Connecticut Business Litigation Blog : Connecticut Business Lawyer & Attorney : N. Kane Bennett : Raymond & Bennett Law Firm : Hartford, Middletown, Glastonbury

Here are some quick hits on business blogs:

The Wall Street Journal blog reports on two restaurants involved in a lawsuit to determine who is most harmful to your health.  Well, sort of.  The Heart Attack Grill, an Arizona eatery, filed a federal lawsuit against the owners of Heart Stoppers Sports Grill, a Florida restaurant, accusing them of stealing the idea for an unhealthy menu.  

Victoria Pynchon of the Settle It Now blog is trying to decide on a cover for her conflict resolution book entitled "A is for Asshole, the ABC's of Conflict Resolution."  If the cover is anything like the title, it should be a hit seller.

Edward McNally of the Delaware Business Litigation Blog has a helpful post that links to a new Delaware case for anyone looking for ways to calculate money damages or breach of a non-compete agreement.  Many times, these cases are resolved with injunctions or temporary restraining orders.  It is not very common to actually get to the issue of monetary damages for breach of a non-compete agreement.   This new case provides some ideas on how to calculate damages.

Megan Erickson's Social Networking Blog discusses Facebook's concerns over identifying its responsibilities for privacy of its 350 million users.

 Maxwell Kennerly's Litigation and Trial Blog digests recent Third Circuit law in two different cases involving first amendment and privacy rights for students creating fake MySpace pages.

 The Business Law Prof Blog has an interesting post about turning a simple contractual relationship into a fiduciary relationship.  Once a fiduciary relationship is established, it can have significant implications on the outcome of litigation.  A mere contractual relationship is not significant enough to form a fiduciary relationship absent other special factors.  One of my prior posts covers breach of fiduciary duty in Connecticut.

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 Here's some humor for the holidays:

• A very funny post from Faces of Lawsuit Abuse.org.  It is a 2009 poll of the most ridiculous lawsuits of the year.  My vote was for the April winner: "Tourist sues New York club after she slipped while dancing on top of the bar."  (story here). The judge carefully examined the facts and made his ruling according to simple math:  drunk + dancing + wet bar = case dismissed.

• "You dont bring a gun to a snowball fight,"  brought to you by one of my favorites Above the Law, a legal tabloid.   This is now a viral holiday story about a snowball fight between a lawyer and a police officer.  Who do you think wins that fight?  Read the lawyer's take here, and to make your own decision, check out the video.

• Inmates do not like Christmas music, but judges do!  According to the Phoenix news blog,   the Maricopa County Sheriff has won its fifth lawsuit from inmates related to playing Christmas tunes in county jails.    My guess is they were playing Michael Bolton's Christmas album, which has made a few  "worst album ever" lists for christmas songs. Look for an appeal based on cruel and unusual punishment.

• Riskvue, a website for risk management professionals, has a detailed post on holiday party disasters and how to avoid them.   The Denver Business Journal says "Don't let Your Holiday Party Become A New Year's Lawsuit."  What is it about drinking at an office party and the photocopier?  For some funny videos, check out YouTube "holiday party disasters."  

• For some humorous reports on a series of recent lawsuits, check out Jester's Courtroom on the Center for Individual Freedom blog. 

 Happy Holidays everyone!

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Here are some quick hits from Blogs I read around the country on business litigation.

Dionne Searcey of the Wall Street Journal law blog reports on the intellectual property fight over the red, white, and blue "Hope" image of President Barrack Obama created by Los Angeles artist Shepard Fairey.  Fairey is claiming his rights to the work, but apparently is confused as to his source material leading to the withdrawal of his duped attorneys. 

Rush on Business breaks down his tips for negotiating Franchise Agreements. Rush highlights the need to have an attorney review your franchise agreement and not to believe any franchisor that says you do not need an attorney or that they will not hold you to certain terms of the agreement.

A win for digital technology was reported on by Mack Sperling in the North Carolina Business Litigation Report.  Mack reports on a case where a settlement agreement was challenged under the statue of frauds because it involved land and there were no written signatures.  You can read here an earlier post from me on the statute of frauds in Connecticut.  The court upheld the agreement in part based on electronic signatures in emails exchanged between counsel. 

Nancy Savitt of the Privacy Law Blog reports on an enforcement action concerning the Children's Online Privacy Protect Act (COPPA).  The Federal Trade Commission fined Iconix Brand Group, Inc $250,000 for "collecting personal information from children without complying with COPPA's parent consent..."  The personal information at issue was dates of birth.  Collecting personal identifiers such as dates of birth can be a real risk for any business.  Read here for some of my posts on how Connecticut businesses can address privacy concerns.

 Jeffrey Mehalic's West Virginia's Business Litigation Blog discusses an interesting suit involving misappropriation of trade secrets against the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette.  A corporation, Mylan, brought a lawsuit against the paper claiming misappropriation of trade secrets and conversion for articles that were allegedly not favorable to Mylan.

Edward McNally of Delaware Business Litigation Blog reports on a case upholding Delaware as a forum for a trade secret case.  This post is informative in that it discusses why Delaware is often a preferred forum for corporate litigants trying to protect trade secrets. 

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Here is a round up of a few interesting business lawsuits making news in Connecticut this past week: 

Smoking Gun "Crap" Email In Case Watched by Wall Street

In Pursuit Partners, LLC v. UBS AG, et al., a 35 million dollar prejudgment remedy was awarded in favor of a Connecticut hedge fund against UBS.  Judge Blawie issued the order in Stamford Superior Court after finding the bank was in possession of material non-public information regarding downgrades to financial products that UBS continued to sell.  This case is getting a lot of attention on Wall Street and reported on by Matthew Goldstein  at seekingalpha.com and Serena NG and Carrick Mollenkamp on WSJ.com. 

The UBS case will be interesting to watch and is another example of the increasing importance of discovering smoking gun emails.  Preliminary discovery in the case turned up internal emails calling some of the financial products "crap."   Here is a docket report on the case. (download).

Fairfield Company Uncovers Fraud and Ejects Board Member

Competitive Technologies (CTT), won a contested default judgment for more than $4 million dollars after discovering a former board member took company money and invested it in a fictitious South American company that did not exist.  Read the report on the case by Michael Juliano of the Connecticut Post.  You can also download here a copy of the judgment from Judge Dorsey who found that the defendants willfully disregarded court orders.  

The fraud was uncovered in part by the work of Breen & Associates.  I have worked with Bill Breen before on several cases.  He is an exceptional fraud investigator and expert.  Looks like he successfully uncovered another financial fraud for a business client.   

Civil Rights Violations Alleged Against Litchfield In Refusing Jewish Temple

Rabbi Joseph Eisenbach has filed a lawsuit in federal court against the Town of Litchfield over the Town's refusal to permit modification of his property for religious purposes.  The complaint (download here) states that the Rabbi is seeking declaratory relief, permanent injunction, and damages for violations of civil rights and the Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act of 2000.  This case was reported on by Christine Stuart, editor of  CTNews Junkie where a reader left some disturbing comments about anti-semitic statements at the commission hearings on the matter. 

An attorney for the Town has not yet appeared in the case and no answer has been filed. Given the allegations in this Complaint, this is a case that is likely to stay in the news. 

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