Joseph M Mclaughlin

April 07, 2021 | New York Law Journal

In his Corporate Litigation column, Joseph McLaughlin discusses the recent Ninth Circuit decision in 'Anderson v. Edward D. Jones & Co.,' which reversed a SLUSA dismissal of state law fiduciary claims last month, illustrating that particularly in fee-related cases the line between federal securities law claims and state law claims remains inexact.

By Joseph M. McLaughlin

10 minute read

February 10, 2021 | New York Law Journal

May a damages class be certified if the proponent of certification is unable to show a reliable, administratively feasible way to identify putative class members? Federal circuit courts continue to answer this question in varying ways, with the Eleventh Circuit recently contributing to a deepening division of federal authority on what is required of a proposed class representative in order to demonstrate the existence of an ascertainable Rule 23(b)(3) class.

By Joseph M. McLaughlin and Shannon K. McGovern

10 minute read

December 09, 2020 | New York Law Journal

State court enforcement of exclusive federal forum provisions for 1933 Act claims is the final step to issuers and other participants in securities offerings subject to the 1933 Act curbing duplicative state court litigation, and recent California decisions provide important guidance toward that objective.

By Joseph M. McLaughlin and Shannon K. McGovern

8 minute read

October 07, 2020 | New York Law Journal

As derivative plaintiffs continue to seek to expand what constitutes mission critical corporate risk, these decisions provide practical guidance on how courts will: (i) identify the key compliance risks a company's business presents, and (ii) evaluate whether a particular company has implemented reasonable board-level monitoring and reporting procedures.

By Joseph M. McLaughlin and Shannon K. McGovern

21 minute read

August 14, 2020 | New York Law Journal

In their corporate litigation column, Joseph M. McLaughlin and Shannon K. McGovern discuss the recent decision in 'Applied Energetics,' which explores the remedies of ratification and validation in Sections 204 and 205 of the Delaware General Corporation Law.

By Joseph M. McLaughlin and Shannon K. McGovern

9 minute read

June 10, 2020 | New York Law Journal

A class should not be certified unless plaintiff establishes by a preponderance of the evidence that the process of distinguishing the injured claimants from the uninjured claimants will not entail highly individualized factual inquiries

By Joseph M. McLaughlin and Shannon K. McGovern

14 minute read

April 08, 2020 | New York Law Journal

In their Corporate Litigation column, Joseph M. McLaughlin and Shannon K. McGovern write: The first wave of circuit guidance on the procedural and substantive implications of 'Bristol-Myers' for class actions brought in federal court has unfortunately failed to mitigate uncertainty about the timing and viability of jurisdictional challenges to nonresidents' putative class claims.

By Joseph M. McLaughlin and Shannon K. McGovern

11 minute read

February 11, 2020 | New York Law Journal

The Delaware Court of Chancery recently addressed a nearly unprecedented issue: the discovery and privilege implications of a special litigation committee's decision to hand over control of a company claim to a stockholder derivative plaintiff who initiated the claim and survived a motion to dismiss. As Joseph M. McLaughlin and Shannon K. McGovern discuss in this edition of their Corporate Litigation column, the framework established by the court to provide the plaintiff with the benefit of the SLC's work has expansive disclosure aspects and important boundaries to be understood by practitioners.

By Joseph M. McLaughlin and Shannon K. McGovern

7 minute read

December 11, 2019 | New York Law Journal

When a company is acquired, who "owns" the company's pre-acquisition, attorney-client privileged communications—the buyer or the seller? In their Corporate Litigation column, Joseph M. McLaughlin and Shannon K. McGovern discuss the Delaware and New York approaches to this question, and discuss a recent Second Department decision that addressed a variation on those divergent approaches.

By Joseph M. McLaughlin and Shannon K. McGovern

9 minute read

October 09, 2019 | New York Law Journal

In their Corporate Litigation column, Joseph M. McLaughlin and Shannon K. McGovern discuss the recent pair of federal court decisions—'House v. Akorn' and 'Scott v. DST Systems'—which highlight courts' willingness to probe supplemental disclosures to ascertain whether shareholders received a material benefit warranting an award of attorney fees, as part of a settlement or otherwise.

By Joseph M. McLaughlin and Shannon K. McGovern

8 minute read