negligence, breach of contract, unjust enrichment, invasion of privacy and breach of fiduciary duty due to the late May data breach involving MOVEit Transfer and MOVEit Cloud software.
Verizon was “grossly reckless and negligent” in allowing a third-party criminal to access plaintiff Christopher Ayeni’s cellphone and steal more than $215,000 from his bank accounts, alleged Ayeni's complaint (docket 2:23-cv-00618), removed July 24 by defendants Verizon and Bank of America to U.S. District Court for New Mexico in Las Cruces from the 5th Judicial District Court, Eddy County, New Mexico. Verizon “failed to follow reasonable procedures” to prevent criminals from hacking Ayeni’s device and account data “when criminals apparently visited a Verizon location and sought to ‘hack’ into” his account and phone, said the complaint.
Core Communications’ brief in opposition to AT&T’s motion for summary judgment (see 2307170030) doesn’t dispute “any material facts,” said AT&T’s reply Friday (docket 2:21-cv-02771) in U.S. District Court for Eastern Pennsylvania in Philadelphia in support of its motion. “As to the legal issues, Core’s brief does more to obfuscate the law than to articulate any valid defenses,” it said. Core seeks to recover $11.4 million in unpaid access service charges from AT&T, which refuses to pay, claiming nearly 100% of the calls that CoreTel affiliates in Delaware, New Jersey, Virginia and West Virginia connected were fraudulent (see 2212280001). Core hopes to defeat summary judgment by persuading the court that a “morass” of FCC “technical precedents” supports its purported right to collect from AT&T and that AT&T is trying to “invalidate its tariff,” said AT&T’s reply. That’s “not the case,” it said. The “straightforward” task before the court is to “construe the plain language of Core’s tariff and an FCC rule against the undisputed facts,” it said: “The clear result is that Core simply is not permitted by its own tariff and the rule to recover any additional charges from AT&T.”
The U.S. Supreme Court should “unequivocally abandon” the contemporary Chevron deference doctrine “because it contradicts Articles I, II, and III of the Constitution,” said an amicus brief (docket 22-451) in support of the petitioners in Loper Bright v. Raimondo submitted Monday by Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, Rep. Mike Johnson, R-La., and 34 other Republican members of Congress.