Justia Delaware Court of Chancery Opinion Summaries

The Court of Chancery granted summary judgment to Plaintiffs in this case involving the removal of one plaintiff from an LLC's board of managers, holding that Plaintiffs were entitled to summary judgment and that Defendants were not entitled to summary judgment.Plaintiffs filed a complaint under 6 Del. C. 18-110 seeking an injunction preventing Lorenzo Roccia's removal from the Skyline Renewables LLC board of managers and a declaration that his purported removal was void. Defendants argued that the removal of Roccia was valid and binding. Both parties filed motions for summary judgment. The Court of Chancery granted summary judgment for Plaintiffs, holding that the individual who removed Roccia was not authorized to do so. View "Roccia v. Mugica" on Justia Law

The Court of Chancery granted Defendants' motion to dismiss Harley Franco's action filed under 6 Del. C. 18-110 and 6 Del. C. 18-111 seeking a declaration that because Franco no longer agreed to Doug Houghton's continued service on the Avalon Freight Services LLC Board of Directors, Houghton must be removed from the Board, holding that section 3.1 of the Avalon LLC Agreement did not empower Franco to unilaterally remove Houghton from the Board.Franco interpreted section 3.1's requirement that the fifth director of the Avalon Board - Houghton - be mutually agreement upon and appointed by Franco and one other director to mean that if Franco no longer agreed to houghton's continued service, Houghton must be removed from the Board. The Court of Chancery dismissed the action, holding that that Franco may not unilaterally remove Houghton from the Avalon Board. View "Franco v. Avalon Freight Services LLC" on Justia Law

In this case involving the validity of an agreement (the Omnibus Agreement) between Stream TV Networks, Inc., its two secured creditors, and fifty-two of its stockholders, the Court of Chancery denied Stream's motion for a preliminary injunction and granted SeeCubic Inc.'s motion for a preliminary injunction, holding that the Omnibus Agreement was valid.In the Omnibus Agreement, Stream agreed to transfer all of its assets to SeeCubic, an entity controlled by Stream's secured creditors. Stream argued that the agreement was invalid and sought a preliminary injunction to prevent SeeCubic from taking any action to enforce it. SeeCubic, on the other hand, argued that the agreement was valid and sought a preliminary injunction preventing Stream or any third-party defendants from taking any action to interfere with it. The Court of Chancery granted SeeCubic's motion, holding that none of Stream's arguments against the validity of the agreement had merit and that SeeCubic was entitled to a preliminary injunction. View "Stream TV Networks, Inc. v. SeeCubic, Inc." on Justia Law

The Master of Chancery determined that Meghan Kelly's complaint against Donald Trump, in his individual capacity and in his official capacity as President of the United States, must be dismissed as legally frivolous under 10 Del. C. 8803(c).In her complaint, Kelly brought three counts alleging that Trump violated her religious freedom. Among other relief, Kelly sought relief permanently enjoining and restraining Trump from forcing religious views or sponsoring religion and from persecuting those with diverse religious beliefs while he serves as President of the United States. Kelly's primary claim was that, through Trump's deception, he was misleading people, deceiving them to sin, and dooming them to hell, and therefore, Kelly will not be able to love them for eternity. The Master in Chancery recommended that the Court dismiss the complaint as legally frivolous, holding that the complaint failed to state a claim upon which relief may be granted. View "Kelly v. Trump" on Justia Law

The Court of Chancery granted Hightower Holdings, LLC's motion to dismiss this action under Rule 12(b)(3) based on the doctrine of forum non conveniens, holding that Hightower carried its burden to show that it would suffer overwhelming hardship from being forced to litigate this action in Delaware under the circumstances presented.This litigation arose when Scott Holsopple left his employment with Focus Operating, LLC (Focus Sub) and took a job with Hightower Holdings, LLC. Focus Financial Partners, LLC (Focus Parent), the publicly traded parent company of Focus Sub, filed this lawsuit against Holsopple and Hightower. Five days later, Holsopple and Hightower filed an action against Focus Parent in a California court, seeking declarations that restrictive covenants and Delaware-forum and Delaware-law provisions in a unit agreement Holsopple signed when joining Focus Sub were invalid and unenforceable under California law. Focus Parent then filed a second amended complaint asserting, among other things, claims for breach of the Delaware-forum provisions. Hightower moved to dismiss this action under the doctrine of forum non conveniens. Holsopple was subsequently dismissed from the lawsuit. The Court of Chancery granted the motion, holding that, under the circumstances, it would impose overwhelming hardship if Hightower were forced to litigate a less advanced case in this jurisdiction. View "Focus Financial Financial Partners, LLC v. Holsopple" on Justia Law

The Court of Chancery granted Defendants' motion to dismiss this derivative action under Rule 23.1 on the grounds that Plaintiff failed to demand that the Facebook board of directors (the Board) pursue the litigation and did not establish that demand was futile.At the request of Mark Zuckerberg, the Board pursued a reclassification of Facebook's shares, the result of which would be to shift two-thirds of Facebook's economic value to the non-voting stock and enable Zuckerberg to transfer the bulk of his economic ownership in Facebook without giving up voting control. After a lawsuit, the Board withdrew the reclassification. Plaintiff then filed a derivative action against Zuckerberg and Board members that approved the reclassification, claiming that the pursuit of the reclassification constituted a breach of duty and that Facebook was harmed as a result. Plaintiff chose not to make a pre-suit demand. Defendants moved to dismiss the action under Rule 23.1. The Court of Chancery granted the motion, holding that demand was not excused on the grounds that the directors were incapable of making an impartial decision regarding whether to institute such litigation. View "United Food & Commercial Workers Union v. Zuckerberg" on Justia Law

The Court of Chancery granted Scott Holsopple's motion for dismissal from this case, holding that this Court lacked any basis to assert personal jurisdiction over Holsopple.Holsopple previously worked for Focus Operating, LLC, a subsidiary of Focus Financial Partners, LLC (Focus Parent). During his employment with Focus Operating, Holsopple signed five Unit Agreements, two of which selected the courts of Delaware as the exclusive forum for disputes relating to the Unit Agreements. By signing the agreements, Holsopple because a member of Focus Parent. The two most recent iterations of Focus Parent's operating agreement selected the Courts of Delaware as the exclusive forum for disputes relating to the operating agreements. After Holsopple took a position with Hightower Holdings, LLC, a competitor of Focus Operating, Focus Parent filed this lawsuit alleging, among other things, that Holsopple violated the employment-related provisions in the Unit Agreements and violated the exclusive choice-of-forum provisions by filing a lawsuit in California state court. Holsopple filed a motion to dismiss for lack of personal jurisdiction. After a choice-of-law analysis, the Court of Chancery granted the motion, holding that the Delaware choice-of-forum provisions could not support jurisdiction. View "Focus Financial Financial Partners, LLC v. Holsopple" on Justia Law

In this litigation in which Altaba, Inc. (the Company) sought dissolution under the framework established by Sections 280 and 281(a) of the Delaware General Corporation Law the Court of Chancery held that the Company may make an interim distribution using its proposed amounts of security on the condition that it reserve funds for lawsuits pending in Canada resulting from data breaches that the Company disclosed in 2016 (the Canadian Actions Claim).As to all but two claims, in which the Company agreed to hold back the full amount of security requested by respective claimants, the Court of Chancery held that there was no obstacle to an interim distribution based on the amounts of security. For two claims, however, the Company sought to hold back less than the full amount of security requested by the claimants. The Court of Chancery held (1) as to the Canadian Actions Claim, if the Company wished to make an interim distribution to its stockholders it must reserve $1.05 billion Canadian; and (2) as to the second claim, the Company made a convincing showing that the amount it proposed to reserve was likely to be sufficient to provide compensation for claims that had not been made known to the Company or that had not yet arisen. View "In re Altaba, Inc." on Justia Law

In this case involving disputes over how several related Delaware statutory trusts should be governed and how they should operate the Court of Chancery held that the Trusts have no beneficial interest in the student loans that serve as collateral for the debt instruments (Notes) and that the holders of residual beneficial interests in the Trusts (the Owners) owe certain fiduciary duties to the indenture trustee, the note holders, and the reinsurer for certain of the notes (Indenture Parties).When several constituents brought separate operational controversies in separate lawsuits the actions were consolidated. At issue were offshoots of the National Collegiate Student Loan Master Trust I (the Trusts), each of which were Delaware statutory trusts formed for the purpose of acquiring and servicing a portfolio of student loans (the Student Loans). The Trusts acquired the Student Loans with the proceeds from the issuance of Notes and then entered into an Indenture granting interest in the Student Loans to the Indenture Trustee. The Indenture made Clea that the Trusts transferred the Student Loans for the benefit of the Noteholders. The Trusts then promised to service the Student Loans. The Owner Trustee, which possessed the right to act on behalf of the Trusts, found itself in the middle of a dispute between the Owners and the Indenture Parties, who had various economic interests in the Trusts. The Court of Chancery held as set forth above. View "In re National Collegiate Student Loan Trusts Litigation" on Justia Law

The Court of Chancery held that management of a Delaware corporation does not have the authority unilaterally to preclude a director of the corporation from obtaining the corporation's privileged information.This dispute concerned obtaining access to privileged communications among management of a company, its in-house counsel, and its outside counsel. The company, acting by and under the direction of a special committee of the company's board of directors, filed an action against a corporation and an L.P. alleging that the defendants breached contractual obligations they owed to the company. The special committee sought access to the privileged communications in order to oppose the company's motion for leave to voluntarily dismiss the complaint. The Court of Chancery held that the members of the special committee were entitled to discovery of the privileged communications. View "In re WeWork Litigation" on Justia Law