Understand Your Rights. Solve Your Legal Problems
A Delaware court ruled in favour of South Korean investment bank Mirae Asset Dewoo Co Ltd and affiliates in a suit against China’s Anbang Insurance Group over the termination of a $5.8 billion contract to buy 15 luxury US hotels.
Last year, a consortium led by Mirae agreed to purchase the hotels from Anbang, which had come under the control of the Chinese government in 2018 and was selling its overseas assets. However, Mirae did not close the deal on the scheduled April 2020 date, claiming that Angang’s “representations and warranties were inaccurate” and that the insurer had “failed to comply with its covenants under the sale agreement”.
Anbang then filed suit against Mirae in Delaware in an attempt to force the company to fulfil its promised payment, according to the court filing.
The Delaware Court of Chancery found that the Anbang subsidiary that owns the hotels had made extensive changes to its business to cope with the COVID-19 pandemic, including employee layoffs, furloughs and the closure of amenities. These measures led to a failure to meet a condition in the contract that business be “conducted in the ordinary course of business”, thus allowing Mirae to terminate the agreement, the court found.
The court ruled that Anbang should return contract payment to Mirae Asset along with an additional $3.685 million to cover transaction cost and related litigation expenses. Mirae said in a regulatory filling that will respond through its legal representative depending on whether the plaintiff appeals.
[ymal]
The case could set a precedent for deals that have had their valuations drop since the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic.
Mirae Asset shares closed 6.5% higher in Seoul following the news.
Australia’s financial services watchdog on Tuesday filed a civil lawsuit against the country’s largest bank for charging more than 2,200 customers an interest rate that was higher than advertised over a seven-year period.
The Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC) alleged that a systems error at the Commonwealth Bank of Australia caused the bank to charge 34% interest on business overdraft accounts between December 2011 and March 2018, more than double the advertised rate of between 14.55% and 16%.
The difference caused the bank to gain more than $2.9 million, ASIC said in its filing.
Customers continued to face higher rates than stated even after a complaint in 2013 prompted the bank to try (unsuccessfully) to fix the overcharging error, the regulator continued. The average customer lost around $1,500 due to the error, while one customer was overcharged by $17,522.
ASIC asked the Federal Court to find that CBA made false or misleading statements in breach of federal laws, and that the bank broke its obligations under the Corporations Act regarding financial services laws. For these, the regulator seeks a fine “as the court determines to be appropriate” and an order forcing CBA to publicly acknowledge any such fine and determination.
“CBA has cooperated fully with ASIC’s investigation and does not intend to defend the proceedings,” the bank said in a statement on Tuesday, adding that the problems behind the error had been dealt with and the 2,269 affected customers had been refunded a total of $3.74 million.
[ymal]
The suit stems from a case study from a Royal Commission into the Australian banking industry two years ago. ASIC said in its statement that, between December 2014 and March 2018, CBA breached financial services laws 12,119 times.
Personal injury occurs when you get injured as a result of the neglect of another party. This means that the accident could have been avoided if the situation or circumstances were handled more carefully. You have every right to contact a personal injury lawyer when faced with such a situation.
Check out some instances or situations where it makes sense to contact a personal injury lawyer.
Your workspace should be a safe place for you to carry out your tasks and responsibilities. If you get injured while on the job, you can contact a personal injury lawyer to help protect your rights and interest. Workplace injury can include: injuries caused by faulty work equipment, dangerous working sites without markings and warnings, and getting injured by operating equipment when you didn’t receive any training.
If you experience any sort of workplace injury, you should observe the following procedures:
Keep in mind that different workspaces have various guidelines regarding injury procedures. Make sure to get acquainted with these procedures if you become injured. Once you get medical clearance, you should visit a personal injury lawyer who will take the case forward.
Your workspace should be a safe place for you to carry out your tasks and responsibilities.
When you’re a victim of negligent driving and suffer injuries as a result, you should contact a car accident lawyer. You may have been the other driver, or a pedestrian, or in a car with a person who was driving negligently. The fact that you were placed in a compromising position that jeopardised your health and safety means that you may receive compensation.
To increase your chances of getting compensated, you need to observe the following process right after you’re involved in an accident:
Once you have followed the recommended procedures, you must seek medical guidance. Your doctor should give you a report that you need to present to your lawyer as evidence of your injuries that have been attended to as a result of the accident. Once you’ve been medically cleared, you must head to your injury lawyer who’s trained to lead your case to a successful outcome.
If you’re in a grocery store for example, and you slip and fell on a wet floor and get injured, you can file for compensation. It needs to be proven that there wasn’t a caution sign or the area wasn’t marked off. This also applies in scenarios such as poorly maintained roads that caused the fall that led to your injury.
Suffering from a dog bite is very dangerous. This is why dog owners are supposed to have their dogs on a leash whenever they’re off their private property. If you’re walking down the street, or hanging out at a park, you’re supposed to be confident that all dogs you encounter are on leash. It’s the dog owner’s responsibility to prevent their dogs from harming other people. If you get bitten by a dog that wasn’t on a leash or wasn’t being restrained by the owner, you can contact a personal injury lawyer.
You can contact a personal injury lawyer if you believe that a loved one passed away as a result of wrongful death. This may have been as a result of a car accident, or workplace injury for example. Depending on the unique situation, a lawyer will advise you about the documentation required to file your claim.
[ymal]
Hiring a personal injury lawyer has many advantages compared to fighting a legal battle on your own.
Below are some of the reasons why you should hire a personal injury lawyer:
There are different situations that you can file for a personal injury lawsuit. These include a car accident, workplace injury, slip and fall, as well as a wrongful death. A lawyer has the expertise required to see your case through. Hiring a lawyer increases your chances of getting compensated for your injuries.
If you are arrested and an officer of the law is trying to charge you with a drug-related offence, it is vital to exercise the right to remain silent. The police are probably going to ask questions or ask you to provide your statement to help them with the investigation. Since any statement or information that you provide could later be used as evidence against you, you must remain silent and contact your lawyer immediately to explain your obligations and rights in this situation.
A defence lawyer will give you advice on the best way to proceed.If you’re interested in finding a good firm, then you can learn more. Make notes about everything you remember surrounding how and when you got arrested. A strong defence relating to drug charges is when police obtain evidence of a crime when they commit an unlawful search. If possible, write a detailed report on when and how a police officer searched you. A defence lawyer might be able to use this information to your advantage when it comes to building your defence.
Make sure you attend your fingerprinting and show up in court as requested. If you were arrested and later released for an offence that is drug-related, you will be given documentation that will demand that you go to the closest police station for your fingerprinting as well as indicate a date, place, and time that you are required to make an appearance in court.
You need to ensure that you obey all the orders in this document. If you fail to comply with the orders it can lead to a warrant being issued to arrest you, along with other criminal charges for breaching conditions associated with your release, or when you fail to appear in court.
[ymal]
Contact a law firm immediately to be put in touch with a defence lawyer. Do not waste time when it comes to choosing a reputable criminal defence lawyer. If you wait too long, it can negatively impact your case and take even longer to resolve or address the criminal charges you are now faced with.
It is also advisable to enrol in an addiction counseling programme or consider looking for a volunteering opportunity in your community. If you can prove that you are taking proactive steps to deal with the problem that resulted in your charges (substance abuse, for example, or selling narcotics), and you are working on righting your wrongs, this can help your criminal defence attorney to secure a resolution with the courts that is more favourable for you.
The Pennsylvania Supreme Court on Saturday dismissed a bid from Representative Mike Kelly and other Republicans to halt the certification of the 2020 presidential election results in the state.
Kelly’s case argued that a 2019 law mandating mail-in voting in Pennsylvania was unconstitutional, proposing two solutions: the invalidation of all mail-in ballots cast during the election or allowing the Republican-controlled Pennsylvania general assembly to appoint presidential electors, rather than allocating them according to the popular vote.
The seven-member court agreed unanimously that the suit came too late, having been filed more than a year after the mail-in voting law was enacted. The court also overturned a lower court injunction blocking Pennsylvania from moving ahead with the certification process.
The case’s dismissal marks the latest in a string of legal defeats for Republicans and affiliates of President Donald Trump’s campaign in an ongoing attempt to dispute the legitimacy of the 2020 election results.
In Pennsylvania last week, two Republican suits aimed at halting the certifications of the state’s election results. Stephanos Bibas, a Trump-nominated judge on the Third Circuit Court of Appeals, wrote in a 21-page unanimous decision on Friday that the president’s lawsuit challenging the results had “no merit.”
[ymal]
“Free, fair elections are the lifeblood of our democracy,” Bibas wrote. “Charges of unfairness are serious. But calling an election unfair does not make it so. Charges require specific allegations and then proof. We have neither here.”
Taylor Wessing has become the latest international law firm to revise its remote working policy, as it recognises that lawyers show “clear preference” to divide their hours between the office and home.
The firm’s new “hybrid” model of working will allow staff, including trainees, to conduct between 20% and 50% of their work outside of the office – allowing for anywhere between one day per week to a maximum of five days across two weeks to be spent working from home.
The new policy will come into effect once the government encourages a return to office-based working, which is likely to occur in 2021.
“We were already on a journey towards more flexible working before the pandemic as part of our strategic commitment to inclusivity,” said Shane Gleghorn, managing partner at Taylor Wessing. “Our experience this year has shown that we can continue to exceed our clients’ expectations regardless of where we work. We are confident that a hybrid model, underpinned by a spirit of teamwork and collaboration, will deliver benefits for our people, our business and our clients.”
Taylor Wessing is not the only firm to institute a shift away from the office. Dentons closed several of its UK offices during the summer as part of a broader move towards remote working, and Slater and Gordon also announced office closures to allow for easier remote operations. Both firms, and many others, have discussed implementing a framework for remote working even after the COVID-19 pandemic has abated.
[ymal]
Squire Patton Boggs and Linklaters have instituted policies most similar to Taylor Wessing’s, allowing lawyers and staff to work remotely for 20-50% of their usual hours in the office.
Palo Alto Research Center Inc (PARC), a subsidiary of Xerox Corp, has accused Facebook and Twitter of infringing several of its patents, including some tools that the company has used to stop the spreading of fake news and misinformation.
In three suits filed in the US District Court for the Central District of California, PARC accused Facebook of infringing seven of its patents, Twitter of infringing six and Snapchat of infringing three, with eight patents at issue overall. PARC claimed that its patented technologies were used to support numerous key functionalities of the social media companies.
All three platforms were alleged to have infringed on PARC’s patents covering methods for collecting contextual information and for using that information to create and present informative content, which PARC says the social media companies used to solve problems related to determining relevant audiences and targeting them with tailored advertising.
"Because PARC was at the nucleus of the idea that later birthed the Internet, it anticipated many of these issues before they ever became a problem for Facebook," the company said in its filings, adding that its technology “forms the backbone” of solutions now used by Facebook and other platforms.
PARC also claimed that Facebook and Twitter infringed US Patent No. 7,167,871, which it describes as a method for “determining the reliability of a document based on its textual contents,” and which it claims is being used by the social media platforms to identify and flag misinformation.
[ymal]
The company claimed that Facebook made extensive use of this technology in combating misinformation about the COVID-19 pandemic. "In April 2020, Facebook weeded out and flagged 50 million false posts and 2.5 million exploitative ads for COVID-19 related products such as PPE and testing kits,” PARC said in its suit.
The US government on Wednesday granted Chinese tech company ByteDance a seven-day extension of an order to sell US operations of its flagship video-sharing platform, according to a court filing.
The Trump administration has been attempting to ban TikTok for some months now, citing security concerns over the potential for ByteDance to pass user information to the Chinese government.
An initial executive order directing ByteDance to divest the app within 90 days was issued on 14 August. ByteDance was also recently issued a 15-day extension that was set to expire on 27 November. The newest extension will expire on 4 December.
In September, it appeared that ByteDance was set to sell TikTok to US-based Oracle Corp and Walmart Inc, though the companies seemed to offer different explanations of the deal. The Committee on Foreign Investment, a panel led by the Treasury Department, did not ultimately sign off on the sale.
A US Treasury spokesperson said that the extension was granted to allow time for a “revised submission” to be reviewed by the Committee.
TikTok remains one of the fastest-growing social media platforms in the world. To date, it has been downloaded more than 100 million times in the US.
[ymal]
ByteDance has filed a number of legal challenges against the ban, with deadlines in certain proceedings set to arrive after January. Several judges have blocked the ban from taking effect, and it is not yet clear what penalty will be issued to ByteDance should it fail to comply with the order.
In the aftermath of the US presidential election, the executive order banning TikTok may lapse once President-elect Joe Biden takes office in January, unless he chooses to enforce the previous administration’s order in court.
During the UK government’s 2020 spending review, chancellor Rishi Sunak pledged to invest £275 million in the criminal justice system in 2021/22 in a bid to address the growing backlog in courts and tribunals.
Sunak announced that the Treasury’s settlement with the Ministry of Justice would deliver a 3.3% increase in annual real terms. Core resource funding will also be increased by £145 million, and the department’s capital budget will be increased by £237 million in 2021.
£337 million pounds in extra funding was pledged towards the criminal justice system to ensure “swift and effective justice” to convicted offenders and to support victims. This pledge includes £275 million to manage the “downstream demand impact of 20,000 additional police officers and reduce backlogs in the Crown court caused by COVID-19”.
Sunak pledged £315 million to improve the state of prisons in the UK, £105 million for courthouse renovations, and £40 million to support victims of crime. There were, however, no pledges to increase legal aid spending.
Overall, the Ministry’s budget will be £10.1 billion in 2021/22, up from £8.1 billion in 2019/20.
Chair of the Bar Council, Amanda Pinto QC, welcomed the pledged funding. “The announcement of extra funding for the justice system in today’s Spending Review is a ray of hope in terms of fixing the many problems our justice system faces,” she said. “It is a sign that this government understands the importance of investing in the entire justice system from start to finish.”
“But it must not be a flash in the pan,” she added. “To tackle the significant challenges in the courts and wider justice system, including the backlogs in the criminal courts, which are the inevitable consequence of decades of under-investment, the government must now ensure the system is sustainable in the long-term to ensure access to justice for everyone.”
[ymal]
David Greene, president of the Law Society of England, also hailed the news. “Justice in this country was in a dire situation already before the pandemic, and is under pressure now like never before, so the £275 million pledged to reduce persistent Crown court backlogs has come not a moment too soon,” he said.
Also announced in the spending review was an increased minimum wage and a freeze on public sector pay, excluding NHS and the current lowest-paid positions.
Alana Penkethman, chartered legal executive and Molly Dilling, trainee solicitor at Parker Bullen Solicitors, offer law firms their firsthand advice on increasing employee productivity through agile working.
Albeit brief, the general view of the adoption of home working is that it will be a force for good for many businesses. As a result, home working has also led many businesses to question whether other working practices and employment structures, many of which haven’t changed for over a century, can better support their employees and customers going forward.
Flexible and agile working are different concepts; flexible working is a variation to an employee’s contract which normally involves an atypical working structure agreed through formal procedure.
Agile working, on the other hand, focuses on the concept that work is an activity, not a place. It allows employees to work where they want and when they want with the premise that giving employees maximum flexibility with minimum constraints actually maximises their performance and produces better overall output for the business and its clients.
When discussing clients, we are talking about both businesses in other sectors that need advice from employment specialists and also clients of the firm as a whole. The key is looking at all the issues holistically.
Having adopted agile working as a firm we have first-hand experience of the challenges and benefits. The good news is that it has been a success with all members of staff, from trainees to partners supporting the move. But it does take time to adjust and it will inevitably evolve.
Albeit brief, the general view of the adoption of home working is that it will be a force for good for many businesses.
If you are advising clients considering a similar move then the following should be considered.
Agile working appears to be very employee-focused and employers may be concerned that placing such a significant amount of trust in their employees could compromise their quality of work. Some of us are early birds, some of us are night owls and a standard 9-5 day only accommodates a proportion of employees. Our experience shows that you can actually increase productivity if you trust your employees to work when they are most productive.
Of course, employees should still fulfil their contractual hours. Agile working is not a contractual variation and employers can rescind an employee’s right to use agile working if they feel like their performance is being compromised.
Our experience shows that agile working encourages transparency, responsibility and honesty by employees. It also empowers them to take charge of their own work, admit when they are struggling (either with work or with their mental health) and deal with it. The trust placed in them by their employer can make them feel more valued, which is a key indicator of employee engagement and will ultimately lead to higher staff retention rates, better performance and overall job satisfaction.
Ultimately, if your staff are happy and motivated, this is going to have a direct impact on the level of work delivered to your clients. Introducing an agile working policy should see a decrease in unplanned staff absences, increased staff wellbeing and an increase in fees received. From a financial perspective, a firm could make cost savings because it has fewer staff in the office.
All this is good news for clients, but many will be concerned that it could just mean it is harder to get hold of their lawyer. In our experience the opposite is true.
Ultimately, if your staff are happy and motivated, this is going to have a direct impact on the level of work delivered to your clients.
Research from Legal Marketing experts Find Get Grow showed that clients under the age of 44 wanted more ‘out of hours’ access to lawyers, in the evenings and at weekends, and those over the age of 60 were more interested in meeting at a place of their choice. Agile working helps address these issues much more than standard 9-5 working hours. A client’s team could, for example, be available from 7am to 10pm – an extra 7 hours of availability for clients.
If you are going to introduce an agile working policy, you should ensure that your expectations are communicated to your employees from the outset. A sensible initiative is to hold workshops which explain the background to the policy, how it would work, and the expectations any law firm partners have in relation to it.
It should be understood by all employees that there will be regular reviews for both the policy and for the employees who choose to adopt it. A further recommendation would be for employers to implement effective performance management and time recording systems; for law firms, performance may be judged by amount of time recorded, fees received and client feedback.
Plainly, employers should be aware that presence does not equal performance. Just because an employee may be logged for 12 hours a day, this doesn’t mean their performance is good.
In our experience agile working has allowed us to broaden our catchment as more flexible hours have enabled us to attract clients who previously considered 9-5 opening a restriction.
Another very important benefit is the fact that firms introducing the agile working policy can benefit from recruiting from a wider geographical talent pool. We, for example, have traditionally attracted staff within a half to an hour’s drive away, but this has recently expanded to new recruits joining from across the South and South West.
[ymal]
The key point about this style of working is that there is no permanency to it. Because there is no contractual variation, the employer has the authority to rescind it at any point.
There is every reason to trial it for a period of six months, to see how it works. At this point, you will need to get employee and client feedback to monitor progress.
Our view from our senior partner is clear: “Agile working gives your workforce significant autonomy which also recognises that employers trust and value what they do. So long as the clients are well served, where and when your staff carry out that work should be far less important. Your colleagues should be respected as being client helpers, and not clock watchers.”
