Case Summaries

[03/15] Service Employees Int'l Union v. Nat'l Union of Healthcare Workers
In an action by a parent and local affiliate union seeking injunctive relief to obtain restoration of properties it alleged were illegally taken by the former officers and leaders of the local union, who formed a rival union, the district court's grant of a temporary restraining order (TRO) is affirmed where: 1) the TRO was an appealable order and thus the court of appeals had jurisdiction to review it; 2) in its subsequent preliminary injunction, the district court explicitly preserved a portion of the TRO as still effective after issuance of the injunction, so the appeal was not moot; and 3) the district court's jurisdiction was proper under 29 U.S.C. section 185(a) because providing a federal forum for injunctive relief against the former officers and leaders of the union promoted the stability of the parent-local relationship and the representation of rank-and-file members.

[03/15] Grothenhuis v. County of Santa Barbara
Following a county's denial of trustee-plaintiff's appeal for an assessment reduction and tax refund, the trial court's tax refund judgment in favor of the trustee is reversed as the corporate alter ego theory, which is generally used to prevent a fraud and impute liability, like "only in narrowly defined circumstances and only when the ends of justice so require," and here, plaintiff cites no authority that the corporate alter ego theory may be invoked to gain a tax advantage in violation of section 69.5.

[03/10] Sec. & Exch. Comm'n v. Tambone
In SEC's action against executives of a registered broker-dealer for allegedly allowing certain preferred customers to engage in market timing, district court's dismissal of the SEC's Rule 10b-5(b) claim is affirmed as the SEC's expansive interpretation of "make" as used in Rule 10b-5(b) is inconsistent with the text of the rule and with the ordinary meanings of the phrase "to make a statement," inconsistent with the structure of the rule and relevant statutes, and in considerable tension with Supreme Court precedent. (En Banc opinion)

[03/10] Citigroup Global Markets, Inc. v. VCG Special Opportunities Master Fund Ltd.
In an appeal from a district court's order granting plaintiff's motion for a preliminary injunction and enjoining defendant from proceeding with an arbitration initiated against plaintiff before the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority, the order is affirmed where the "serious questions" standard for assessing a movant's likelihood of success on the merits remains valid in the wake of recent Supreme Court cases, and neither the district court's assessment of the facts nor its application of the law supported a finding of abuse of discretion.

[03/09] In re: Omnicom Group, Inc. Secs. Litig.
In a securities class action alleging that defendants fraudulently accounted for a transaction, summary judgment for defendants is affirmed where: 1) plaintiffs failed to prove loss causation because their expert's testimony did not suffice to draw the requisite causal connection between the information in the article at issue and the fraud alleged in the complaint; and 2) the generalized investor reaction of concern causing a temporary share price decline was far too tenuously connected -- indeed, by a metaphoric thread -- to the transaction to support liability.

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