Free Speech, Due Process and Trial by Jury
The Fifth Court of Appeals has granted an unopposed request from Ken Paxton to postpone oral arguments in the lawsuit brought against him by the state bar’s Commission for Lawyer Discipline, days after he requested they be delayed until after the conclusion of his impeachment trial.
“The case will be reset for submission in due course,” the court’s order reads.
More than 90 insurers have been named as defendants in the lawsuit brought by settlement trustee Barbara Houser, who formerly served as the chief bankruptcy judge in the Northern District of Texas until her retirement in May 2020.
Jurors heard opening statements Tuesday that included examples of the rig site sexual harassment Jessica Cheatham alleges she endured for more than two years while working for Schlumberger. The trial taking place before U.S. District Judge Kenneth Hoyt is expected to last 10 days.
In this edition of Litigation Roundup, the Dallas Court of Appeals sets the panel and date for oral arguments in the state bar’s disciplinary lawsuit against Ken Paxton, an oilfield services company’s trade secrets suit against its ex-president gets rolling and an East Texas jury hits LG with a $1.68 million patent infringement verdict.
Dallas County District Judge Monica Purdy presided over a seven-day bench trial in May before determining that PrimaLend violated the terms of a loan agreement when it changed the locks and foreclosed on an Ohio car dealership before first exhausting attempts to recover its money by pursuing the business’ assets. Judge Purdy is expected to enter final judgment awarding the Benit family about $6.7 million within the next week.
In this edition of Litigation Roundup, the Fifth Circuit asks the Texas Supreme Court to answer two certified questions, a team of Austin lawyers are hired to represent Twitter in a $90 million suit against Wachtell and Texas Instruments sues a slew of insurers over damage to its clean room.
Joe Coleman, John Kane, Brian Hail and a team of other lawyers from Kane Russell Coleman Logan recently secured a favorable outcome for a group of unsecured creditors in a bankruptcy proceeding for a Carl Icahn-owned company, Auto Plus. At the outset, it seemed the unsecured creditors stood to recoup none of their roughly $200 million in unsecured debt, but the legal team overcame three key challenges on its way to recovering more than $57 million: Auto Plus’ apparent administrative insolvency, a fast-tracked sale of assets already in motion and “the specter of the fact that Carl Icahn was the ultimate owner,” Coleman said. “Obviously, Mr. Icahn has an enormous reputation, he’s a very shrewd businessman.”
In this edition of Litigation Roundup, the Texas Supreme Court held that the attorney-client privilege means a conservative nonprofit news organization cannot get access to certain documents stemming from a University of Texas admissions process investigation, and the parties on either side of a personal injury lawsuit that netted a $352 million jury verdict told an intermediate appellate court a settlement has been reached.
In a 7-2 ruling issued Friday morning, the last day of the court’s term, the justices denied a request from the former owner of the Houston Astros, Drayton McLane, to bring an early end to a lawsuit brought by the team’s current owner, Jim Crane, alleging lies and deceptions caused him to overpay for the team in 2011. The ruling means Crane will have a chance to proceed with a trial in Harris County where he is seeking to recoup the entire $332 million he paid for a stake in the Houston Regional Sports Network that was part of his $615 million purchase of the Major League Baseball team.
Trial lawyers who spoke to The Lawbook said the ruling in Gregory v. Chohan didn’t offer much clarity on the proper evidentiary standard for noneconomic damages awards. Justice John Devine, who agreed with the plurality that an improper closing argument likely influenced the damages award and mandates a new trial, decried the new evidentiary standard advocated for by three justices as “impossible” to meet.
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