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Gilana Keller

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Gilana Keller focuses her practice on complex litigation matters with a focus on insurance and reinsurance matters and commercial litigation. Gilana represents companies in insurance and reinsurance disputes, pending in state and federal court and before arbitration panels. These disputes have included representation of a leading life insurance carrier in arbitrations against reinsurers involving yearly renewable term (YRT) life reinsurance agreements and environmental insurance coverage.

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In an opinion Tuesday, Judge Caproni preliminarily enjoined New York’s Attorney General from enforcing a new law that bars landlords from setting rents based on recommendations from algorithmic pricing software, finding that RealPage, which licenses such software, is likely to succeed on its First Amendment challenge.

New York General Business Law § 340-B, enacted in 2025 to address rising rents and lengthy apartment vacancy periods, contains two operative provisions. Section 2 bars facilitating agreements among competing landlords not to compete on price, including through software.  Section 3 separately makes it unlawful for residential landlords to set or adjust rents based on recommendations from software that performs a “coordinating function.” RealPage licenses AI-powered software that generates rent and occupancy recommendations for residential landlords. Since settling with the Department of Justice, RealPage transitioned away from using non-public data, except in limited circumstances. RealPage argued that the Statute violates the First Amendment by restricting protected speech in the form of algorithmically generated pricing recommendations.

Continue Reading Judge Caproni: NY Law Targeting AI Rent Recommendations Likely Sweeps Too Broadly

On Friday, Judge Carter granted defendant Zealthy Inc.’s motion to dismiss claims brought by Novo Nordisk under the Lanham Act and New York General Business Law. Novo Nordisk alleged that Zealthy, which markets compounded GLP-1 medications, falsely represented to consumers that those products were equivalent to Novo Nordisk’s FDA-approved medications like Ozempic and Wegovy. Compounded medications (mixed by a doctor or pharmacist for an individual patient) are not FDA-approved, even if legal to prescribe.

Novo Nordisk pointed to a cluster of statements on Zealthy’s website: that “GLP-1 medications, with active ingredient semaglutide, are FDA-approved for type 2 diabetes”; that a clinician “might prescribe FDA-approved medications like Wegovy or its active ingredient, semaglutide”; that Zealthy offers “FDA-approved weight loss medications, including semaglutide”; and similar language elsewhere describing “FDA-approved medications such as semaglutide.” Novo Nordisk argued that these statements falsely indicate that Zealthy’s compounded products are FDA-approved.

Continue Reading Judge Carter Dismisses Novo Nordisk’s False Advertising Claims, Finding Statements About Compounded GLP-1s Were Susceptible To An Accurate Reading

On Friday, Judge Liman granted Blake Lively’s motion for attorneys’ fees and costs, but denied her request for damages (including treble and punitive damages), following the court’s dismissal of a lawsuit filed by Justin Baldoni and his production company accusing Lively of defamation arising from the filming of It Ends With Us (see our prior coverage of the cases here).

Last month, the parties settled their disputes, including Lively’s related lawsuit alleging sexual harassment and retaliation, but left for the Court to decide Lively’s request for fees, costs, and damages under California Civil Code Section 47.1.

Enacted in 2023 in response to the #MeToo movement, Section 47.1 establishes a qualified privilege for communications made without malice concerning sexual harassment, assault, or discrimination, and it permits a prevailing defamation defendant to recover attorneys’ fees, costs and damages.

Continue Reading Judge Liman: Rule 54(d) Does Not Authorize Blake Lively To Recover “Damages” For Dismissed Defamation Action Against Her

In an opinion filed on Thursday, Judge McMahon granted summary judgment to plaintiffs on their claims that the Government’s April 2025 mass termination of more than 1,400 National Endowment for the Humanities (“NEH”) grants was unconstitutional and ultra vires (see our prior coverage here). The court described a glaring departure from NEH’s established grant‑review process, under which officials affiliated with the Department of Government Efficiency (“DOGE”) directed that grants issued during the Biden Administration be reviewed for purported connections to subjects such as “diversity, equity, and inclusion” (“DEI”), “environmental justice,” and “gender ideology.” The court found that DOGE officials “exercised decisive authority over the selection and termination of NEH grants” absent statutory authority.

Continue Reading “The Devil Made Me Do It” Defense Rejected: Judge McMahon Grants Summary Judgment Against Government’s AI‑Driven Mass Termination of NEH Grants

In an opinion filed on Friday, Judge Caproni denied the National Football League’s renewed attempt to compel arbitration in an employment discrimination action brought by a putative class of current and former NFL coaches (the “Coaches”). Initially filed in 2022, the lawsuit alleged systemic racial discrimination in the hiring, retention and termination of NFL coaches and executives.

Shortly after the lawsuit was filed, the NFL moved to compel arbitration, which was granted as to certain claims and denied as to others. On appeal, the Second Circuit affirmed the district court’s refusal to compel arbitration claims against the Giants, Broncos and Texans, while declining to rule on jurisdictional grounds on the claims that had been compelled to arbitration. The Second Circuit explained that “the NFL failed to provide a neutral forum that could even be called an ‘arbitration’ and that [plaintiff] could not effectively vindicate his statutory rights in the forum that the NFL provided, given the designation of the NFL Commissioner as the default arbitrator and the lack of express arbitral procedures.”

In light of the Second Circuit’s ruling, the Coaches moved for reconsideration of the district court’s earlier order compelling arbitration of the remaining claims. “[T]o conform to controlling law,” Judge Caproni granted the Coaches’ motion and denied the NFL’s motion to compel arbitration in full. 

Continue Reading Judge Caproni Denies NFL’s Motion To Compel Arbitration Against Coaches on Reconsideration

In an MDL brought by private plaintiffs challenging Google’s allegedly monopolistic digital advertising practices, Judge Castel ruled on Monday that Google was precluded from relitigating issues decided in an April bench trial ruling in the Eastern District of Virginia. The Virginia case involved similar monopolization allegations, but was brought by DOJ and state attorneys general.

Judge Castel found that the elements for issue preclusion were met — that is, that the Virginia case involved the same issues, that Google had a fair chance to litigate the issues, and that they were necessary to a final judgment — but noted that issue preclusion, as an equitable doctrine, required him to also consider the overall fairness of binding a litigant to adverse findings from another case.

On that point, Judge Castel found “no unfairness to Google” in applying issue preclusion, especially given the “massively high stakes” of the Virginia case:

Continue Reading Judge Castel: Google Barred From Relitigating Issues Decided In DOJ Digital Ad Monopoly Case