Should convictions outlive defendants, a push to consolidate Ozempic cases, Calif. bar pass rate disparities and Sandra Day O’Connor’s legacy ??

?? Good morning from The Legal File! Here are today's top legal stories:

? Convictions should outlive defendants' deaths, US tells appeals court

The DOJ urged a federal appeals court in Boston to break new ground by holding that a defendant's conviction outlasts his death and does not get wiped away just because he died before his appeal could be heard.

Former PixarBio Corp CEO Frank Reynolds was found guilty in 2019 by a federal jury of carrying out a scheme to mislead investors into believing he was a successful inventor with a drug in development that would end opioid addiction. Prosecutors in?making that argument?to the 1st Circuit acknowledged that every other federal appeals court would under their precedents vacate Reynolds' conviction following his 2022 death.

But Assistant U.S. Attorney Mark Quinlivan told the three-judge panel the practice had no constitutional basis and was inconsistent with statutes like the Victims Rights Act aimed at protecting victims and holding those who wronged them accountable.

"It really is a slap in the face to the victims of a crime and their loved ones because it tells them that they are unimportant and indeed irrelevant in the eyes of the law," Quinlivan said.

Read more.

??? As Ozempic cases mount, consumer lawyers push to consolidate lawsuits

Attorneys representing people who say they weren’t properly warned about harsh side effects associated with blockbuster weight loss drugs such as Ozempic and Wegovy are pushing to centralize the lawsuits in a Louisiana federal court, filings show.

About 20 lawsuits over the drugs, known as GLP-1 receptor agonists, have been filed since August against pharmaceutical companies Novo Nordisk and Eli Lilly, court records show. Attorneys from Morgan & Morgan, which has brought nine of the lawsuits, filed a?motion?on Friday asking the U.S. Judicial Panel on Multidistrict Litigation (JPML) to consolidate the litigation over the drugs in the Western District of Louisiana.

The lawsuits name Novo’s drugs Ozempic, Saxenda, Rybelsus and Wegovy, and Eli Lilly drugs Mounjaro and Trulicity.

The companies have refuted the claims in court filings, arguing in motions to dismiss filed in one of the earliest cases that the side effects of the drugs are well known and printed on their labels.

Read more about the push to consolidate the cases.

?? California law schools lacking ABA approval show 21% bar pass rate, state report finds

Students at California law schools not accredited by the American Bar Association have low odds of passing the bar and strong chances of dropping out after their first year, according to a new report from the State Bar of California.

Graduates of the 18 California-accredited schools had a pass rate of just 21% on the July 2022 bar exam, compared with 67% among graduates of ABA law schools, according to the state bar’s first-ever comprehensive?Law School Profile, released on Friday.

The report also highlights the disparate outcomes among the various types of schools. The attrition rate among first-year law students at ABA-accredited schools in California is 8%, compared with 42% at California-accredited schools and 51% at unaccredited law schools.

Students of color make up 46% of enrollment in the state’s ABA-accredited law schools; 56% of enrollment in California-accredited school; and 50% of enrollment in unaccredited law schools.

Read more about the report’s findings.

???? Sandra Day O’Connor’s unfinished legacy of judicial election reform

For all the late Justice Sandra Day O'Connor's trailblazing accomplishments, one piece of her legacy remains incomplete: reforming judicial elections.

Jenna Greene in her latest column looks at O’Connor’s plan to fix our system for electing state and local judges. While largely unrealized, it offers a compelling blueprint to reform a process that too often reduces would-be jurists to politicians in robes, trolling for campaign contributions and stumping for votes.

Here's the full column.

?? That's all for today, thank you for reading?The Legal File and have a great day!

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