After the plaintiff purchased an economic interest in an LLC at a UCC sale, she brought claims for breach of fiduciary duty and breach of good faith and fair dealing against the manager of the LLC. The plaintiff alleged that she was entitled to inspect the books and financial documents…
Chicago Business Litigation Lawyer Blog
Plaintiff Fails to Get Corporate Veil Pierced for Employee Aggregation Purposes
A collection of car dealerships operated through independent LLCs but received management services from the same company. The management services company was owned by the same person who owned the majority interest in each of the dealership LLCs. Each dealership had fewer than fifteen employees individually. A salesman with one…
Promega Settles Lawsuit with Minority Shareholders
We talked about the lawsuit between Promega Corp., a biotech company based in Madison, Wisconsin, and its shareholders a couple months ago in this blog post. At the time, Circuit Judge Valerie Bailey-Rihn said she was convinced minority shareholders had been oppressed by the company and its founder and CEO,…
Former Playboy Model’s Defamation Lawsuit against Fox News Host Tucker Carlson Dismissed
A federal judge recently dismissed a defamation lawsuit filed by former Playboy model Karen McDougal against Fox News host Tucker Carlson. The lawsuit concerned statements Carlson had made about McDougal during his show “Tucker Carlson Tonight” which airs on the Fox News Channel. The judge ultimately granted the motion to…
Default Judgment Awarded to Plaintiff When Corporation Fails to Retain Counsel
After a corporation attempted to designate its principal agent the right to file an answer to a complaint pro se, the trial court found that the corporation had not properly appeared before the court and awarded a default judgment to the plaintiff. The corporation attempted to have the default judgment…
Seventh Circuit Holds Alleged Violations of the Illinois Biometric Information Privacy Act Confer Article III Standing
Recently, the U.S. Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals held that a putative class action lawsuit alleging a technical violation of the Illinois Biometric Information Privacy Act (BIPA) was sufficient to establish the Article III standing required in order to proceed in federal court, reversing the District Court’s dismissal of the…
Bill Murray Faces Copyright Lawsuit from Doobie Brothers
Every time you hear a famous song playing in a commercial, it’s because the producers paid for the right to use that song in their commercial … or at least they were supposed to. According to a recent copyright lawsuit the Doobie Brothers filed against Bill Murray, the famous actor…
Corporation Not Entitled to Discovery Assistance for Private Foreign Arbitration
Two corporations agreed to arbitrate a dispute in front of a foreign arbitration panel in Birmingham, England, under the terms of their agreement. After they agreed to arbitrate, one of the parties filed an ex parte application to a U.S. district court asking the court to issue a subpoena compelling…
Recent Opinion Highlights Strategy for Shareholders Opposing Corporate Action: Invalidity
In a recent opinion, the Delaware Court of Chancery considered a summary judgment motion in an action by Applied Energetics, Inc. against George Farley, who at the time of the challenged actions was the sole member of the company’s board of directors and compensation committee as well as an officer.…
New York Court Rules that Insulting Online Review is Not Defamatory
Freedom of speech and defamation law are sometimes in tension with each other. Freedom of speech holds that people should be free to say what they want without fear of reprisal. Defamation law holds that people can be held liable and forced to pay for harm caused by false statements…