Recent Cases & News

Case Summaries

Commercial Law

[02/01] In re American Express Merchants' Litigation
In a class action asserting Sherman Act claims, brought against a charge card issuer whose card acceptance agreement purported to preclude a merchant from bringing a class action lawsuit, the district court's grant of the defendant's motion to compel arbitration and dismissal of the case is reversed, where the cost of plaintiffs' individually arbitrating their dispute with the defendant would be prohibitive, effectively depriving them of the statutory protections of the antitrust laws, and thus the class action waiver in the arbitration provision was unenforceable.

[01/27] C9 Ventures v. SVC-West, L.P.
In a personal injury suit in which a lessor of helium-filled tanks used to inflate festive balloons cross-complained against the lessee to enforce an indemnification provision on the back of an unsigned invoice, the trial court's judgment in favor of the lessor and award of attorney fees to it is reversed, where: 1) the lessee did not manifest assent to the terms on the back of the unsigned invoice by course of dealing or course of performance, or under basic contract law; 2) the lessee did not sign the invoice or otherwise expressly agree to its terms; 3) an unsigned invoice itself is not a contract, and repeated delivery of a particular form does not make the form part of the parties' agreement; 4) payment of the invoice merely constituted the lessee's performance of the obligation under the oral contract to pay for the rental of the helium-filled tanks; and 5) assuming the transaction was a sale of goods covered by division 2 of the California Commercial Code, the indemnification provision was not an additional term of the contract under section 2207 of the Commercial Code.

[01/24] Long v. Tommy Hilfiger U.S.A. Inc.
In a putative class action against a men's clothing retailer alleging that its printing of “EXPIRY: 04/##” on a credit card receipt willfully violated the Fair and Accurate Credit Transactions Act (FACTA)'s prohibition against printing the expiration date of the a credit card upon any receipt provided to the cardholder at the point of the sale, the district court's grant of the defendant's motion to dismiss is affirmed, where: 1) FACTA prohibits a merchant from printing expiration date information on a receipt provided to the consumer, even if the year is redacted; but 2) the defendant's interpretation of FACTA, although erroneous, was at least objectively reasonable, and thus there was no "willful" violation that could support a claim.

[01/24] Mabey Bridge & Shore, Inc. v. Schoch
In a suit by a corporation engaged in the business of supplying temporary steel bridges for construction projects, seeking a declaration that the Pennsylvania Steel Products Procurement Act, as interpreted and enforced by the Pennsylvania Department of Transportation (PennDOT), is unconstitutional, and requesting a preliminary and permanent injunction enjoining PennDOT from prohibiting the use of the company's temporary bridges on its projects, the district court's grant of summary judgment against the company on all its claims is affirmed, where: 1) the state Steel Act was not preempted by the federal Buy America Act and related federal regulations; 2) the Steel Act is not unconstitutional under the dormant Commerce Clause; 3) PennDOT's actions did not violate the Contract Clause; and 4) PennDOT's application of the Steel Act did not violate the Equal Protection Clause.

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Contracts

[02/07] Sioux Honey Ass'n v. Hartford Fire Insurance Co.
In a case in which domestic producers sought distributions under the Continued Dumping and Subsidy Offset Act of 2000 and sought to compel the assessment and collection of additional antidumping duties, the dismissal of claims by the United States Court of International Trade is affirmed with respect to certain claims and reversed with respect to others, where: 1) the Trade Court lacked jurisdiction to hear certain claims against various sureties, both under statute and because it did not possess common law, pendent jurisdiction; and 2) the plaintiffs were not intended third-party beneficiaries of bond contracts posted by the sureties, so they could not enforce the contracts.

[02/01] GECCMC 2005-C1 Plummer Street Office L.P. v. JPMorgan Chase Bank, N.A.
In a suit alleging breach of lease agreements that the defendant bank assumed after it purchased a failed bank's assets and liabilities from the FDIC pursuant to the terms of a written purchase and assumption agreement, the district court's grant of the bank's motion to dismiss is affirmed, where under federal common law, the plaintiff lacked standing to bring suit under the agreement because it was not an intended third-party beneficiary of the agreement.

[01/27] C9 Ventures v. SVC-West, L.P.
In a personal injury suit in which a lessor of helium-filled tanks used to inflate festive balloons cross-complained against the lessee to enforce an indemnification provision on the back of an unsigned invoice, the trial court's judgment in favor of the lessor and award of attorney fees to it is reversed, where: 1) the lessee did not manifest assent to the terms on the back of the unsigned invoice by course of dealing or course of performance, or under basic contract law; 2) the lessee did not sign the invoice or otherwise expressly agree to its terms; 3) an unsigned invoice itself is not a contract, and repeated delivery of a particular form does not make the form part of the parties' agreement; 4) payment of the invoice merely constituted the lessee's performance of the obligation under the oral contract to pay for the rental of the helium-filled tanks; and 5) assuming the transaction was a sale of goods covered by division 2 of the California Commercial Code, the indemnification provision was not an additional term of the contract under section 2207 of the Commercial Code.

[01/26] Lopez & Medina Corp. v. Marsh USA, Inc.
On appeal of a rejected cross-motion for summary judgment that argued that an insurance policy's coverage expressly applied to an airline's underlying claims for damages arising from the insured's failure to provide air transportation, as contractually required, to the airline's passengers, the district court's order denying the motion is affirmed, as the phrase "legally obligated to pay as damages" in a commercial general liability policy, which usually covers only tort claims, does not also provide coverage for claims in an underlying action arising out of and related to a contract between the parties.

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Government Contracts

[02/06] Laguna Hermosa Corp. v. US
In a suit brought by the former operator of a resort facility on federal land, seeking compensation from the United States for facilities that were allegedly retained and used by the Bureau of Land Management or by the resort operator's successor, the Court of Federal Claims' dismissal of the complaint for failure to state a claim is affirmed, where: 1) the trial court erred in concluding that the issues were identical to those in another case, and thus issue preclusion did not apply; but 2) the United States did not require the retention of the facilities under Public Law 96-375, so they remained the property of the resort operator and were abandoned.

[02/03] Sauer v. Dep't of Education
In a suit by a California state agency seeking review of an arbitration award that made it liable to a blind vendor for failing to sue the federal General Services Administration (GSA) to vindicate the rights of the vendor to conduct business on federal property, the district court's judgment affirming the award is reversed, where: 1) the arbitration panel committed a legal error when it interpreted the Randolph-Sheppard Vending Stand Act as requiring the state agency to bring an action against GSA, and that the agency's failure to do so made it liable for compensatory damages; and 2) because the arbitration panel's ruling was not in accordance with law, it had to be set aside under the Administrative Procedure Act.

[01/26] The DIRECTV Group, Inc. v. US
In a case involving the calculation and payment of segment closing adjustments associated with a corporation's sale of certain business units that included the transfer of defined benefit pension plans, the decision of the United States Court of Federal Claims granting summary judgment in favor of the corporation is affirmed, where: 1) the Claims Court did not err by calculating segment closing adjustments based on the assets and liabilities of the entire segment, rather than only the assets and liabilities that the corporation retained; and 2) the Claims Court correctly determined that the corporation's segment closing obligations could be satisfied by the cost savings realized by the government in the successor contracts.

[01/25] US v. Hornsby
In a prosecution of the chief executive officer of Maryland’s Prince George’s County Public Schools for honest-services fraud, tampering with evidence, and obstruction of justice, convictions of honest-services fraud are reversed and convictions of tampering with evidence and obstruction of justice are affirmed with a remand for resentencing, where: 1) there was an erroneous jury instruction on honest-services wire fraud; 2) the district court did not err in admitting past-conduct evidence; 3) the district court did not err in denying a motion for severance of the tampering and obstruction counts from the honest-services fraud counts; 4) the district court did not err when it denied a motion in limine to suppress preindictment statements the defendant made to an undercover government informant; 5) the district court did not err in not giving a jury instruction that defined reasonable doubt; 6) there was no prejudicial spillover of evidence supporting the honest-services fraud counts that required the reversal of the tampering and obstruction convictions; and 7) it was not reasonably certain that the judge would have imposed the same sentences even if the erroneous charge of honest-services fraud had not been submitted to the jury.

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