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Wal-Mart Uses Class Action Against Netflix
Network News |
2011/09/07 00:36
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Wal-Mart is using its failed class action lawsuit with Netflix to attract new users to its video streaming service, Vudu.
A federal court in California agreed late last week to allow Wal-Mart to pay $27.5 million to 40 million Netflix subscribers. The kicker? They can make the payment in the form of gift cards for Walmart.com. As a result, this also gives Wal-Mart access to Netflix's customer database.
The class action suit came in response to a dinner meeting in 2005, where the CEOs of Netflix and Wal-Mart allegedly agreed to share the DVD market. According to consumer advocates, under the pact, Wal-Mart agreed not to rent DVDs if Netflix promised not to sell them. Class action suits were filed against both companies in 2009, claiming that this agreement violated antitrust laws.
While Wal-Mart decided to settle the case, Netflix is still fighting the allegations, claiming the suit has no merit.
Wal-Mart's settlement, which still has to be finalized in February 2012, comes as the discount giant is in the process of aggressively promoting its Vudu service, which it acquired in February 2010. At the same time, Netflix is in dire need of an image cleanup, following several unfriendly consumer moves, including a recent price hike and the falling out of its Liberty Starz deal. |
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2 law firms in Louisiana and Mississippi to merge
Network News |
2011/08/31 08:46
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A New Orleans-based law firm is expanding into Mississippi as it merges with a firm based in Jackson.
The New Orleans firm is Jones, Walker, Waechter, Poitevent, Carrere amp; Denegre L.L.P.
It is combining with Watkins Ludlam Winter amp; Stennis, P.A., a firm that includes former Mississippi Gov. William Winter.
The firms say in a news release Tuesday that the merger should be complete by Jan. 1, and the combined firm will have 375 attorneys.
It will go by the current name of the New Orleans firm, Jones Walker.
After the merger is complete, Jones Walker will have 15 offices in Louisiana, Alabama, Arizona, Florida, Mississippi, Texas and the District of Columbia. |
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A Court Cannot Exclude Evidence Because It Is Self-Serving
Network News |
2011/08/31 08:46
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In Reed v. City of Evansville, _ N.E.2d _ (Ind. Ct. App. 2011), Cause No. 82A05-1012-PL-768, Evansville sought to have some of the evidence the Reeds submitted in opposition to the City's motion for summary judgment because it was self-serving. Today, the Court of Appeals clearly stated that parties should not make this same objection in the future.
The Reeds filed a claim against Evansville and Evansville moved for summary judgment, arguing that the notice was not timely under the Tort Claims Act. The trial court granted that motion and the Reeds appealed.
On appeal, the Court held that the trial court erred when granting summary judgment to the City, because there were genuine issues of material fact. The court then addressed the City's cross-appeal, which challenged the trial court's denial of the City's motion to strike some of the Reeds' evidence. The City moved to strike some of that evidence because it was self-serving. The Court had none of it.
http://www.indianalawupdate.com/entry/A-Court-Cannot-Exclude-Evidence-Because-It-Is-Self-Serving |
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Serbia seeks to block execution of citizen in Nev.
Network News |
2011/08/14 09:29
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The Serbian government is asking a Nevada court to block the execution of one of its citizens, saying its consulate was not informed of his 1994 arrest as required by international law.
Serbia, in a friend-of-the-court brief filed last week in Washoe County District Court in Reno, maintains the notification would have provided Avram Nika with assistance that could have spared him the death penalty.
Nika, 41, is on death row at Ely State Prison for the 1994 killing of a good Samaritan who stopped to help him along Interstate 80 near Reno. He has yet to exhaust his state and federal appeals.
(Nika was) particularly vulnerable to the denial of consular assistance due to his inability to speak English and his lack of familiarity with the U.S. legal system and culture, Serbia's brief says.
The failure to notify the consulate caused no mitigating evidence to be presented at his sentencing hearing — such as that he was a hard-working family man who came from poverty and was discriminated against because he was a member of a nomadic ethnic group known as Roma, also called Gypsies, according to the document.
District Attorney Dick Gammick says there was no consulate to contact because the former Yugoslavia where Nika was from was undergoing drastic change at the time. Serbia did not exist as a country then, he said, and other countries in the region came and went. |
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Ballard Spahr says Stewart new chair of national law firm
Network News |
2011/07/06 08:44
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Law firm Ballard Spahr LLP says that Mark Stewart, who helped the firm open six new offices, has been named its chair.
The law firm — its headquarters are in Philadelphia — said Stewart became chair on Friday, succeeding Arthur Makadon who took the position in 2002. He is returning to active practice with the firm.
Stewart joined the firm as a summer associate in 1981.
Ballard Spahr has more than 475 lawyers in 13 offices across the U.S. and offers litigatition, business and finance, real estate, intellectual propery and public finance services. |
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Class-action lawsuit has been filed against infrastructure products
Network News |
2011/06/20 08:17
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A class-action lawsuit has been filed against infrastructure products maker Armtec Infrastructure Inc. alleging the company broke securities laws when it instituted a dividend, later to cancel it after it became unsupportable by earnings.
The suit filed in Ontario Superior Court on behalf of investors who bought shares between March 30 and June 8 alleges that Armtec should have known when it raised capital in the public market that it did not have sufficient earnings to pay dividends.
Through this class action, we hope to determine precisely what the defendants knew about Armtec's financial results when Armtec raised more than $50 million from investors, lawyer Jay Strosberg of Sutts, Strosberg LLP said in a statement.
Armtec shares plummeted earlier this month after the Ontario-based announced a widening of its first-quarter loss and the planned suspension of the 40 cent per share dividend. The dropped 22 cents or six per cent to $3.43 in early trading Friday on the Toronto Stock Exchange.
Class action lawsuits must be certified by a judge in order to proceed. None of the allegations against Armtec have been proven in court.
In a statement issued late Friday, Armtec said it was confident that there are no grounds for a lawsuit to succeed.
If, however, this suit proceeds, Armtec will defend it vigorously based on, amongst other things, Armtec's disclosure of the risk factors associated with its business and to the payment of a dividend.
The Guelph-based company, which makes construction materials such as precast concrete and tubing, said business was hurt by an unusually late and wet spring across the country during the quarter and ended up with a payout significantly in excess of free cash flow.
The company said it had to meet certain terms in its credit facilities and meet earnings tests on senior notes to be permitted to pay dividends. |
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SEC charges 4 with insider trading
Network News |
2011/01/12 01:02
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| pFederal regulators on Monday charged the co-founder of a New York hedge fund and three other individuals with insider trading, the latest action in what the government has called the biggest insider-trading case in U.S. history./ppThe Securities and Exchange Commission announced it filed a civil lawsuit against hedge fund Trivium Capital Management, its co-founder Robert Feinblatt and analyst Jeffrey Yokuty. The SEC also filed charges against Sunil Bhalla, a former senior executive of tech company Polycom, and Shammara Hussain, a former employee at a consulting firm that did work for Google. The agency said Bhalla and Hussain provided confidential information that enabled Feinblatt and Yokuty to make about $15 million from trading on the information./ppSo far the SEC has filed civil charges against 27 people and hedge funds in a wide-ranging probe of the Galleon group of hedge funds and its founder. The government says Galleon funds made about $69 million in illegal profits. Raj Rajaratnam, the one-time billionaire founder of the Galleon funds, has pleaded not guilty. Federal authorities have arrested 23 people on criminal charges in the case; 14 have pleaded guilty./ppThe SEC alleged in its suit that Feinblatt and Yokuty traded using confidential information they received from Roomy Khan, a Florida investor who pleaded guilty in 2009 to conspiracy and securities fraud in the Galleon case. Khan has been cooperating in the government's investigation./ppThe SEC said that Bhalla gave Khan inside information on Polycom's fourth-quarter earnings in 2005, and that Khan traded on the information and gave it to others, including Feinblatt and Yokuty. The SEC also alleged that Hussain gave Khan confidential information about Google's second-quarter earnings in 2007./p |
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