Skip to main content

$100 Million Lawsuit Gets Tossed Over Statute of Limitations

A recent case from an appeals court involved two heavyweight (i.e., "expensive") law firms, White & Case and Arnold & Porter, fighting over the statute of limitations of a malpractice lawsuit. (The plaintiff originally used another firm.) 

In the case, EB Brands Holdings sued its accountants for malpractice for, among other things, over-stating asset accounts (accounts receivable and inventories), which EB claims harmed and mislead its Board of Directors in making decisions. The agreement said that any lawsuits against the accountants had to be brought within two years of the subject audit report. The lawsuit sought damages of $100 million.

EB first brought suit in New York County, but the lawsuit was dismissed "without prejudice"--meaning EB could've fixed the problems in the complaint and re-filed it. Instead, EB brought a new lawsuit in Westchester County and abandoned its New York County case. But by then the two-year statute of limitations had ended. 

In the Westchester case, the defendant accountants made a motion to dismiss based on the two-year statute of limitations and won. EB appealed the decision, but the appeals court said nope, the two years was up, and no exceptions were applicable. Considering the firepower of their lawyers, I'm sure they argued everything possible. 

Sounds like EB should've stuck with the New York County case!

Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Recent Cases: Appeals Court Reverses Lower Court in Slip and Fall

In a decision issued on March 18, 2015 , a New York appeals court reversed a lower court decision dismissing a slip and fall case. The plaintiff was a 12-year-old boy. He was injured when he slipped and fell on "loose and broken pieces of asphalt" as he was running towards an ice cream truck near an Ikea store in Brooklyn. There were two interesting things about the decision. First, like many slip and fall cases, the case turned on constructive notice--how long was the loose/broken asphalt on the ground before the accident so that the defendants should have seen it and corrected the dangerous condition? The appeals court said the defendants failed to show when they last cleaned or inspected the area, so they did not establish lack of constructive notice. The more interesting thing is that apparently the boy told staff at the hospital where he was taken that he tripped over his shoelaces. The defendants found this in the hospital records and basically said, "Ha! He di...
Post a Comment
Read more

Recent Developments: Lawsuit Against School District for a Bus Monitor Abusing a Special Needs Child

The parents of a child "who suffers from severe mental disabilities" sued the Beacon City School District, in Dutchess County, alleging that a bus monitor physically and mentally abused their child. The parents sued the School District for, among other things, assault, battery, and negligent supervision. The case went through the fact-finding phase (called "discovery"), and the School District made a motion to dismiss at least some of the claims. The motion was granted, but an appeals court reversed the lower court.  The appeals court first noted that  [s]chools have a duty to adequately supervise the students in their care, and may be held liable for foreseeable injuries proximately related to the absence of adequate supervision and  [t]he standard for determining whether the school has breached its duty is to compare the school's supervision and protection to that of a parent of ordinary prudence placed in the same situation and armed with the same...
Post a Comment
Read more

Insurance Companies Trying to Gag Superstorm Sandy Victims?

As reported in several news articles ( this one  is free), in the aftermath of superstorm Sandy, engineering firms were hired by insurance companies to inspect the homes of people making claims for flood damage.  There have been allegations that two of the engineering firms, U.S. Forensic out of Louisiana, and GEB HiRise out of Uniondale, forged property damage reports in order to deny claims. The NY State Attorney General is investigating those allegations and wants to talk to the homeowners.  At the same time, there are about 1,800 lawsuits in federal court involving the insurance coverage claims. A three-judge panel is trying to expedite resolution of the cases.  Last week it was revealed that one of the insurance companies, The Standard Fire Insurance Company, which is a subsidiary of Travelers Insurance, drafted language in a settlement document saying that any homeowner who accepts a payout of their claims cannot cooperate with the criminal invest...
Post a Comment
Read more