Litigation Insights
Analysis and practical guides on litigation.
286 articles, checklists, and guides on litigation law, written by the attorneys at MC Law. Every piece is general information, not legal advice—for a specific matter, contact the firm.
Tortious Interference and Unfair Competition Claims Between Businesses
When a competitor hires away a sales team, a supplier stops shipping after a rival calls, or a customer walks away mid-contract, the claim businesses reach for is tortious interference. It is also the claim they most often lose, because competition is privileged and the line between aggressive selling and improper interference is drawn by a doctrine that varies by state. This article explains both interference torts element by element, the competition privilege and the independently wrongful conduct requirement that most states impose for prospective relations, and the justification defenses. It then covers the adjacent claims that usually travel with it: common law unfair competition, breach of fiduciary duty and aiding and abetting, civil conspiracy, and unjust enrichment, along with the preemption and economic loss doctrines that eliminate several of them. Later sections address proof and damages, injunctive relief, defenses including Noerr-Pennington and the litigation privilege, and how to plead and defend these cases.
Obtaining or Setting Aside a Default Judgment: A Practical Guide
This guide takes both sides of a federal default through every step, from the day the answer deadline passes to the day the judgment is enforced or vacated. For plaintiffs it covers confirming service and the deadline, requesting entry of default, the Servicemembers Civil Relief Act check, choosing between a clerk's judgment and a court judgment, building the damages record, drafting the Rule 55(b)(2) motion and proposed judgment, and enforcing the result. For defendants it covers triage by procedural posture, stopping enforcement, building the declarations that explain the default and establish a meritorious defense, choosing among Rule 6(b), Rule 55(c), and the Rule 60(b) grounds, and negotiating a stipulation. Each step states what to do, why, the governing authority, common pitfalls, timing, and cost. A timeline and cost table, a worked example that runs through both sides of one case, common mistakes, an FAQ, and takeaways close the guide.
Rule 45 Subpoena Response Checklist: A Practical Checklist
A subpoena to a company that is not a party to the lawsuit is a deadline problem before it is a legal problem, and the most valuable action available—a timely written objection—takes an afternoon and shifts the entire burden of going forward to the party that issued it. This checklist runs the response in the order the clock requires: validate service and the compliance geography on day one, issue a preservation hold, identify whose privilege and confidentiality are implicated, serve a specific objection with a quantified burden showing and a narrowed proposal before day fourteen, then negotiate scope, cost, and format. It closes with production mechanics, testimony, and the motion practice that follows if negotiation fails. It closes with the privilege log, the cost-shifting request, and the protective order terms worth negotiating before anything is produced.
Federal Appellate Practice: Preserving Error, Standards of Review, and Briefs That Win
An appeal is not a second trial. It is a review of what the trial court did with what it was given, which means the appeal was largely won or lost in the district court by lawyers who may never have thought about it. This article explains federal appellate practice from that perspective. It covers appellate jurisdiction, including the final judgment rule, the narrow exceptions of section 1292, Rule 54(b) certification, and the collateral order doctrine; the jurisdictional deadline for the notice of appeal and the motions that toll it; and the standards of review that determine what an appellate court is actually permitted to do, with practical guidance on characterizing issues to obtain the most favorable standard. A long section addresses preservation, including the objection requirements at trial, the interaction between denied summary judgment motions and Rule 50 after Ortiz v. Jordan and Dupree v. Younger, and the plain error and harmless error doctrines. It then turns to craft: assembling the record, selecting issues, structuring the statement of the case, writing an argument that respects the standard of review, oral argument preparation, and post-decision options including panel rehearing, rehearing en banc, and certiorari. It closes with checklists, a worked example, an FAQ, and related reading.
Cross-Border IP Litigation and Service Toolkit: A Roadmap and Resource Library for International Disputes
This toolkit is a high-level roadmap for litigating intellectual property disputes that cross borders, from assessing the dispute through service abroad under the Hague Service Convention (with special attention to China), establishing jurisdiction, managing parallel proceedings and forum selection, coordinating global patent and trademark enforcement, gathering evidence abroad, enforcing foreign judgments, and deploying anti-suit injunctions in FRAND wars. Each stage links to mclaw.io articles and checklists plus the controlling conventions, statutes, and cases, including the Hague Service and Evidence Conventions, 28 U.S.C. § 1782, PACER, WIPO, and Water Splash v. Menon. It is written for litigators, in-house counsel, and IP owners coordinating enforcement across the United States, China, Europe, and beyond. Use the narrative to orient and the resource links to execute. The toolkit flags traps in service on Chinese defendants and the unsettled state of anti-suit and anti-anti-suit injunctions in standard-essential-patent disputes. Verify treaty reservations, central-authority requirements, and timelines at the official sources before relying on them.
Section 1983 Civil Rights Litigation: Color of Law, Monell, and Qualified Immunity
Section 1983 is the statute that lets a person sue a government official for violating the Constitution, and almost every difficult question in the field is about who can be sued rather than what was done. This article works through the architecture: the color of law requirement, the individual capacity claim and the qualified immunity defense that dominates it, municipal liability under Monell and why respondeat superior does not apply, the Eleventh Amendment and the Ex parte Young workaround, and the fee shifting provision that makes the whole enterprise economically possible. It covers the most litigated claim types, the Heck bar that traps claims arising from arrests, and the practical realities of damages and settlement.
Damage Statistics: Administrative and Government Litigation
Suing the government is not like suing your neighbor. Before a dollar of damages is on the table, the plaintiff must find a statute in which the sovereign has consented to be sued, and each consent statute comes with its own ceiling, its own forum, and its own list of things it will not pay for. This guide maps the damages landscape across the major vehicles: the Federal Tort Claims Act, the Tucker Act and the Court of Federal Claims, Section 1983 civil-rights suits and the qualified-immunity wall, Bivens claims, Fifth Amendment takings, the Administrative Procedure Act (which buys you an injunction, not a check), and the Equal Access to Justice Act fee-shifting statute. It explains how damages are proven and capped when the defendant is a government, why honest "average award" numbers are hard to come by, and how a careful lawyer values a case against a public defendant. The hard figures the input promised do not exist in any reliable public dataset, so this article frames ranges and sources honestly rather than inventing verdict statistics.
Federal Subject-Matter Jurisdiction: Arising Under, Diversity, Supplemental Claims, and the Defect That Never Waives
This article explains why a federal judgment can be erased years after trial because of a defect nobody noticed, and why the party who picked the court can be the one to raise it. It reads the leading cases on federal question jurisdiction closely, from Mottley through Grable and Gunn, including how arising-under doctrine works in patent, copyright, and declaratory judgment cases. It then covers diversity: complete diversity, the citizenship of people who work anywhere, corporations under Hertz, LLCs and trusts traced through every layer, and the amount in controversy. Supplemental jurisdiction, removal, remand, snap removal, and the voluntary-involuntary rule follow. The law is stated through the Supreme Court's 2026 decisions in Hain Celestial v. Palmquist, Enbridge v. Nessel, and Jules v. Andre Balazs Properties, along with Royal Canin v. Wullschleger from 2025. A table sorts which defects can be cured and which cannot.
Motions to Dismiss Under Rule 12: A Practical Guide for Plaintiffs and Defendants
A motion to dismiss is the first real fight in most federal cases, and it is decided on a record consisting of exactly one document. This guide explains how Rule 12 actually works: the seven enumerated defenses, the strict consolidation and waiver rules of Rule 12(g) and 12(h) that destroy more defenses than any judge ever does, and the sequencing questions courts face when jurisdiction, venue, and merits arguments arrive together. It covers the plausibility standard of Twombly and Iqbal in operational terms, including the two-step method courts actually use, the limits the Supreme Court reaffirmed in Erickson and Johnson v. City of Shelby, and the heightened pleading regimes of Rule 9(b) and the securities laws. It explains what a court may consider without converting the motion to summary judgment, the doctrines of incorporation by reference and judicial notice and how they are abused, and the standards for facial and factual attacks under Rule 12(b)(1). It then turns to strategy: when a motion is worth filing, when it merely educates the plaintiff, how to use Rule 12(e) and 12(f), how leave to amend works under Foman v. Davis, and how to write an opposition that survives. It closes with drafting checklists, a worked example, an FAQ, and related reading.
Defending a Professional License Before a State Board
A professional license is frequently a person's entire livelihood, and a board complaint threatens it through a process that resembles litigation only partially. The board is investigator, prosecutor, and adjudicator; the rules of evidence are relaxed; the standard of proof may be lower than in civil court; and the collateral consequences of any discipline—database reporting, reciprocal action in other states, exclusion from federal health programs, loss of privileges and insurance—frequently exceed the sanction itself. This guide walks the process from the arrival of the complaint through judicial review, explains what to do and what not to do in the investigative phase where most cases are decided, covers settlement and the terms that matter, and addresses the collateral consequences that should shape every strategic decision. It closes with rehabilitation and reinstatement, and with the practices that prevent a complaint from becoming a career-ending event.
Laying the Foundation for Business Records and Defeating Hearsay Objections: A Practical Guide
This guide walks through getting records admitted, and keeping them out, in the order the work actually happens. It starts with an exhibit-by-exhibit theory of admissibility, then covers choosing between a live witness and a certification, locking down foundations in discovery, serving Rule 902 notices, and handling exhibits at trial. Sample question-and-answer scripts cover ordinary records, third-party documents, system data, email, and missing entries. A separate track explains what self-represented people can do in a smaller court, and another shows the opposing side how to attack a weak foundation. Costs, timing, trade-offs, and common mistakes are set out for each stage.
Defending a Deposition Checklist: A Practical Checklist
Defending a deposition is one of the most consequential and least understood skills in civil litigation, because harmful testimony can decide a case on summary judgment or in settlement long before trial. This checklist walks defending counsel through the arc from the witness preparation session to the errata sheet: preparing the witness within the ethical line that separates legitimate preparation from improper coaching, controlling the record, making proper concise objections under Rule 30(c)(2) and the distinction between form and substance, knowing the three narrow grounds for instructing a witness not to answer, navigating the rules on conferring with the witness, defending the Rule 30(b)(6) corporate designee and the expert, terminating an abusive deposition under Rule 30(d)(3), and handling transcript review and the errata sheet. Each phase is paired with the reason it matters and the case law—anchored by Hall v. Clifton Precision—that punishes obstruction.