NEWS

Hugo alleges the music icon-turned-fashion figure has "engaged in self-dealing, concealed material information, and diverted revenues owed." "Such willful, fraudulent, and malicious conduct warrants the imposition of punitive damages," Hugo’s attorney, Brent J. Lehman, said in court documents. Read Article

While existing ethics rules and statutes already prohibit many of these practices, enforcement has been hampered by limited resources at the State Bar. SB 37 empowers consumers by authorizing citizen enforcement against unlawful attorney advertising, capping, and illegal referral services. 

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While applicants submit resumes and wait for a response, Eightfold allegedly scrapes vast amounts of personal data—much of it inaccurate, incomplete, or drawn from unknown third-party sources—and funnels it through a proprietary large language model to score and rank candidates based on their supposed “likelihood of success” in the role. The lawsuit asserts how, much like employment background checks, these AI-generated evaluations function as “consumer reports under the federal Fair Credit Reporting Act (FCRA) and California law.  Read Article

Google asserts that the Court’s August 2024 ruling ignored the reality that people use Google because they want to, not because they’re forced to. The decision failed to account for the rapid pace of innovation and intense competition we face from established players and well-funded start-ups. And it discounted compelling testimony from browser makers like Apple and Mozilla who said they choose to feature Google because it provides the highest quality search experience for their consumers.  Read Article

The court’s denial is considered a big win for Alaska Natives. They said the state’s challenge struck at the heart of the long-held subsistence protection and put at risk oversight of a vital food, the salmon that has sustained Alaska villages for ages. 

“‘We are deeply gratified by the Court’s decision not to disturb the robust protections that affirm federal subsistence priorities,” said Ben Mallott, president of the Alaska Federation of Natives the state’s largest Native group in a prepared statement.   Read Article

The former CEO of a Southern California nonprofit camp for children with serious medical conditions has been charged with embezzling more than $5 million from the organization, prosecutors said. Christopher LeBaron Butler, 49, is charged with 15 felony counts, including nine counts of grand theft, five counts of forgery and one count of fraudulent use of a computer, per the Los Angeles County District Attorney’s Office.  Read Article

Elon Musk's X Corp is suing 18 major music publishers and a major music industry trade association in the United States on Friday, alleging that they conspired to block competition and force the social media platform to purchase licenses for musical works at inflated prices. The lawsuit, filed in a federal district court in the U.S. state of Texas, asserts the National Music Publishers' Association, Sony Music, Universal Music, Warner Chappell, and other record labels of violating federal antitrust law by refusing to negotiate individual licensing agreements with the social network.

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Google and Character.AI plan to settle several lawsuits with families alleging that their products drove their children to self-harm or suicide, according to recent court documents. 

The companies have reached settlement agreements “in principle” in five cases, they said in filings Tuesday and Wednesday. That includes lawsuits brought by the families of 14-year-old Sewell Setzer III and 13-year-old Juliana Peralta, both of whom committed suicide after lengthy conversations with Character.AI’s chatbots. Read Article

January 7, 2026 -- At 4:17 p.m., Jurupa Valley Sheriff deputies and Eastvale Special Enforcement Team served a search warrant in the 6700 block of Leanne Street, Eastvale, in connection with an illegal marijuana cultivation investigation. During the service of the warrant, deputies determined the residence had been converted to support an illegal indoor marijuana operation. Deputies seized over 2000 marijuana plants, which have an estimated street value of over one million dollars. The total estimated loss from utility theft was approximately $145,000. Read Article

At approximately 1:25 p.m., the Rialto Police Department responded to several calls reporting a traffic collision involving a motorcycle and another vehicle in the 1300 block of North Riverside Avenue. Patrol officers responded immediately and arrived at the scene within two minutes of the initial calls. Officers found the motorcyclist, Juan Alvarez-Flores suffering from significant injuries and immediately began providing medical assistance. Rialto Fire Department paramedics arrived shortly thereafter, took over medical care, and transported Alvarez-Flores to a local trauma center. Despite these efforts, Alvarez-Flores later died from his injuries and was pronounced deceased at approximately 2:00 p.m. by hospital staff. Read Article

The Trump administration is withholding about $160 million from California in response to the state's decision to delay the cancellation of more than 17,000 immigrant commercial driver's licenses. "Our demands were simple: follow the rules, revoke the unlawfully-issued licenses to dangerous foreign drivers, and fix the system so this never happens again," U.S. Department of Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy said in a statement. "Gavin Newsom has failed to do so — putting the needs of illegal immigrants over the safety of the American people." Read Article

The Department of Homeland Security said Tuesday that it started what could be described as the largest immigration enforcement operation ever carried out by the agency — with 2,000 federal agents and officers expected in the Minneapolis area for a crackdown tied in part to allegations of fraud involving Somali residents.

The government planned to send about 2,000 Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents and officers to Minnesota, according to a U.S. official and a person briefed on the matter. Read Article

The lawsuit, filed in the Northern District of Illinois on Dec. 23, claims that the company misled customers since it "does not contain any actual pork rib meat at all." The suit alleges that McDonald's "knowingly markets the sandwich in a way that deceives reasonable customers," saying that the beloved sandwich has lower quality pork products, including pork shoulder, heart and scalded stomach. Those cuts are less desirable than the premium rib meat. Read Article

The Bureau of Land Management this winter will hold the first lease sale in the reserve since 2019, potentially opening the door for expanded oil and gas activity in an area that has seen new interest from oil companies in recent years. The agency on Dec. 22 said it approved an updated management plan that opens about 82% of the National Petroleum Reserve-Alaska to oil and gas leasing. Read Article

The 2026 batch of newly public artistic creations doesn't quite have the sparkle of the recent first entries into the public domain of Mickey or Winnie. But ever since 2019 - the end of a 20-year IP drought brought on by congressional copyright extensions - every annual crop has been a bounty for advocates of more work belonging to the public. Read Article

The complaint from the Legal Accountability Project against Judge Sarah Merriam of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit states that it is based on conversations with multiple former law clerks who fear retaliation if they come forward themselves.

"She is a bully, in all the ways one might bully their employees: yelling, berating clerks, sending all-caps unhinged emails," said Aliza Shatzman, president and founder of the Legal Accountability Project. Read Article

Genesis HealthCare, once the nation’s largest nursing home chain, filed for Chapter 11 reorganization bankruptcy in July with a proposal to protect its controlling investor, Joel Landau, from legal liability. In court papers, Genesis had originally estimated all its settled and pending cases — which it said numbered nearly a thousand — would cost $259 million to resolve. Read Article

Mario Rodriguez, who appeared in Perry's 2016 movie "Boo! A Madea Halloween," filed a lawsuit on Thursday in Los Angeles County California. The lawsuit alleges that Perry subjected him to repeated unwanted sexual advances that lasted for several years. In the lawsuit, Rodriguez also claims that Perry committed sexual battery and assault against him at Perry's Los Angeles home. Read Article

The NAACP South Carolina State Conference is the lead plaintiff, joined by individual voters with disabilities. Attorneys from the American Civil Liberties Union, the ACLU of South Carolina and Proskauer Rose LLP represent them. Plaintiffs argue the challenged laws clash with Section 208 of the Voting Rights Act, which permits voters who need assistance due to blindness, disability or inability to read or write to receive help from a person of their choice, with limited exceptions.  Read Article

Rialto Police Department Detectives were called to the 3400 Block of North Grapewood Avenue, Rialto. on December 15, at about 10 p.m.  regarding a shooting incident. Officers located an adult male victim inside the residence. The victim was unresponsive and suffering from apparent gunshot wounds to the head and upper torso. Rialto Fire Department personnel responded and pronounced the victim deceased at 10:21 p.m. due to obvious signs of trauma.  Read Article

The Justice Department filed a complaint against the Virgin Islands Police Department (VIPD) alleging that the territory's unreasonable delays and conditions on lawful gun owners' rights make for an unconstitutional permitting process in violation of the Second Amendment.  Read Article

An Alaska Native group and conservation groups filed a lawsuit on Dec. 11 to stop ConocoPhillips’ large winter exploration plans on the North Slope after the Trump administration approved the plan last month in the National Petroleum Reserve-Alaska.  Read Article

Naveed Akram, armed with what police described as “long guns”, opened fire on more than 1,000 people attending a Jewish festival in the Archer Park area of Bondi Beach. The other gunman, his father Sajid Akram, 50, was killed in an exchange of fire with police at the scene. Fifteen people were killed and dozens of others were injured in the attack, which targeted Australia's Jewish community at an event celebrating the first night of Hanukkah. Read Article

The 12-member jury will consider whether the steps taken by Dugan on April 18th, to control her courtroom earlier this year amounted to a felony and a misdemeanor. Dugan was presiding over the domestic violence case of an undocumented immigrant named Eduardo Flores-Ruiz, and she demanded to know whether the agents had a judge-signed warrant to arrest the defendant. Read Article

Investigators from the San Bernardino County Sheriff's Department conducted a search warrant at Reds Shop in reference to illegal activity. The search warrant led to the discovery of multiple illegal gambling machines, a large amount of narcotics, a firearm, a scale, and U.S. currency in different denominations. Read Article

The estate of an 83-year-old Connecticut woman filed a wrongful death lawsuit Thursday against OpenAI and Microsoft, alleging the ChatGPT chatbot fueled her son's paranoid delusions and contributed to her murder. This case is part of a series of lawsuits claiming that OpenAI's chatbot acted as a "suicide coach" and lacked necessary safety measures. Read Article

Mitch Winehouse, father of late British singer Amy Winehouse on Tuesday defended his UK lawsuit against two of her friends after they sold some of her clothes at auction for around £730,000 ($970,000).

Mitch Winehouse told the High Court in London that Naomi Parry, the star's former stylist, and her friend, Catriona Gourlay, did not have the right to sell dozens of items in auctions between November 2021 and May 2023. Read Article

Terry Rozier, a Miami Heat player, has pled not guilty in federal court on Monday to charges related to an ongoing gambling investigation. During his arraignment in Brooklyn federal court, the 31-year-old point guard formally entered the plea to federal wire fraud and money laundering conspiracy charges. Read Article

The European Commission slapped a 120 million euro fine on Friday on Elon Musk's social media platform X, formerly known as Twitter, for the first time under its landmark Digital Services Act following a two-year investigation. At the centre of the probe is the blue checkmark, previously used to signal official accounts at no cost but now sold for 7 a month, which risks confusing users about the veracity of identities. Read Article

The European Commission has opened a formal antitrust investigation into Meta over a new WhatsApp policy that could restrict third-party artificial intelligence providers from using its business communication tools. European regulators are concerned that this policy, which was announced in October, may breach EU competition rules by giving Meta’s own AI chatbot a competitive advantage while blocking rivals. Read Article

Nicki Minaj is facing a huge legal setback as a Los Angeles court moves toward seizing her $20 million Hidden Hills mansion. The decision stems from an unpaid judgment owed to former security guard Thomas Weidenmuller, who suffered a devastating injury during Minaj’s concert in Germany. Read Article

As part of her legal battle with Justin Baldoni and Wayfarer Studios, Blake Lively issued subpoenas against several YouTubers, alleging that they were part of a smear campaign against her. Popcorned Planet Inc.'s attempt to quash Lively's subpoena for his communications to Wayfarer was based on journalist's privilege has been denied. Read Article

Nine MediaNews Group newspapers filed a civil lawsuit Wednesday against OpenAI and Microsoft, accusing the tech giants of violating copyright law by stealing the news publishers’ content to build and operate the large language models that power their artificial intelligence applications.

The newspapers are the Los Angeles Daily News, The San Diego Union-Tribune, San Bernardino Sun, Boston Herald, Hartford Courant, The Morning Call, the Boulder Daily Camera, the Daily Press and The Virginian-Pilot. Read Article

The Trump administration has released a plan for offshore oil and gas leasing that would open up almost all Alaska marine waters to development, along with the entire Pacific coast and the Gulf of Mexico.

The Alaska portion of the plan proposes 21 lease sales through 2031, five of them in Cook Inlet, two in the Beaufort Sea, two in the Chukchi Sea and the others in other marine areas. Those include a lease sale in a newly designated “High Arctic” area that lies beyond the 200-nautical-mile exclusive economic zone and where U.S. territorial rights are not yet clear. Read Article

All 20 San Mateo County cities joined a lawsuit last week claiming the state of California kept $38 million in vehicle-license fees owed them.

The lawsuit originally filed in August 2025 claims the funds shared by the county and the cities provide critical dollars for health care, public safety, and affordable housing programs. Read Article

Georgia Judge Scott McAfee has dismissed the sprawling 2020 election interference case against Donald Trump, ending the final effort to accuse the president for allegedly attempting to overturn his loss to Joe Biden. Attorney Peter Skandalakis took over the case after the initial prosecutor's removal, asked the Judge to dismiss the charges. Read Article

SAN BERNARDINO, Calif., - Four people have pleaded no-contest to felony insurance fraud and assault charges for their role in staging a collision targeting a rideshare driver. Fifth individual, alleged co-conspirator, Deshawn Perater-Nickson, 26, of Adelanto, faces additional charges of false imprisonment, pimping, and pandering and is due in court January 26, 2026. Read Article

Megan Thee Stallion, whose legal name is Megan Pete, alleges in a lawsuit, filed in U.S. District Court in the Southern District of Florida, that content creator, Milagro Cooper participated in a targeted and coordinated social media campaign to harass, intimidate and defame Pete, in concert with rapper Tory Lanez, who was convicted of shooting and injuring Pete in a July 2020 incident. Read Article

On October 8, 2025, Governor Gavin Newsom signed SB 361, amending the state’s existing data broker registration statute to expand obligations for data brokers. The law takes effect January 1, 2026, with a registration deadline for data brokers set for January 31, 2026.

What does SB 361 do?

An act to amend Sections 1798.99.82, 1798.99.84, and 1798.99.86 of the Civil Code, relating to privacy. Read Article

The Supreme Court met in private on Friday with a high-profile issue on its agenda — President Donald Trump ’s birthright citizenship order declaring that children born to parents who are in the United States illegally or temporarily are not American citizens. The justices could say as soon as Monday whether they will hear Trump’s appeal of lower court rulings that have uniformly struck down the citizenship restrictions. They have not taken effect anywhere in the United States. Read Article

Filing a lawsuit in the D.C. Circuit, the Sierra Club challenged the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) approval for the Southwest Power Pool (SPP) to fast-track the interconnection of mostly fossil-fueled generation to the power grid. SPP spans 14 states, stretching from Louisiana, parts of Texas, and New Mexico up to Montana and North Dakota. 

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The Department of Justice filed suit against California, saying the state is violating federal law and the rights of non-Californians by allowing undocumented immigrants who live in the state to pay the same reduced tuition rates as other in-state residents at the University of California and California State University. California is illegally discriminating against American students and families by offering exclusive tuition benefits for non-citizens," Attorney General Pamela Bondi said in a statement announcing the lawsuit, filed in federal court in Sacramento. Read Article

Los Angeles County District Attorney Nathan J. Hochman announced a criminal investigation into potentially fraudulent sex abuse claims against Los Angeles County, including claims under the $4 billion settlement with Los Angeles County approved in April – the largest sex abuse settlement in U.S. history. This includes fraud potentially committed by claimants, lawyers, recruiters, and doctors. Read Article

The U.S. Supreme Court agreed to hear a defense by President Donald Trump's administration of the government's authority to limit the processing of asylum claims at ports of entry along the U.S.-Mexico border.The metering policy is separate from the total ban on asylum at the U.S.-Mexico border that Trump issued after returning to office. Read Article

In his ruling on November 13, U.S. District Judge Mark Pittman in Fort Worth, Texas, said Musk’s social media platform X and startup xAI can move forward for now with their lawsuit, in a preliminary victory for the billionaire entrepreneur in a battle over artificial intelligence dominance. Judge Pittman underlined that the order does not address the claims' merits, which will be decided later. Read Article

The Justice Department (DOJ) intervened as a plaintiff in a November 5 lawsuit by the California Republican Party and 19 registered voters in the state. The case challenges California's ballot initiative Proposition 50, which allows temporary use of new congressional district maps. The lawsuit against California's redistricting plan are because it constitutes racial gerrymandering in violation of the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment and Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act. Read Article

The "Social Security Emergency Inflation Relief Act" or "Social Security Emergency Inflation Relief Act" is a proposed bill by Senators Elizabeth Warren, Chuck Schumer and Alex Padilla introduced to expand Social Security and Veterans Affairs benefits. Senate Democrats believe that it would provide an additional $200 in monthly benefits to eligible recipients for a six-month period (January through July 2026). Read Article

Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy said Wednesday that California's action to revoke these licenses is an admission that the state acted improperly even though it previously defended its licensing standards. California launched its review of commercial driver's licenses it issued after Duffy raised concerns. Read Article

Tech giant Google went on the offensive, filing a lawsuit with the U.S. District Court in the Southern District of New York battling what it alleges is a huge criminal organization based in China called "Lighthouse" that provides software and support to online scammers. Read Article

The "Renner Zhou controversy" involves Chinese filmmaker Yi Zhou accusing actor Jeremy Renner of sexual misconduct, harassment, and threatening to involve immigration authorities (ICE) using Direct Messaging and Whatsapp. Read Article

Potentially a major ruling in election law, the Supreme Court on Monday agreed to decide whether federal law requires ballots to be not only cast by voters but also received by election officials by Election Day. As part of the list of orders from the justices’ private conference on Friday, the court took up Watson v. Republican National Committee, a challenge by the Republican National Committee (RNC) and others to a Mississippi law. Read Article

Newport News, VA - In the Abby Zwerner case, a jury awarded her $10 million in damages in her civil lawsuit against former Richneck Elementary School assistant principal Ebony Parker. The jury found that Parker was grossly negligent in failing to act on multiple warnings that a six-year-old student had a gun on the day Zwerner was shot. Read Article

Due to the ongoing government shutdown, SNAP benefits for November will be reduced to approximately 65% of the usual maximum allotments. This change affects approximately 42 million Americans who rely on SNAP for food assistance. Recent changes to the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) have limited eligibility for immigrants. Under the new rules, only U.S. citizens, lawful permanent residents (with certain exceptions), Cuban and Haitian entrants, and citizens of COFA Compact of Free Association nations are eligible for SNAP benefits, while many previously eligible immigrants will lose their benefits. Read Article

In a decision issued on October 28, 2025, U.S. District Judge Sidney Stein in New York ruled that the authors presented plausible arguments that the text generated by ChatGPT could be considered "substantially similar" to their original, copyrighted works, which might violate their copyrights. 

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The judges in Massachusetts and Rhode Island gave the administration leeway on whether to fund the program partially or in full for November. That also brings uncertainty about how things will unfold and will delay payments for many beneficiaries whose cards would normally be recharged early in the month. Read Article