By Melina Karaolia, M. ELIADES & PARTNERS LLC
While we were planning for the LDR PG meeting to be held at the GGI Regional Conference in Limassol, we thought that the topic of the purpose and functionality of commercial courts, with a particular focus in Cyprus, would be an interesting one. At the time we were first discussing this, the Cyprus Ministry of Justice had deposited a draft bill in Parliament for the establishment of a Commercial Court that would deal with international matters, including in the English language if the parties so choose. The approval of court procedures in the English language would require constitutional amendments.
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By Eric Blay and Dylan S. Fisher, Pallett Valo LLP
Canada’s first real judicial interpretation of a cyber liability policy is the decision in Family and Children’s Services of Lanark, Leeds and Grenville (FCS) v. Co-operators General Insurance Company (Cooperators), released in March 2021. In 2016 an unidentified hacker stole confidential reports from FCS, which were allegedly leaked onto Facebook, resulting in a class action against FCS for CAD 75 million in damages.
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By James J. Boland, Freeborn & Peters LLP
On 25 June 2021, the United States Supreme Court dealt a blow to class actions asserting claims for statutory damages. The Court strongly reinforced the rule that each class member in a class action must have suffered a concrete injury-infact in order to pursue a claim for monetary damages, even if the claim is for violation of federal statute and Congress has authorised the recovery of statutory damages.
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By Tyler Schwettman, Sandberg Phoenix & von Gontard
Earlier this year, the US Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit issued an opinion in the case of Hersh v. CKE Restaurants Holdings, Inc., 995 F.3d 659 (8th Cir. 2021), in which it held that the defendants’ motion to dismiss on forum non conveniens grounds was untimely. As further explained below, this decision serves as a warning to litigants and advocates who may choose to hold off on filing a motion to dismiss based on such grounds. In short, sooner is better than later, and later may very well be too late.
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By Alison Gadoua, Prager Metis International LLC
If you owe money to the Internal Revenue Service (“IRS”) then it is very likely that it will file a Notice of Federal Tax Lien (“NFTL”) against you to secure the debt. The NFTL provides the US government the right to collect the net proceeds of any sale of property that you own in the county in which a lien has been filed. The fastest way to have the lien released is to pay your debt in full. But what if you can’t afford to pay the debt in full? What if you are looking to sell your home but the sale will not produce any funds for the IRS to entice them to release their lien? Is all hope lost? No!
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By Sudevi Mukherjee-Gothi and Christina Chiu, Pallett Valo LLP
The Supreme Court of Canada has ruled that insurance companies with no previous knowledge of a policy breach may deny coverage to their insureds once knowledge of the breach comes to their attention, no matter how late that may be.
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By Jihee Ahn, Harris Bricken
Many of our clients believe alternative dispute resolution (ADR) clauses are little more than boilerplate, but well-drafted ADR clauses can not only put you on the winning side in any litigation, they can also cause your counterparty to back away from litigation entirely. Unfortunately, a poorly drafted alternative dispute resolution clause can be worse than no clause at all.
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By Michael Murphy, Ervin Cohen & Jessup LLP
The lack of diversity on corporate boards – and how to cure this problem – has long been a topic of debate. A 2018 McKinsey study reported a correlation between companies with diversity in management and “greater financial returns”. Activists often cite this study when pressuring companies to diversify leadership.
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By Michiel Teekens, TeekensKarstens advocaten notarissen
Based on private international law, a foreign decision from a nontreaty state is recognised in the Netherlands if, among other criteria, the recognition of the foreign decision is not contrary to Dutch public order. In such recognition proceedings it is often claimed by the defendant that the foreign legal proceedings and/or the foreign judgment violates its fundamental rights and is therefore contrary to the Dutch public order. The Dutch Supreme Court ruling of 05 April 2002 (ECLI:NL:HR:2002:AD9145) stipulated that a defendant that did not exhaust its legal remedies against the claimed violation of fundamental rights, cannot rely on the defence that recognition of the foreign judgment is contrary to the Dutch public order.
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By Leslie A. Berkoff, Moritt Hock & Hamroff LLP
On 17 May 2021, the US Supreme Court granted certiorari to address the question of whether federal courts have subject matter jurisdiction to confirm or vacate an arbitration award under the Federal Arbitration Act (“FAA”) where the only basis for jurisdiction is that the underlying dispute involves a question of federal law (see Badgerow v. Walters, No. 20-1143). The appeal challenges a Fifth Circuit decision finding that under Section 4 of the FAA, a petition to compel arbitration can be determined by “any United States district court which, save for [the arbitration] agreement, would have jurisdiction …[over the subject matter]” (9 U.S.C. § 4).
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