HOT DOCS

EMPLOYMENT – Ramos v. Baldor Specialty Foods Inc.

OPINION – A group of warehouse “captains” supervised “customarily recognized departments or subdivisions” and thus qualify as executives exempt from the overtime pay requirements of the under the Fair Labor Standards Act even though their teams are functionally identical to other units, the 2nd Circuit has ruled. (2d Cir.)

CONTRACTS – Tenor Opportunity Master Fund Ltd. v. Oxygen Biotherepeutics Inc.

OPINION – Tenor had a contract with Oxygen giving it rights to future offerings by Oxygen. Oxygen made a $4.6 million offering to a third party that Tenor claimed should have been offered to it. Oxygen argued that Tenor got an equivalent offering, and that Tenor is equitably estopped from its claim, but the court disagreed. A jury will determine damages. (S.D.N.Y.)

PRODUCTS LIABILITY – Rosa v. Taser Int’l Inc.

OPINION – The 9th Circuit has ruled that Taser International Inc. had no duty to warn that repeated jolts from its stun guns could produce fatal levels of metabolic acidosis because such risk was not known or knowable prior to the distribution of the weapons. (9th Cir.)

INSURANCE – Sawyer v. West Bend Mut. Ins. Co.

OPINION – An insurer has a duty under a policy provision covering “personal and advertising injury” to defend a heating and air conditioning company against a class action lawsuit accusing it of sending unsolicited, “junk” faxes, a Wisconsin appeals court has ruled. (Wis. Ct. App.)

EMPLOYMENT – Doe v. Salvation Army in U.S.

OPINION – The Salvation Army has lost its bid to dismiss an employment discrimination lawsuit based on its contention that it is immune as a religious organization and thus not “principally engaged” in providing social services. (6th Cir.)

COURT WIRE: JUST FILED