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In a case sure to send retail pharmacy corporate-types scurrying to board room meetings to ensure their bases are covered, a Northern District of California federal judge held that Walgreens’ Co.’s 15 year-long pattern of filling opioid prescriptions for customers without performing adequate due diligence as to the medical legitimacy of the prescription substantially contributed to the opioid crisis in San Francisco.
Continue Reading Seller Beware—Considering How Walgreens’ Liability for the San Francisco Opioid Epidemic Applies to Retail Pharmacies Everywhere

Listen as Phyllis H. Marcus, partner at Hunton Andrews Kurth and Co-Chair of the ABA Antitrust Law Section’s Privacy and Information Security Committee, speaks about the privacy concerns over using smart devices on the ABA’s Our Curious Amalgam podcast, Is Your Assistant Spying on You? Understanding the Privacy Law Issues Involving In-Home Assistants.
Continue Reading Is Your Smart Home Too Smart? Hunton Partner Featured in ABA Podcast on Privacy and Smart Speakers

A new bill introduced in Congress earlier this month could increase litigation risk for the retail industry by leaving companies unable to prevent the Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) from disclosing inaccurate or premature information about potential product hazards. The Safety Hazard and Recall Efficiency (SHARE) Information Act, introduced on January 9, 2020, by U.S. Representative Bobby L. Rush (D-IL), would also increase the maximum civil penalty for violations of the Consumer Product Safety Act (CPSA) from $15 million to $50 million. Largely seen as a response to public criticism over the perceived delays in the CPSC’s disclosure of hazards associated with infant inclined sleepers over the last year, the SHARE Information Act would allow the CPSC to tell the public that a product may pose a safety issue before the hazard has been confirmed.
Continue Reading SHARE Information Act Could Increase Companies’ Product Liability Litigation Risk

Innovation and developments in technology bring both opportunities and challenges for retailers, and Hunton Andrews Kurth has a sophisticated understanding of these issues and how they affect retailers. On January 23, 2020, our cross-disciplinary retail team, composed of over 200 lawyers, released our annual Retail Industry Year in Review. …
Continue Reading 2019 Retail Industry Year in Review

The theme for this Recall Roundup is effectiveness of recalls. In October, the US Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation released an investigative report criticizing the CPSC’s data-handling breaches from the spring. This month, the Office of Oversight and Investigations Minority Staff from the same US Senate committee released a report criticizing the CPSC’s handling of three “high-profile failures to effectively recall dangerous products” last year. …
Continue Reading Recall Roundup: December

The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals dismissed a consumer-fraud class action lawsuit against Diet Dr Pepper maker Dr Pepper/Seven Up, Inc., holding that use of the word “diet” in the product’s name was not false or deceptive advertising in the proper context of the soft drink market. …
Continue Reading “Diet” Soda Doesn’t Have to Lead to Weight Loss, Court Rules

Last month, the CPSC and three affiliated retailers issued a joint warning to consumers after the retailers discovered they sold nearly 1,200 units of 19 previously recalled consumer products between 2014 and 2019. The range of products at issue varied, including infant sleepers, scarves, portable speakers, barstools, children’s cardigan sets, hoverboards, beer mugs, coffee presses and infant rattles. It remains to be seen whether any further CPSC action, such as a civil penalty or a requirement to implement stronger recall systems and protocols, will be taken with respect to these three retailers.
Continue Reading Recall Roundup: November