Free Speech, Due Process and Trial by Jury
In a lawsuit filed Monday, a Colorado investor is seeking to recover a $1.3 million investment he made with the real estate firm owned by Nate Paul, who recently was at the helm of a political scandal involving the Texas Attorney General's Office.
Mergers and acquisitions that end up in high-stakes litigation are often about two issues: the fine print of the transaction agreement and the intent of the buyers and sellers. No one knows this more than Forterra GC Lori Browne, who spent the past six years battling the German company that sold the water and drainage pipe maker to private equity fund Lone Star for $1.3 billion on Christmas Eve 2014. Browne won the case and the 2020 DFW Outstanding Corporate Counsel Award for Business Litigation of the Year.
The high-stakes trial between Williams and Energy Transfer over their failed $38 billion merger concluded with testimony from several high billable hour tax lawyers from Cravath, Latham, Wachtell and Gibson Dunn. Natalie Posgate reviews their testimony, which will help a Delaware chancery court decide which party is on the hook for a $410 million merger breakup fee.
While lawyers continue to adjust to practice during the pandemic, it is increasingly clear that certain new ways of doing things will become standard when we return to working in person. This includes remote witness testimony. Remote practice has exposed a heightened risk of unethical behavior, including undisclosed communications between the witness and counsel mid-testimony in violation of controlling federal and Texas law. Because it is harder to uncover such misconduct in a remote setting, counsel should take necessary steps to manage these risks effectively and efficiently.
Mary Goodrich Nix, a major league litigation partner with all-star credentials, is leaving Holland & Knight for Lynn Pinker Hurst & Schwegmann. Her last day at H&K was Monday.
The move comes more than a month after the Miami-headquartered firm publicly acknowledged merger talks with Dallas-based Thompson & Knight. But that’s not the reason for the move, according to Nix. The Texas Lawbook has the story.A jury in Midland on Friday returned a $5.9 million verdict against an oil field company from Glen Rose and an employee who killed four people while speeding to work in a rainstorm. The verdict is believed to be the largest ever in a personal injury case in Midland County.
The company leaders behind both The Williams Companies and Energy Transfer have taken the stand in the final trial involving companies’ contentious legal battle over their failed $38 billion merger. Both got grilled, but one CEO’s cross-examination appeared to be more brutal than the other.
Key negotiators for The Williams Companies in its failed 2016 merger with Energy Transfer Equity testified Monday in the Delaware Court of Chancery about an equity offering executed by ETE that they say breached the parties’ $38 billion merger agreement because of how unfair it was to Williams shareholders. But they didn't go unchallenged on cross-examination.
A multi-day trial between a Japanese internet media giant and a Chinese technology conglomerate over the patent rights to popular online games ended Friday with a federal jury in Marshall awarding $92 million.
The final chapter of Energy Transfer and Williams’ legal battle over their failed mega-merger from 2016 will unfold in a six-day trial that begins Monday in Delaware. If you forgot what they’re still fighting about, not to worry. Natalie Posgate has the who, what, when, where and why to refresh your memory.
For the second time this spring, a Fort Worth federal judge has dismissed with prejudice a lawsuit that stemmed from a business deal that fell apart between Arlington-based Six Flags Entertainment Corp. and Riverside Investment Group related to the development of Six Flags parks in China.
Mediation has always been an important part of patent litigation – especially in the Eastern District of Texas. Because of the Covid-19 pandemic, virtual mediations have become an important and successful way to resolve patent disputes. We have conducted or participated in more than 50 virtual patent mediations since the pandemic began, and these recommended best practices are based on our experiences over the past year.
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