A long-standing B2B client has occasional trouble with its clients not paying their bills. This past week, I sat in on a negotiation of such a situation. It turned out that my services will not be needed to get this bill paid. A few months ago another of this client’s clients was not cooperative, so I sued them. They cried a lot and paid their bill before the suit progressed to an attachment of their bank account.
One of the firm’s newer clients is working toward acquisition of a B2C advisement practice. There are several issues to be resolved, including investor funding and whether that will involve SEC registration or if there is a workable exemption to registration under 4(a)(2).
For another client, the firm circulated a stipulation of dismissal for signatures and got that filed, thereby resolving a contentious situation between the client, a former employee, and a friend of the employee who also was a customer of the client. Commercial disparagement can be a tricky claim to sustain in the age of consumer reviews and anti-SLAPP statutes.
Sometimes the solution is to say as little as possible. This was the case this week for a client working to resolve a trademark infringement allegation through diligent compliance with the senior user’s requests.
This week was busy for discovery, which is the process of requesting information from an opposing party and producing information in response to requests. Meaningful efforts at discovery can show an opposing party seriousness about moving a lawsuit forward or defending it. The firm served discovery requests in five cases: a breach of promise to pay for a business, an embezzlement of funds advanced to pay for a business, a tortious interference with business efforts, a complaint about rust on a used car, and a very contentious business divorce with hidden revenue, unauthorized disposal of assets, and embezzlement.
The firm has taken on another pro bono case. An old man had a messy yard; the neighbors complained. The town sent a contractor to clean up the yard, and the contractor removed more than $10,000 of hand tools, garden structures, and working power equipment.
Last week the firm was preparing to amend a complaint and to argue against a motion to dismiss. Today, I argued the motion. We are waiting for the Judge to decide whether the defendant should be dismissed and then cited back in with an amended complaint, or just kept in the case pending amendment.
Milford Superior Court clerk is a stickler for rules, more stringent than any other judicial district I’ve practiced in. It took a couple of tries to get a prejudgment remedy application considered after the original complaint had been served and returned.
In New Haven Federal District Court, a copyright / trade secret / employment case is on hold while the plaintiff works up settlement papers.
Arbitration in Miami is stalled because the respondent still is on house arrest. They made a move to depose the firm’s client, and the arbitrator insists that a final hearing will proceed at the end of July.
Witness interviews were interesting in a commercial disparagement case.
