An additional class-action lawsuit has been filed against Toyota Motors, claiming the company repurchased cars that showed sudden acceleration and forced owners to sign confidentiality agreements to keep their complaints silent. The suit also alleges that Toyota engineers were able to duplicate the acceleration problems in labs but failed to notify the proper government agencies. More than 200 lawsuits have been filed against Toyota after their recall of millions of vehicles earlier this year.

A West Virginia family has been awarded $1.5 million in a lawsuit filed against a gas company over an accident that left their young son badly burned. The boy suffered severe burns over 80 percent of his body during a natural gas explosion in the family’s home in 2006. The boy underwent 23 surgeries and spent three months in the hospital as a result of the accident

A Florida court of appeals has upheld a $65 million verdict in a lawsuit over a 2007 crash that left a young woman seriously injured. The woman was hit by a tractor trailer that ran a red light, suffering such extensive injuries that she cannot care for herself. The company that owns of the tractor trailer that hit the woman, asked for the damages to be reduced, but the appeals court sided with the lower court’s decision.

The California Supreme Court has reinstated a lawsuit filed by pharmacies against Pfizer Inc. that accuses the company of price fixing. The lawsuit claims that Pfizer and other drug companies conspired together to keep cheaper medications from Canada out of the U.S.  The suit was dismissed by  a lower court in 2008 after Pfizer argued that the pharmacies weren’t harmed because the higher prices were passed on to customers. That argument was rejected earlier this week and the case was sent back down to an Oakland, Calif., trial court.

A federal judge will reportedly allow a lawsuit filed against AT&T and Apple to proceed with class-action status. The lawsuit accuses Apple and AT&T of creating an exclusive deal to pair the iPhone with service provider AT&T as a way to eliminate competition. Because of this exclusive partnership, customers with an iPhone were locked into longer-than-expected contracts with AT&T, the lawsuit states. The lawsuit seeks an injunction to stop Apple from selling iPhones locked into AT&T’s network.

A $32.2 million verdict against Goodyear Tire & Rubber Company has been upheld by the Nevada Supreme Court in a lawsuit over the death of three people in 2004.  Goodyear had argues that the initial ruling was excessive (in the initial trial it was ruled that Goodyear could not present a defense of liability because of their pre-trail approach of “stalling, obstructing and objecting.”

Drug maker Merck & Co. has been ordered by a jury to pay $8 million to a Florida woman whom claimed that the company’s drug Fosamax caused her severe jaw damage. The woman said in her lawsuit that the osteoporosis drug, which she had taken from 1997-2006, caused the tissue in her jaw bone to deteriorate. Reuters is reporting that there are some 900 lawsuits pending against Fosamax by patients who claim the same effects.

A New Orleans U.S. District judge has blocked the Obama Administration’s ban on drilling in the Gulf of Mexico after arguments were heard from a group of oil companies earlier this week. U.S. District Judge Martin Feldman said in his ruling that the administration had failed to justify the wide breadth of the moratorium and that the ban would cause “irreparable harm to businesses” along the Gulf. Gulf Coast state representatives have praised the judge’s decision and urged the federal government to replace the ban with more narrowly drafted requirements that would “address only truly essential safety issues.”

Toyota must turn over tens of thousands documents related to complaints about uncontrolled acceleration, a federal judge ruled last week. The ruling marks a victory for attorneys representing plaintiffs with personal injury, wrongful death or consumer claims against the automaker. At least 89 deaths have been linked to uncontrolled acceleration of Toyota vehicles, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration said

A judge has ruled that a lawsuit over the fatal shooting of a man by five city New York City police officers may proceed. Sean Bell was shot and killed in 2006 after he accidentally hit a police officer in the leg with his car while leaving a bachelor party. Officers fired more than 50 bullets at the car Bell was driving, saying they believed either he or one of the other two men in the car to be armed. There were no guns in the car. The two sides will meet to discuss a possible settlement in late July.