Plaintiffs hoping to hold Bank of America liable for alleged fraud by its Countrywide Financial unit got some tough news on Thursday. Despite Quinn Emanuel's aggressive efforts to keep the bank on the hook in a Countrywide mortgage-backed securities case brought by Allstate, a federal judge in Los Angeles once again rejected the insurer's successor liability claim.

The legendary creator of Spider Man and the Hulk severed ties with the company that bears his name and made peace with Marvel last year. But that--and a long string of adverse rulings--hasn't stopped Stan Lee Media from continuing to go after rights to the Marvel characters.

N.Y. Supreme Court Justice Eileen Bransten, who's overseeing MBIA's big mortgage-backed securities suit against Countrywide and Bank of America, apparently got fed up with a flurry of letters from lawyers battling over BofA's separate $8.5 billion MBS settlement.

Los Angeles federal judge Mariana Pfaelzer denied motions by Countrywide, its auditors, its underwriters, and its outside directors to dismiss an amended shareholder class action against them. The ruling comes less than four months after Judge Pfaelzer denied motions to dismiss the plaintiffs' first complaint. She has also refused to dismiss a shareholders derivative suit against several Countrywide directors and officers.

The government's KPMG tax case has certainly had its share of setbacks, but yesterday it achieved some redemption. A federal jury in Manhattan convicted Raymond Ruble, a former partner at Brown & Wood, along with Robert Pfaff and John Larson, two former KPMG executives, of multiple counts of fraud, conspiracy, and tax evasion. A third KPMG executive, David Greenberg, was acquitted.

The industry is flying in a small army of lawyers in advance of the Jan. 31 trial date.