There’s a serious debate unfolding nationwide about the public health and environmental consequences of genetically modified crops. But a judge considering a novel challenge to Monsanto’s GM seed patents didn’t take the case seriously enough to allow the plaintiffs past Monsanto’s motion to dismiss.

A Massachusetts statute barring protesters from a 35-foot fixed buffer zone around reproductive health care facilities is constitutional as applied to three Planned Parenthood clinics, a federal judge has ruled, finding that the statute “is a valid regulation of the time, place, and manner of Plaintiffs’ speech.”

The 7th Circuit has ruled that a group of black financial advisers who are suing Merrill Lynch for racial discrimination can proceed with their class action, agreeing with the plaintiffs that the Supreme Court’s Wal-Mart ruling could be used to support class certification rather than deny it.

As Chevron fights an $18 billion judgment for environmental damage in Ecuador, it also faces a federal suit in New Jersey by the plaintiffs’ lawyers. The suit, which Patton Boggs brought pro se, accuses Chevron of malicious prosecution and improperly obtaining an injunction to fend off liability.

A federal judge in Philadelphia has tossed some cases in the multidistrict asbestos litigation against a group of defendants he said couldn’t be held liable for the fact that their non-asbestos-containing products were later used in asbestos-containing products handled by the plaintiffs.