Blog Posts
04.01.20 | Covid-19 has caused stress for both business owners and employees. In the past days, two new benefits are in effect from April 1, 2020 through December 31, 2020: emergency paid sick leave (EPSL) and paid FMLA leave (FMLA+).
01.18.19 | Independent contractors who work in transportation may not be forced into mandatory arbitration.
05.21.18 | An innocuous line in a Court of Appeals opinion reminds attorneys that there is a different deadline for paper filings versus electronic filings.
06.27.17 | The Kansas savings statute, K.S.A. 60-518, may not be invoked after the expiration of 6 months following the dismissal of the original timely action.
05.09.17 | Standing in a foreclosure case requires possession of an enforceable note at the time the foreclosure is filed. A mortgage and note may be later reunited and be enforceable.
12.29.16 | A Motion to Compel Arbitration is not one of the motions under Fed.R.Civ.P. 12(b) that extends the time to answer under Fed.R.Civ.P. 12(a)(1). In order to avoid filing an answer, defendants should file a Motion to Dismiss or, in the alternative, To Compel Arbitration.
03.28.16 | K.S.A. § 60-19a02, establishing caps on recovery for noneconomic damages in personal injury actions, is constitutional as applied to personal injuries resulting from collisions between motor carriers and motor vehicles.
03.21.16 | In Missouri, a settlement offer that does not include time limits or a condition that it be accepted before the court rules on summary judgment, remains open for a "reasonable period of time". Even after summary judgment has been granted, the losing party can accept an open settlement offer, reasonably soon after the offer was made.
01.04.16 | While a Kansas court may grant relief from a final judgment based on excusable neglect, it is an abuse of discretion to grant that relief when the party seeking that relief has failed either to explain what facts constituted excusable neglect or to provide any evidence to support that claim.
02.09.15 | An agent may recover attorney's fees when enforcing a principal's contract if: the agent is granted the express authority to enforce the contract in the contract itself, the contract contains an attorney's fees provision, and the agent is the prevailing party.
01.20.15 | Kansas has joined a short, but growing, list of states introducing legislation purporting to give terminally ill patients the option to try drug treatments not yet approved by the FDA, but which have passed Phase One FDA testing. However, the legislation does not incentivize any manufacturer to provide such drugs and in fact potentially exposes a manufacturer who does provide access to additional risk of lawsuits.
06.23.14 | Experts are not required to rule out all possible causes when performing the differential etiology analysis if the experts have properly ruled in the alleged cause.
04.21.14 | Based on its adoption of a statutory scheme of comparative negligence, Kansas has abolished common law assumption of the risk as a bar to recovery. Simmons v. Porter, 298 Kan. 299, 312 P3d 345, 355 (Kan. 2013).
03.20.14 | The plaintiff has the burden of proving standing, which is a jurisdictional issue that can be raised at any time.
03.07.14 | This morning, in a decision of interest to many residents and practitioners in Kansas the Supreme Court of Kansas issued its long-anticipated ruling in the school finance case, and held:
02.25.14 | In Kansas, the parties bind themselves to an enforceable settlement, even though the parties contemplate subsequent execution of a formal instrument. However, when the parties specifically condition a contract on it being reduced to writing and signed, there is no enforceable contract until such act is accomplished.
08.28.13 | Kansas, like many other jurisdictions, does not recognize the tort of spoliation absent another independent tort, contract, agreement, voluntary assumption of a duty, or special relationship. Kansas has also held that neither a commercial relationship nor knowledge of pending litigation is the type of special relationship that creates a duty to preserve documents.
08.05.13 | On July 26, 2013, the Kansas Supreme Court refused to expand the economic loss doctrine from its origins in product liability litigation to act as a bar to tort claims for economic recovery in the context of a negligent misrepresentation claim.
06.26.13 | The U.S. Supreme Court recently held that the federal Medicaid statute's anti-lien provision preempted a North Carolina state statute that required a Medicaid beneficiary to release up to one-third of any damages recovered for a tortious injury to the State as reimbursement for payments it made for the beneficiary's medical treatment, up to the amount actually paid by the state. We take a look at how the ruling in Wos v. E.M.A., 133 S.Ct. 1391 (2013) could potentially affect Missouri and Kansas Medicaid lien statutes.
06.26.13 | The U.S. Supreme Court recently held that the federal Medicaid statute's anti-lien provision preempted a North Carolina state statute that required a Medicaid beneficiary to release up to one-third of any damages recovered for a tortious injury to the State as reimbursement for payments it made for the beneficiary's medical treatment, up to the amount actually paid by the state. We take a look at how the ruling in Wos v. E.M.A., 133 S.Ct. 1391 (2013) could potentially affect Missouri and Kansas Medicaid lien statutes.
10.29.12 | In October of 2012, the Kansas Supreme Court resolved four constitutional questions and upheld the noneconomic damages cap of $250,000 in personal injury actions contained in K.S.A. 60-19a02. In Miller v. Johnson, 289 P.3d 1098 (Kan. 2012), a patient brought a medical malpractice action against a physician who mistakenly removed patient's left ovary during a surgery intended to take the right ovary. . .
10.04.12 | Supreme Court of Missouri issued an opinion in Deborah Watts as Next Friend for Naython Kayne Watts v. Lester E. Cox Medical Centers d/b/a/ Family Care Center, Lester E. Cox Medical Centers, Melissa R. Hermann, M.D., Matthew P. Green, D.O., and William S. Kelly, M.D. holding that RSMo 538.210, which caps non-economic damages, is unconstitutional, as it violates the right to trial by jury. . .
09.25.12 | Supreme Court of Missouri issued a unanimous opinion in Robert L. Bateman, et al., James K. Owens et al., v. Platte County, Missouri affirming that defendant waives its statute of limitations defense when the defendant fails to plead the particular statute. . .
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