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Month: December, 2014
Sony Hacking Scandal – Bloomberg, CCTV
Category: News, Press | Friday, December 19th, 2014 | Comments Off on Sony Hacking Scandal – Bloomberg, CCTV
Devin McRae was prominently featured on Bloomberg TV and CCTV regarding the Sony hacking scandal, and Sony’s decision to cancel the release of the movie “The Interview” following threats.
Receiver appointed in fight over micro green company – Los Angeles Daily Journal
Category: News, Press | Monday, December 15th, 2014 | Comments Off on Receiver appointed in fight over micro green company – Los Angeles Daily Journal
Receiver appointed in fight over microgreen company
Receiver appointed to oversee operations amid ownership, management dispute
By Henry Meier, Los Angeles Daily Journal
A Los Angeles County Superior Court judge recently appointed a receiver to run the business operations of a company that grows organic microgreens, finding the current management situation warranted third party oversight until an ownership dispute could be resolved.
Judge William D. Stewart said he intends to appoint David J. Pasternak to oversee World Organics LLC’s microgreens operation after an investor claimed the company was being run poorly. Unava LLC v. World Organics LLC, EC063114 (L.A. Sup. Ct., filed Nov. 4, 2014).
The case deals with a power struggle between a holding company controlled by Ara Abramyan – an ally of Russian President Vladimir Putin – and the businessmen who run World Organics. Abramyan’s company, Unava LLC, sued World Organics and its executives in November after the company said stakes Unava bought in World
Organics during two individuals’ bankruptcy proceedings were worthless.
Unava claims that it owned a 73 percent stake in World Organics, an assertion that the defendants contest. Fearing the defendants’ governance of the company to be lax, Unava’s attorney Bryan Sullivan, a partner at Early Sullivan Wright Gizer & McRae LLP, filed a motion to install the receiver.
Sullivan said that the two sides fundamentally disagreed about what happened in the lead-up to the case.
“We say they breached their fiduciary duties and they say we didn’t fund the company as promised,” he said. “We think we’ve presented more than enough evidence of mismanagement.”
World Organics’ lawyer Richard M. Foster did not immediately return request for comment.
Pasternak has yet to be sworn in officially as the receiver and said he was still not in a position to fully analyze the specifics of the case. He said receivers are commonly appointed in instances involving money disputes.
RNT Holdings, LLC v. United General Title Appellate Ruling Clarifies California Interpretation of Title Insurance
Category: News, Press | Thursday, December 11th, 2014 | Comments Off on RNT Holdings, LLC v. United General Title Appellate Ruling Clarifies California Interpretation of Title Insurance
The Los Angeles Daily Journal featured Eric Early and William Wright in covering Early Sullivan’s appellate victory in RNT Holdings, LLC v. United General Title, a case arising out of the financing of a well known Hollywood producer’s home. The article, by Matt Hamilton, discusses how the RNT decision changes the playing field regarding the interpretation of certain key provisions found in most policies of title insurance. Click “Download PDF” to read the full article.
Sony Hack: ‘Data Security Oil Spill’ Leaves Studio at Risk
Category: Press | Wednesday, December 10th, 2014 | Comments Off on Sony Hack: ‘Data Security Oil Spill’ Leaves Studio at Risk
Devin McRae was quoted in Ted Johnson’s Variety feature “Sony Hack: ‘Data Security Oil Spill’ Leaves Studio at Risk.”
Stephen Ma Speaks at 2014 So-Cal Innovation Forum
Category: Events | Wednesday, December 10th, 2014 | Comments Off on Stephen Ma Speaks at 2014 So-Cal Innovation Forum
Stephen Ma was a panelist on “Hollywood Going Digital” at this year’s So-Cal Innovation Forum (SIF) in Pasadena, California. SIF is an annual event held in Southern California to integrate the entrepreneurial resources in both China and the United States by partnering with leading incubators, startups, and venture capitalists.
Mary Kaufman Quoted in “Mattel could use time defense in epic Bratz litigation” – Los Angeles Daily Journal
Category: Press | Wednesday, December 3rd, 2014 | Comments Off on Mary Kaufman Quoted in “Mattel could use time defense in epic Bratz litigation” – Los Angeles Daily Journal
Mattel could use time defense in epic Bratz litigation
By Matthew Blake
LOS ANGELES – Lawyers have nearly run out of superlatives to describe the ever-unfolding litigation between rival toymakers Mattel Inc. and MGA Entertainment Inc. that has persevered amid mammoth shifts in the fashion doll economy and cost hundreds of millions of dollars in attorney fees. But it looks like the two are on a path to war again over MGA’s Bratz dolls.
Los Angeles County Superior Court Judge Amy D. Hogue’s tentative ruling this month rejecting Mattel’s motion to dismiss a $1 billion trade secret lawsuit filed by MGA means there will probably be a third jury trial. MGA’s current lawsuit resuscitates claims that for 17 years Mattel employees used phony identities to steal MGA information at trade shows and used that doll intelligence to expedite the demise of Bratz, the erstwhile sassy MGA dolls with pouty mouths an almond-shaped eyes that took business away from Mattel’s venerable Barbie dolls.
Mary C.G. Kaufman, an associate at Early Sullivan Wright Gizer & McRae LLP, said that Van Nuys-based MGA and El Segundo-based Mattel are “trailblazing” in pressing on with courtroom fights, noting, “The litigation has surpassed the market for Bratz dolls.”
Kaufman and other lawyers interviewed said round three could hinge on whether MGA’s time window to make trade theft claims has expired.
The legal battle began in Mattel Inc. v. Bryant et al., CV04-3431 (C.D. Cal., filed May 14, 2004), when Mattel alleged their employees gave MGA the idea for Bratz.
A federal jury agreed, but on appeal, the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in 2010 reversed the decision, sending the case back to the Central District. MGA lawyer Jennifer L. Keller of Keller Rackauckas LLP then unveiled a bombshell counterclaim: Mattel spied on MGA between 1992 and 2009.
A new jury sided with MGA and the company won $172 million in damages and $137 million in attorney fees. Then, in 2012 the Circuit took away MGA’s damages while keeping their collection of attorney costs, finding MGA lacked procedural grounds to file the counterclaim, and, again, sent the case back to the Central District.
After Judge David O. Carter dismissed MGA’s claims with prejudice in December 2013 and termed the dispute “a decadelong litigation odyssey,” MGA filed suit against Mattel in state court, MGA Entertainment v. Mattel Inc., BC532708 (L.A. Super. Ct., filed Jan. 13, 2014).
The current lawsuit attempts to catalogue the prior lawsuits, noting, for example, that past litigation has taken up 10,000 separate docket entries and 11.5 million pages of discovery.
With memories of discoveries past, Keller said Hogue should speedily proceed to a jury trial sometime in 2015.
Keller noted that the prior trade secret lawsuit was “overturned on a technicality” and that with a less conservative Los Angeles jury pool, MGA could get even more than the original $172 million damages initially rewarded.
Roger N. Behle Jr., a partner at Foley Bezek Behle & Curtis LLP, agreed MGA could win big in a jury trial based on the trade secret allegations’ merits.
But Behle also said that, unlike in the prior federal trial, Mattel attorney John B. Quinn of Quinn Emanuel Urquhart & Sullivan LLP will likely focus on a “time-based defense” that the clock has expired on trade theft claims – and try to find evidence that MGA suspected espionage long before its 2010 allegations.
Quinn, who could not be reached for comment, has already sought to dismiss the case by arguing MGA is using similar facts to claims in prior lawsuits that were dismissed. In a Nov. 13 ruling still under seal, Hogue rejected for now those arguments.
Under California’s Uniform Trade Secret Act, MGA had three years upon learning of Mattel spying to file a claim. According to Kaufman, an entertainment and business litigator, Mattel could either argue that the clock kept running since 2010, when the company was first sued for the trade theft, or – more likely – allege that MGA suspected espionage long before 2010.
Kaufman said the new trial would have a significant discovery phase of what MGA knew when. “This is the place where they are going to take additional discovery,” Kaufman said.
Jedediah Wakefield, a partner at Fenwick & West LLP, said he is not sure if Mattel has strong statute of limitations or other time defense claims, but did note that a case alleging years of continuing trade theft is highly unusual.
“I’m not aware of another case where an ongoing pattern has been alleged,” said Wakefield, who focuses on trademark litigation. “Usually the plaintiff figures out what has been going on and brings an action earlier.”
Keller stressed that for years Mattel effectively concealed its espionage to the point MGA executives thought they had a mole.
In fact, one of the plaintiff’s arguments is that Mattel not only spied on MGA, but was really good at it. Keller said that the espionage combined with a briefly upheld 2008 injunction on sale of the Bratz dolls, effectively drove Bratz off the shelves. Ten years ago, Bratz had almost 50 percent market share of the fashion doll industry.
Because of Bratz’s downfall, Wakefield said, “MGA sees potentially significant upside” in filing another suit and hoping for a big day and bad publicity for Mattel.
Wakefield is not holding his breath that the matter will wrap up in state court.
“I expect to see an appeal by somebody.”
matthew_blake@dailyjournal.com