February 4, 2020 by V. John Ella

Parties in litigation may wish to keep certain pleadings or other documents out of the public eye or even keep their names off of publicly filed court documents altogether. For example, in defamation cases plaintiffs are often forced to re-publish false and defamatory statements about them when they file their complaint. Litigants in such cases […]

January 24, 2020 by V. John Ella

The Minnesota Supreme Court has affirmed decisions by two lower courts that a minimum wage ordinance passed by City of Minneapolis on January 1, 2018, Minneapolis Code of Ordinances (“MCO”) Section 40.390 (2019), was not preempted by the Minnesota Fair Labor Standards Act (“MFLSA”), Minn. Stat. Section 177.24, which also sets a minimum wage for […]

January 20, 2020 by Anna M. Koch

(Note: this content was originally prepared for the Minnesota State Bar Association’s Labor & Employment Law E-Newsletter, Vol. 32) Introduction Several notable decisions in Minnesota state and federal courts regarding restrictive covenants and employment agreements were issued in 2019 and the overall trend continues to be increasing difficulty for plaintiffs to obtain injunctive relief or […]

January 14, 2020 by Bryan R. Battina

Can a non-physician own all or part of a for-profit company that employs doctors to provide medical care in Minnesota?  Pursuant to Minnesota’s corporate practice of medicine doctrine (“CPMD”) the answer is “no.”  This legal doctrine is not found in a statute, regulation or rule.  It comes from the common law of decisions by Minnesota […]

January 2, 2020 by Nathan R. Snyder

The 2018 Farm Bill and Hemp Congress passed the 2018 Farm Bill on December 11, 2018, and, among other things, legalized hemp. Previously, hemp operated in a legal gray area. The 2014 Farm Bill permitted pilot programs to study the growth, cultivation, or marketing of “industrial hemp” (see 7 U.S.C. § 5940), but hemp remained […]

January 2, 2020 by Nathan R. Snyder

The Federal Age Limit to Purchase Tobacco Products, Cigarettes Increased to 21: Effective Immediately On December 20, 2019, President Donald J. Trump signed an amendment to the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act (FD&C Act), Public Law 116-94, which raises the minimum age for the sale of tobacco products from 18 to 21.  The new […]

January 1, 2020 by Anna M. Koch

Starting January 1, 2020, the minimum salary for exempt employees under the Federal Labor Standards Act (“FLSA”) increased to $684 per week or $35,568 per year, pursuant to the Final Rule of the U.S. Department of Labor. Pursuant to the rule, executive, administrative, and professional employees must be paid a salary of at least the […]

December 30, 2019 by V. John Ella

The Minnesota Supreme Court has held that a corporate officer may be personally liable for a defamatory statement made by the corporation where he allegedly “participated” in the publication of the statement. DeRosa v. McKenzie, 936 N.W.2d 342 (Minn. 2019).  The plaintiff, William DeRosa, was appointed to the board of directors of Dakota Plains Holdings, […]

December 15, 2019 by Anna M. Koch

The Minnesota Court of Appeals, in Wells Fargo Insurance Services USA Inc. v. Galioto, A19-0175, 2019 WL 4409414 (Minn. Ct. App. Sept. 16, 2019), determined that a restrictive covenant ancillary to the defendant-employee’s offer of new employment did not require independent consideration, despite being retroactively dated. The Court of Appeals reversed the district court’s grant […]