HOWARD MILLER, J.P. DAVID S. RITTER GLORIA GOLDSTEIN THOMAS A. DICKERSON, JJ. Teamsters Local 456 Annuity Fund, derivatively on behalf of Cablevision Systems Corporation, et al., plaintiffs

In a non-prosecution agreement announced on Tuesday, Alpha Natural Resources agreed to pay $209 million to settle a federal investigation into a 2010 explosion at a West Virginia coal mine owned by Massey Energy Company. Cleary Gottlieb, which represented Alpha on its $7 billion acquisition of Massey earlier this year, advised the company on the agreement with the Justice Department.

Six months ago a judge in New York dismissed claims that a company that partnered with Pfizer's Wyeth unit duped investors about a potential blockbuster Alzheimer's drug. Now, with help from New Jersey's Porzio, Bromberg, & Newman and a revolving cast of out-of-town counsel, Pfizer has cleared the decks of the last securities class action remaining over the drug.

After he won a record $521.7 million verdict against BDO Seidman, Steven Thomas was so enamored of working on the plaintiffs side that he quit a Sullivan & Cromwell partnership to start up his own firm. But Tuesday he experienced the other side of the coin, when a state court judge directed a verdict for BDO's international parent.

With a ruling Tuesday against Amgen Inc. and its lawyers at Sheppard Mullin Richter & Hampton, the Ninth Circuit has evened the count in a federal circuit split over a key requirement for winning class certification in securities cases.

Delaware Vice Chancellor Leo Strine Jr. said that the board's approval of the controversial purchase of Barnes & Noble College Booksellers, as portrayed by the plaintiffs, had a "fishy smell." He refused to dismiss a derivative suit in which shareholders allege that the directors approved a sweetheart deal for Barnes & Noble chairman Leonard Riggio, who allegedly made more than half a billion dollars from the sale.