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Russia court rejects $16 billion claim against BP
Business Law Info |
2011/11/14 11:39
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A Russian court on Friday rejected a $16 billion claim against BP PLC filed by an obscure minority shareholder in BP's Russian venture, TNK-BP.
The court victory may have softened the blow that BP sustained when Rosneft dropped it as a partner in developing Russia's untapped Arctic oil and gas riches. The multibillion dollar deal broke down after TNK-BP's Russian billionaire shareholders blocked it, claiming that BP should be pursuing it through TNK-BP.
The Arbitration Court in the Tyumen region in Siberia on Friday dismissed two motions filed by a group of minority shareholders led by Andrei Prokhorov, who owns 0.0000106 percent in TNK-BP. The lawsuits are a $13 billion claim against BP and a $2.8 billion suit against two BP-nominated directors on TNK-BP's board.
Prokhorov and other shareholders claimed that BP and its representatives damaged TNK-BP's interests by failing to include the Russian venture in the Arctic deal with Rosneft.
BP's Russian partners in TNK-BP have denied any connection to the minority shareholder's suit. The claim was the reason why Russian police raided BP's office in August, which happened just days after Rosneft teamed up with ExxonMobil to develop the Arctic. |
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Fifth guilty plea entered in Philly abortion case
Lawyer Blog News |
2011/11/13 18:38
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A woman initially hired to clean instruments at a Philadelphia abortion clinic has pleaded guilty to two counts of third-degree murder in the deaths of a newborn baby and a woman who died after an anesthesia overdose.
As part of her plea agreement with prosecutors, Lynda Williams also agreed on Wednesday to testify against the operator of the clinic, Dr. Kermit Gosnell.
Williams was one of 10 people charged in a shocking grand jury report that alleged viable, live-born babies were routinely killed at Gosnell's clinic by having their spinal cords severed with scissors.
At the end of the hearing, a prosecutor told the teary-eyed Williams she "did the right thing" by pleading guilty, The Philadelphia Inquirer reported.
The grand jury report described filthy, inhumane conditions at the clinic, which served many poor and immigrant women.
According to the grand jury report, Gosnell hired Williams, 43, in 2008 to clean instruments at his Women's Medical Center in West Philadelphia. But her duties soon increased to include performing ultrasounds and administering anesthesia. Authorities said it was Williams who administered a lethal mix of drugs that killed Karnamaya Mongar in November 2009. |
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SearchMedia Announces Settlement on Securities Class Action
Class Action News |
2011/11/11 17:32
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SearchMedia Holdings Limited, one of China's leading nationwide multi-platform media companies, today announced that it reached a tentative partial settlement agreement for a securities class action lawsuit pending against the Company and a number of its current and former directors, officers and employees.
The securities class action lawsuit was filed in the United States District Court for the Southern District of Florida (Murdeshwar v. SearchMedia Holdings Limited, et al., Case no. 1:11-cv-20549-KMW) against the Company and certain of its current and former officers and directors in relation to various disclosures regarding the Company's acquisition of SearchMedia International Ltd. and the financial condition of that company.
The partial settlement agreement is made on behalf of the defendants who served as directors and officers of Ideation Acquisition Corp. (the "Settling Defendants") without any admission of wrongdoing on the part of the Settling Defendants and provides for a settlement fund of $2.75 million, which the Company expects to be entirely funded by its insurance carriers. The partial settlement agreement remains subject to court approval and certain other conditions including execution of a stipulation of settlement, notice to class members, and an opportunity for class members to object or opt out of the settlement.
The securities class action lawsuit remains pending against other defendants who reside in China and who have not been served with the complaint and summons. |
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Court says nothing about health care appeal
U.S. Legal News |
2011/11/11 12:32
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The Supreme Court is not immediately saying whether it will make an election-year determination on the constitutionality of President Barack Obama's health care overhaul.
Justices met in private conference Thursday to consider new cases to hear next year. Appeals surrounding the health care overhaul were on the list to be discussed, but there was no announcement as to whether the hot-button issue had even been discussed.
The next opportunity justices have to reveal when or if they will hear a health care overhaul appeal is on Monday.
Lower courts have ruled in conflicting ways on the new law and its requirement that individuals buy health insurance starting in 2014 or pay a penalty.
If the court decides to take the case, oral arguments could come as early as March. |
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First U.S. class-action overdraft fee case settles
Legal Career News |
2011/11/11 09:32
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Union Bank, part of Japan's Mitsubishi UFJ Financial Group Inc , agreed to pay $35 million to settle the first class-action lawsuit arising from nationwide litigation accusing lenders of charging excessive overdraft fees.
The litigation consolidates lawsuits filed against more than two dozen U.S., Canadian and European lenders such as JPMorgan Chase & Co , Citigroup Inc and Wells Fargo & Co .
It accuses lenders of routinely processing transactions from largest to smallest rather than in chronological order. This can cause account balances to fall more quickly, and overdraft fees, typically $25 or $35, to pile up faster.
A notice of the Union Bank settlement was filed on Wednesday with the U.S. District Court in Miami. The settlement requires approval by U.S. District Judge James Lawrence King, who oversees the litigation.
King granted class certification in the Union Bank case in July. That meant that customers, estimated in the tens of thousands, could sue the San Francisco-based bank as a group. |
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Court likely to overturn Calif. law on livestock
Court Feed News |
2011/11/10 13:36
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The Supreme Court seemed ready Wednesday to block a California law that would require euthanizing downed livestock at federally inspected slaughterhouses to keep the meat out of the nation's food system.
The court heard an appeal from the National Meat Association, which wants a 2009 state law blocked from going into effect. California barred the purchase, sale and butchering of animals that can't walk and required slaughterhouses under the threat of fines and jail time to immediately kill nonambulatory animals.
But justices said that encroached on federal laws that don't require immediate euthanizing.
"The federal law does not require me immediately to go over and euthanize the cow. Your law does require me to go over and immediately euthanize the cow. And therefore, your law seems an additional requirement in respect to the operations of a federally inspected meatpacking facility," Justice Stephen Breyer told a California lawyer. |
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