California | The Recorder

Monte Mann, a litigation partner with Armstrong Teasdale, says companies should be very careful during the onboarding process for new hires and make it clear they must respect their former employer's intellectual property and trade secrets.

As Gov. Gavin Newsom's time in office nears an end, his judicial appointment pace has picked up.

Measure ULA’s legality was challenged and upheld, and a ballot initiative to repeal it was withdrawn this summer as part of a legislative compromise that preserved the tax but reshaped the rules going forward. The result is both new risks and new planning opportunities for anyone with capital deployed in Los Angeles real estate.

"Once people see you (legal) not as a bottleneck, but as an entity that helps things move faster and better, they eagerly invite you to the table," said Carla Bedrosian, legal chief of global commerce company Xsolla. "They realize you are making their lives easier, not more complicated."

Andy Clubok of Latham & Watkins describes giving stand-up opportunities to associates as a competitive advantage: a way to attract and retain elite talent while winning cases. Meta’s Nikki Stitt Sokol agrees that it strengthens firm/client relationships while building the next generation of lawyers who know the client.

With Gemini Enterprise for Legal, Google joins a slew of other Big Tech companies building specialized tools for legal industry professionals. Early adopters of the tool include Cleary, Weil, Freshfields and Williams & Connolly.

YouTube creator Ryan Upchurch is fighting a Tennessee's jury order that he pay $18 million to the family of Kiely Rodni, a 16-year-old California girl who died in a 2022 accident. Upchurch used his true-crime channel to contend the girl never existed and that the case was a "scam" devised to solicit online donations.

The high court also appeared ready to affirm the state attorney general's constitutional authority to block sheriffs' investigations.