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Gibbons Attorneys’ Offshore Wind Article Published by ABA’s Section of Environment, Energy, and Resources Quarterly Magazine

Posted in Environmental and Green Issues / Uncategorized

On April 30, 2021

“New Jersey’s Plan to Become the National Capital of Offshore Wind,” authored by Gibbons environmental attorneys Susanne Peticolas and Christopher Cavaiola, appeared in the Spring edition of Natural Resources and Environment, the quarterly magazine of the ABA’s Section of Environment and Energy Resources. New Jersey’s Governor Phil Murphy and his administration have made combating climate change a key priority in the State since his election. Governor Murphy has unveiled arguably his most ambitious plan to date, introducing plans in June that would make New Jersey the hub of the eastern seaboard’s offshore wind industry. The article explores how Governor Phil Murphy plans to do this and examines the relevant state and federal policy and legal implications of same. Click here [Link 1] to read the article.

USEPA Creates PFAS Council

by Gibbons P.C. and Susanne Peticolas

Posted in Environmental and Green Issues

On April 30, 2021

Per- and Polyfluoroalkyl Substances (PFAS) are synthetic chemicals nicknamed “forever chemicals” because they are persistent and resistant to degradation. They have been used in a wide variety of everyday products and are found in detergents, non-stick pans, stain-resistant and waterproof fabrics, fragrances, drugs, disinfectants, pesticides, and fire-fighting foam. PFAS comprise more than 4,700 compounds. Many of them have been identified as potential environmental or public health risks.

Blowing Things Out of Proportion: S.D.N.Y. Finds Hyperlinked Documents Are Not Necessarily Attachments and Rejects a Revamping of Production Protocols

by Kevin H. Gilmore

Posted in E-Discovery: Legal Decisions and Court Rules

On April 28, 2021

The Southern District of New York recently held that hyperlinked documents should not necessarily be considered “attachments” and declined to require a responding party to utilize a collection tool proposed by the requesting party, which would have collected all hyperlinked documents and maintained their familial relationship with the parent document. This is a novel and important issue that has not received such thorough treatment by other courts. With the COVID-19 pandemic forcing many employees to work from home and increasing the use of cloud-storage apps for documents, the issues related to the treatment of hyperlinked documents and litigants’ obligations in collecting and producing these documents are unlikely to disappear anytime soon. In Nichols v. Noom Inc., the plaintiffs initiated a class action suit against Noom for a litany of allegations centered around false advertising. Prior to commencing discovery, Noom agreed to collect and search relevant data from multiple Google App sources (i.e., Gmail, G-chat, Google Drive). The parties agreed to utilize Google Vault to collect the relevant documents from Google Drive, despite the fact that Google Vault would not be able to collect file path metadata for each document. Additionally, the parties never agreed to the method of collection for emails stored on Gmail. While Noom wanted to use Google Vault to collect the relevant emails,...

“Winn’s of Change?” The Eleventh Circuit in Gil v. Winn-Dixie Stores, Inc. Holds That Websites Are Not Places of Public Accommodation Under the ADA

by Mark S. Sidoti and Jessica A. Huse

Posted in Disability

On April 19, 2021

The landscape of ADA website accessibility claims, which have inundated courts throughout the country for years, may be changing with the issuance, on April 7, 2021, of a long-awaited decision by the Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit in Gil v. Winn-Dixie Stores, Inc. In a decision that marks only the second time a Federal Circuit Court of Appeals has addressed the parameters of website accessibility claims based on the Americans With Disabilities Act (ADA), a majority of the panel held that websites are not “places of public accomodation” under Title III of the ADA and thus, the plaintiff’s inability to access certain services provided by Winn-Dixie’s website is not a violation of Title III. While this decision runs counter to many District Court decisions, as well as the Ninth Circuit’s decision in Robles v. Domino’s Pizza, LLC, 913 F.3d 898 (9th Cir. 2019), the Eleventh Circuit was clear – absent congressional action, the court cannot broaden the definition of “places of public accommodation” beyond the physical places of business enumerated in Title III. Thus, the court reversed the district court, which had found, following the only full trial to occur in these matters, that Winn-Dixie violated the ADA by offering a website that fails to meet the accessibility standards that have been accepted...

Employers and the American Rescue Plan Act of 2021 (ARPA)

by Richard S. Zackin

Posted in Employee Benefits

On April 16, 2021

The recently enacted American Rescue Plan Act of 2021 (ARPA) is an economic stimulus bill that will inject $1.9 trillion into the American economy to accelerate the recovery from the economic downturn and health emergency caused by the COVID-19 pandemic. Of special interest to employers, the ARPA in a number of respects expands legislation enacted in 2020 to address the COVID-19 crisis, such as the CARES Act and Families First Coronavirus Response Act (FFCRA). Perhaps the most publicized aspect of the ARPA is the direct $1,400 stimulus checks to individuals. However, other aspects of the ARPA are more directly of interest to employers. Non-Mandated Extension of FFCRA-Related Tax Credits Employers are not required to, but may voluntarily provide to employees Emergency Paid Sick Leave and Emergency Family and Medical Leave that previously had been mandated under the FFCRA. This program will terminate on September 30, 2021. This means employers may grant leave under the FFCRA to employees with eligible leave remaining and continue to receive the corresponding tax credits for those leave payments until that date. Otherwise, this program would have expired on March 31, 2021. While the emergency leave extensions under the ARPA are voluntary, employers should also consider any state or local leave requirements. Under the new legislation: Employers who provide up to...

Negligent Deletion of Meeting Notes Does Not Warrant Adverse Inference Sanctions

by Brittany E. Grierson

Posted in Litigation Preparedness and Strategies

On April 15, 2021

Recently, in the District Court for the Southern District of California, Magistrate Judge Karen Crawford declined to impose adverse inference sanctions against the defendants, despite the defendants’ negligent destruction of relevant evidence. Instead, the court found that the plaintiffs were not severely prejudiced by the defendants’ spoliation of relevant handwritten notes from meetings pertaining to the subject matter of the litigation. Therefore, the court opted for the “least burdensome sanction” and recommended that the defendants be precluded from offering testimony or other evidence about the discussions at the meetings, during which the handwritten notes at issue were taken, in support of their defenses during the trial. In Al Otro Lado, Inc., et al. v. Chad v. Wolf, Acting Secretary, U.S. Department of Homeland Security, et al., the plaintiffs claimed that the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (the “Department”) implemented a policy, known as the “Turnback Policy,” at the U.S.-Mexico border that discouraged individuals from seeking asylum in the U.S.. The plaintiffs requested that adverse-inference sanctions be imposed against the Department due to the admitted destruction of handwritten notes by two senior officials within the U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) made during the Department’s daily operation meetings where the Turnback Policy would be discussed. Essentially, the plaintiffs sought an adverse inference finding (to be adopted...

IRS Provides Guidance on the Full Deductibility of Restaurant Meals

by Steven H. Sholk

Posted in Corporate / Tax

On April 12, 2021

One of the sensual and ineffable pleasures of life is a satisfying meal, whether prepared at home or partaken of at a restaurant. The Consolidated Appropriations Act, 2021 (CAA) temporarily expanded the pathway to this pleasure by providing for the full deductibility of business expenses paid or incurred from January 1, 2021 to December 31, 2022 for food or beverages provided by restaurants. Full deductibility is set forth in Section 274(n)(2)(D) of the Internal Revenue Code of 1986, as amended (the “Code”). Prior to the CAA, the deductibility of restaurant meals, like all other food and beverage business expenses, was subject to a 50 percent limitation. Since the CAA did not define “restaurant,” the precise scope of full deductibility remained uncertain. In Notice 2021-25, the IRS defined “restaurant,” and its definition removes a significant degree of this uncertainty. A restaurant means a business that prepares and sells food or beverages to retail customers for immediate consumption, regardless of whether the food or beverages are consumed on the business’s premises. A restaurant does not include a business that primarily sells pre-packaged food or beverages not for immediate consumption, such as a beer, wine, or liquor store; convenience store; drug store; grocery store; kiosk; newsstand; specialty food store; or vending machine. The 50 percent deduction continues to...

New York Appellate Court Allows Top Floors of Upper West Side Condo Building to Remain

by Howard D. Geneslaw

Posted in Development/Redevelopment

On April 7, 2021

The New York City development community was alarmed by a trial court decision in February of last year that would have required removal of the top floors of a 55-story condominium building under construction at 200 Amsterdam Avenue on the Upper West Side of Manhattan. On appeal, the Appellate Division, First Department, issued a decision in early March reversing the trial court, which means that, absent any further appeal, the building can be completed and the condominium units offered for sale. The case, In the Matter of Committee for Environmentally Sound Development v. Amsterdam Avenue Redevelopment Associates LLC, 2021 NY Slip Op. 01228 (“Amsterdam Avenue”), serves as a high-profile, high-stakes reminder of the importance of two well-settled principles of New York zoning law: Administrative agencies like planning and zoning boards, which are charged with administering technical regulations with which they have substantial experience and technical expertise, are entitled to substantial deference and cannot disregard past precedent without good reason, such as differences in facts or changed circumstances; A party seeking to overturn a permit or approval must avail itself of all opportunities to seek a stay that halts construction or risk having its case dismissed as moot, and a developer seeking to defeat an appeal can do so by taking the risk of diligently proceeding...

“It Wasn’t My Fault”: Court Rejects Attempts by Client and Attorney to Duck Responsibility and Sanctions Both Jointly

by Brielle A. Basso

Posted in E-Discovery: Legal Decisions and Court Rules

On April 6, 2021

This blog has previously discussed the importance of cooperation among parties in a litigation to effectuate a comprehensive discovery framework; however, a recent decision from the District Court for the Northern District of California exemplifies the importance of joint responsibility and collaboration between attorneys and their clients when dealing with e-discovery matters, including preservation, collection, and production of electronically stored information (ESI). In a case that ultimately settled and involved both foreign and domestic parties, the court granted a motion for monetary sanctions pursuant to its inherent authority and Rule 37, after finding that the plaintiff’s discovery misconduct “not only forced [defendant] to incur additional attorneys’ fees but … also forced the court to expend considerable resources beyond what was necessary.” Because both the plaintiff and its former counsel “failed in their responsibilities,” the court imposed sanctions jointly and severally against them. In Optrics Inc. v. Barracuda Networks Inc., the plaintiff, a Canadian engineering firm, filed suit in August 2017 against the defendant, an American company, “bringing trademark, contract, and other claims stemming from allegedly unfair and deceptive business practices by [defendant] during the parties’ thirteen-year business relationship.” Beginning in June 2019, discovery disputes and “discovery violations” by the plaintiff plagued the litigation. In February 2020, “with discovery still mired in disputes,” the parties stipulated...

Amateur Hour Is Over! DR Distributors LLC Offers Crash Course on the Importance of E-Discovery Compliance

by Charlotte Howells and Scott J. Etish

Posted in General Litigation

On March 29, 2021

In DR Distributors, LLC v. 21 Century Smoking, Inc., et al., United States District Judge Iain D. Johnston issued a scathing 256-page opinion, dropping the proverbial hammer on the defendant and its counsel for repeated and egregious e-discovery failures – a veritable Keystone Kops series of discovery errors and misrepresentations spanning several years. The court imposed sanctions pursuant to Federal Rules of Civil Procedure 26(g) and 37, as well as monetary sanctions, and required the defendants’ former counsel to participate in continuing legal education on electronically stored information (ESI). In sum, Judge Johnston put all attorneys on notice that it “is no longer amateur hour” for attorneys grappling with e-discovery – compliance is not merely “best practices,” but required under the Rules, and courts will address incompetence accordingly. The dispute arose from alleged trademark infringement claims involving electronic cigarettes with confusingly similar marks. The case was initiated in 2012 and assigned to Judge Johnston in 2014, who immediately held a case management conference. At this conference, the court asked counsel if litigation holds were issued, and defense counsel neglected to inform the court that no litigation holds had been issued at that point. Defense counsel also affirmatively stated that the defendant, Brent Duke, the principal of 21 Century Smoking, was generally knowledgeable about ESI, including...