Legal News

By Jeremy Hodges – Apr 18, 2013 8:37 AM ET The executive editor at News Corp. (NWSA)’s Sun tabloid will be charged with authorizing bribes to public officials uncovered as part of a wider probe into wrongdoing at the company’s U.K. newspapers. Fergus Shanahan authorized a journalist to make two payments totaling 7,000 pounds ($10,600) [...]

By Ellen Rosen – Apr 18, 2013 7:58 AM ET ArcelorMittal (MT) USA LLC, part of the world’s biggest steelmaker, sued units of OAO Severstal (CHMF), Russia’s second-largest steelmaker, and Nisshin Steel Holdings Co. (5413) for allegedly infringing a patent for metal used in auto parts. Michigan-based Severstal Dearborn and West Virginia-based Wheeling-Nisshin Inc. misappropriated [...]

By Elizabeth Amon – Apr 18, 2013 7:19 AM ET Baker & McKenzie LLP will merge with United Arab Emirates 40-lawyer law firm Habib Al Mulla on July 1, to create Baker & McKenzie Habib Al Mulla. The firm will advise clients on local and international law in its Dubai offices and, with regulatory approval, [...]

By Joshua Gallu – Apr 18, 2013 12:01 AM ET Mary Jo White, chairman of the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. Photographer: Andrew Harrer/Bloomberg Mary Jo White, the first former prosecutor to serve as chairman of the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, has pledged to run a “bold and unrelenting” enforcement program at the agency charged [...]

By Thomas Korosec – Apr 18, 2013 12:01 AM ET A woman arrested in Texas for the slaying of the Kaufman County District Attorney, his wife and another prosecutor confessed to her involvement and said it was her husband who shot the three, police said. Kim Williams, 46, was arrested yesterday and charged with capital [...]

By Dimitra Kessenides – Apr 17, 2013 5:05 PM ET Akin Gump Strauss Hauer & Feld, LLP Kim Koopersmith is as surprised as anyone by the path her career has taken. On April 1, Koopersmith, 53, assumed the chairmanship of Akin Gump Strauss Hauer & Feld LLP, an 850-lawyer global law firm with strong roots [...]

By Karen Gullo - Apr 17, 2013 1:11 PM ET California officials are seeking to enforce the state’s first-in-the nation law barring therapy for minors about avoiding homosexuality after conflicting rulings in lawsuits claiming the ban is unconstitutional. Lawyers for California Attorney General Kamala Harris say the counseling, known as gay conversion therapy, is discredited and unsafe, and the state’s [...]

By Patricia Hurtado - Apr 17, 2013 1:09 PM ET The sentencing of former SAC Capital Advisors LP analyst Jon Horvath for insider trading was delayed at the government’s request as he continues to cooperate with prosecutors. U.S. District Judge Richard J. Sullivan in Manhattan agreed to adjourn Horvath’s court date for six more months in a filing dated today. Horvath, a [...]

By David Glovin & Michael Riley - Apr 17, 2013 12:01 AM ET In searching for clues about whether the deadly bombing in Boston had roots in the U.S. or overseas, investigators will scrutinize the bombs themselves, the timing of the blasts and similarities to earlier attacks. Investigators haven’t disclosed whether they believe the bombings are home-grown terrorism or originated [...]

By Sophia Pearson & Jesse Riseborough - Apr 16, 2013 8:35 AM ET A French citizen with ties to BSG Resources Ltd. was charged with witness tampering and attempting to obstruct a probe into whether a mining company paid bribes to win “lucrative” rights in Guinea, according to court documents. Frederic Cilins, 50, was arrested and charged with plotting to destroy documents [...]

By Elisa Martinuzzi & Sergio Di Pasquale – Apr 16, 2013 7:48 AM ET Siena prosecutors are seizing assets from Nomura Holdings Inc. as part of their probe into Banca Monte dei Paschi di Siena SpA’s use of derivatives to hide losses. Photographer: Alessia Pierdomenico/Bloomberg Italian prosecutors are seizing about 1.8 billion euros ($2.4 billion) of [...]

By Elizabeth Amon - Apr 16, 2013 6:58 AM ET Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen & Katz and Wilmer Cutler Pickering Hale & Dorr LLP acted as legal advisers to Thermo Fisher Scientific Inc. (TMO), the second-biggest maker of life-sciences equipment by market value, which agreed to buy Life Technologies (LIFE) Corp. for $13.6 billion in cash in a deal that expands its [...]

By David McLaughlin – Apr 16, 2013 12:01 AM ET AMR Corp., the parent of American Airlines, filed a plan to exit bankruptcy protection that hinges on creating the world’s largest airline through a merger with US Airways Group Inc. (LCC) American, based in Fort Worth, Texas, won court approval March 27 to proceed with the combination, [...]

By Stephanie Bodoni - Apr 15, 2013 6:05 AM ET Google Inc. (GOOG)’s offer to settle an antitrust probe with the European Union by labeling its own services more clearly in Web search results is a “non-starter” for a group of competitors such as Microsoft Corp. (MSFT), Foundem and Streetmap. The companies and at least 10 other rivals that [...]

By Kathleen Hunter & Roxana Tiron - Apr 15, 2013 12:01 AM ET Movement on gun control and immigration in the U.S. Senate obscures an inevitable roadblock to either measure: a resistant Republican-run House. Obstacles in the House of Representatives to expanding background checks for gun-buyers may be enough to scuttle an initiative that President Barack Obama has pressed in the aftermath of the Newtown, Connecticut, school shootings. [...]

By Renee Dudley – Apr 14, 2013 6:00 PM ET Wal-Mart Stores Inc. (WMT) and Sears Holdings Corp. (SHLD) have so far declined to join Li & Fung Ltd. and other companies in voluntarily compensating victims of a fire last year at a Bangladesh garment factory. Wal-Mart and Sears also didn’t respond to an invitation to attend a [...]

By Bob Van Voris – Apr 12, 2013 10:36 AM ET Kareem Serageldin, the ex-global head of Credit Suisse Group AG (CSGN)’s structured credit trading business, is scheduled to plead guilty to criminal charges today in Manhattan federal court, a court clerk said. Serageldin is charged with leading a 2007 scheme to mark up the value [...]

By Karen Gullo & Janelle Lawrence - Apr 12, 2013 8:41 AM ET Biolitec AG (BIB) Chief Executive Officer Wolfgang Neuberger was ordered arrested by a federal judge in Massachusetts who said Neuberger failed to comply with a court order to not carry out a merger with Biolitec’s Austrian subsidiary. The order was issued in a lawsuit brought against the German [...]

By Edvard Pettersson – Apr 12, 2013 12:01 AM ET Scott London, the former KPMG LLP partner who led the firm’s audit practice in Los Angelesand was charged with passing inside tips to a friend, will plead guilty, his lawyer said. London, 50, was charged by federal prosecutors in Los Angeles with passing inside information about Herbalife Ltd. [...]

By Greg Stohr & Susan Decker - Apr 12, 2013 12:00 AM ET For 30 years, biotechnology innovators have secured thousands of U.S. patents on genes, defining the legal rights to medical and agricultural products worth hundreds of billions of dollars. Now the U.S. Supreme Court is considering whether that was all a big mistake. The court next week will [...]