An agreement among grocery chains to share profits during a labor strike violated antitrust laws, a divided 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals panel ruled Tuesday. In siding with the California attorney general’s office, which sued the chains for anti-competitive behavior, Judge Stephen Reinhardt said the agreement had an anti-competitive effect, even if it was temporary and intended to counter the unions’ tactic of striking only one chain in hopes of pressuring it to cave.

A three-year-old federal law that makes it a crime punishable by up to a year in jail to falsely claim to have received a medal from the U.S. military is unconstitutional, a 9th Circuit panel ruled Tuesday.

When does a copyright get registered? Once an application is submitted to the U.S.

An attorney who conveys an alleged agreement to cover the legal costs of another lawyer’s client can be held liable for unpaid fees, a unanimous New York appellate court panel ruled Tuesday. The decision allows the firm of DePetris & Bachrach to pursue claims against the Shiboleth law firm and one of its lawyers, Charles B. Manuel, that they had promised that their clients would make good on DePetris & Bachrach’s fees.

The Federal Circuit has overturned sanctions imposed by a Southern District of New York judge against New Jersey intellectual property law firm Kaplan Gilman & Pergament and software company ResQNet.com Inc. The panel ruled that the district court’s pretrial order to impose sanctions on the firm and the company once the trial was completed was an abuse of the court’s discretion. It’s rare for the Federal Circuit to overturn a sanctions order given the appellate standard of review, said one patent lawyer.