The court holds that under New York law, insurers are not obligated to defend and indernnify a clothing manufacturer from private and government damage claims stemming from contamination at the manufacturer's New York and Virgin Islands facilities. The manufacturer acquired the two facilities from s...

The court holds that under Maine law, the doctrine of res judicata bars a town from suing a gasoline company for environmental damage affecting the town's water supply insofar as the state previously litigated and settled claims against the same company for the same environmental damage. The court f...

The Court certifies to the Pennsylvania Supreme Court the question of whether it either correctly applied Pennsylvania's hazardous waste law or changed the application of the law when it held in Commonwealth v. Scarpone, 535 Pa. 273 (1993), that a hazardous waste facility operator holding a permit c...

The court reverses and remands a jury verdict awarding damages to a logging company that alleged that the state caused a temporary taking by refusing to permit logging on a parcel of the company's property on which a pair of northern spotted owls were nesting. The court first holds that because of t...

The court holds that although a state department of transportation is technically liable under the Washington Model Toxics Control Act (MTCA) for the disposal of a tank car at a Superfund site, the department need not pay remedial action costs to a group of utilities that cleaned up the site. The de...

The court holds that under Delaware law, a tort claimant that was fraudulently induced to release another from liability may rescind the release or may file a separate suit for fraud. A Florida nursery entered a settlement agreement that released a Delaware corporation from future liability. Subsequ...

The court affirms a district court decision requiring the U.S. Department of the Interior (DOI) to provide water drainage services for agricultural areas receiving water through the Central Valley Project in California. The court first holds that the plain language of the San Luis Act, which authori...

The court holds that an insurer has a duty to indemnify an asbestos tile manufacturer for underlying asbestos-related personal injury claims that were triggered during the one-year commercial general liability policy period. The district court concluded that because none of the personal injury compl...

The court holds that the Eleventh Amendment does not bar the U.S. third-party claim against the state of Alaska for equitable apportionment of damages alleged in a Federal Tort Claims Act action brought by a Native American tribe against the United States for damages caused by leaking fuel. The Unit...

The court holds that the state land department was justified in rejecting conservationists' applications to lease grazing land for nongrazing conservation and recreation purposes. The lands at issue were subject to the Arizona-New Mexico Enabling Act (Enabling Act), which requires the affected land ...