• State Bar backs nonlawyer legal aid program

    Daily Journal
    September 23, 2026

    (Subscription required) The proposal would allow trained community justice workers to provide limited legal services under the supervision of approved legal aid organizations, an effort to narrow California's persistent access-to-justice gap.

  • Contra Costa County Superior Court announces 2027-28 Presiding Judge, Assistant Presiding Judge

    Contra Costa Herald
    September 23, 2026

    The Honorable Joni T. Hiramoto, the Court’s current Assistant Presiding Judge, will become Presiding Judge, and the Honorable Benjamin T. Reyes II has been elected to serve as Assistant Presiding Judge. Their terms run from January 1, 2027, through December 31, 2028. Judge Hiramoto will succeed the Honorable Christopher R. Bowen, whose term as Presiding Judge ends December 31, 2026.

  • 9th Circuit upholds Hawaii gun rules as dissenters accuse court of misreading Bruen

    Daily Journal
    September 22, 2026

    (Subscription required) An en banc 9th Circuit upheld Hawaii's firearm acquisition requirements, drawing sharp dissents that accuse the court of using a footnote in Bruen to sidestep the Supreme Court's text-and-history test for Second Amendment challenges.

    Related: Courthouse News Service

  • Appellants Contend That Company’s Boast of ‘Instant’ Tooth-Whitening Is Not Mere Puffery

    Metropolitan News-Enterprise
    September 22, 2026

    The Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals has been asked to reverse a judgment dismissing a putative class action against the maker of tooth-care products that were represented as providing “instant teeth whitening,” a claim the plaintiffs insist is a provable falsehood but which a magistrate judge declared to be mere puffery.