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Early Sullivan Wright Gizer & McRae LLP Named “Business Litigation Law Firm of the Year – California” by Corporate LiveWire
Category: Awards, Press, Publications | Wednesday, May 27th, 2015 | Comments Off on Early Sullivan Wright Gizer & McRae LLP Named “Business Litigation Law Firm of the Year – California” by Corporate LiveWire
Early Sullivan Wright Gizer & McRae LLP (“Early Sullivan”) is proud to announce that it has been named “Business Litigation Law Firm of the Year – California” by Corporate LiveWire, which honors law firms demonstrating excellence in the corporate finance world and those that have consistently shown best practices and innovation in their work. Nominated by the world’s leading business professionals and corporate finance experts, the Corporate LiveWire awards evaluate a law firm’s performance when deciding the winners of its “Best Law Firm” awards. Candidates are selected by Corporate LiveWire by taking several factors into consideration, including recent significant deals and cases along with firm-produced content demonstrating thought leadership in a particular area of the law.
The Corporate LiveWire Awards represent the pinnacle of business achievement, championing the best in their respective fields. The awards cover the most important sectors of business, from finance to funding to law. The culmination of the awards is the Global Award guide, covering businesses of every type that have proven their excellence throughout the year and years past. The resource offers regular, up-to-date content on various subject areas including business litigation, legislative changes, corporate transactions, international markets and business trends. Early Sullivan’s honor can be seen in the Global Award guide here.
Early Sullivan is a premiere boutique law firm based in Los Angeles, California which handles high stakes business litigation and trials throughout the United States.
Nonaccredited Investments in Crowdfunding Startups – Los Angeles Business Journal
Category: Press | Wednesday, April 22nd, 2015 | Comments Off on Nonaccredited Investments in Crowdfunding Startups – Los Angeles Business Journal
Bryan Sullivan was quoted in the Los Angeles Business Journal regarding “Nonaccredited Investments in Crowdfunding Startups.” Here is Bryan’s quote, which can also be found by clicking on “Download PDF.”
“It is very dangerous to allow non accredited investors to invest in companies via crowdfunding. The principal purpose of the accredited investor concept is to ensure that the only people investing in such companies are people who have demonstrated sufficient financial sophistication to understand the risks associated with the investment and who can bear the economic risk of investing in these types of high-risk investments.”
Bryan Sullivan Named “Top 20 Under 40” by Los Angeles Daily Journal
Category: Awards, News, Press | Tuesday, February 3rd, 2015 | Comments Off on Bryan Sullivan Named “Top 20 Under 40” by Los Angeles Daily Journal
Early Sullivan Partner Bryan Sullivan was named to the Los Angeles Daily Journal’s “Top 20 Under 40” list. Bryan’s profile can be found below:
Bryan M. Sullivan
Practice type: litigation, corporate
Specialties: entertainment, real estate
Trying to fit the work Sullivan does into a tidy box is nearly impossible.
On one end of the spectrum he represents Hollywood luminaries like Miley Cyrus, Kathy Griffin and Whoopi Goldberg in a variety of legal scenarios. On the other, he’s a board member of the tenants’ rights organization Basta and sits on Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti’s affordable housing committee.
Sullivan said that while he is constantly stimulated by all the legal work he does it’s the latter that really appeals to him.
“Basta is probably what I am most passionate about because this is what most people claim to have gone to law school to do – help those less fortunate,” he said, noting his work on the mayor’s commission. “My personal goal is to find ways to protect the existing stock of affordable housing in L.A., which involves strengthening certain provisions of the Rent Stabilization Ordinance.”
Sullivan is passionate about pro bono but he’s also a fierce advocate and valued advisor for his stable of paying clients. Not content to do reactive legal work, Sullivan characterizes himself as a “legal advisor” someone more likely to figure out a way to avoid prolonged litigation than to blindly throw himself into the fray.
That comprehensive legal guidance is what he does for a lot of clients he has in the start-up space. He represents the founder and majority stakeholder of a digital advertising start-up Streamroll, Kenneth Brook, who is attempting to wind down the company to focus on a new venture. There’s a litany of issues involved, from dealing with minority shareholders to making sure fiduciary duties are met, and Sullivan has his hands in everything.
“In these types of situations, I am dealing with brilliant individuals with extraordinarily creative minds but who have no understanding of the legal issues in forming a company, protecting intellectual property and trade secrets, or fiduciary duties,” he said. “I try to help them with that so they can focus on developing and growing their business.”
There are more traditional successes, such as his win at the Court of Appeal in a case involving a dispute between a contractor and construction lender that set new precedent about how subordination agreements are enforceable as a matter of law. Sullivan said the case, Moorefield Construction, Inc. v. Intervest Mortgage Investment Co., et al, D065464 (Cal. 4th App. Dist., filed Sept. 12, 2014), was a huge win, not only for his client but for construction in California generally.
– Henry Meier
Sony Hack: How the Studio Will (Likely) Handle All Those Lawsuits – The Hollywood Reporter
Category: Press | Sunday, January 25th, 2015 | Comments Off on Sony Hack: How the Studio Will (Likely) Handle All Those Lawsuits – The Hollywood Reporter
Bryan Sullivan was quoted in Austin Siegemund-Broka’s article “Sony Hack: How the Studio Will (Likely) Handle All Those Lawsuits,” which appeared in the January 23, 2015 print edition of The Hollywood Reporter, and can also be found here. The article discusses Sony’s legal strategies in the wake of its massive security breach.
Civil suit against private defense firm could gain class cert – Los Angeles Daily Journal
Category: News, Press | Wednesday, January 21st, 2015 | Comments Off on Civil suit against private defense firm could gain class cert – Los Angeles Daily Journal
Civil suit against private defense firm could gain class cert
By Henry Meier
War zone government contracts are some of the most competitive – and lucrative – opportunities for companies in the private security and defense contractor sector. But a pending federal class action shines a harsh light on the working conditions for the mostly ex- military personnel who signed on by the tens of thousands to join defense contractors engaged in counterterrorism operations overseas.
Plaintiff Karl Risinger and others say their former employer, Nevada-based private security firm SOC LLC – which operates mostly in Iraq – told recruits that for $65,000 a year they would work six 12-hour days a week while on duty in Iraq between 2006 and 2012. That turned out to be a gross underestimate as security team members routinely working grueling hours with no time off for months at a time, according to Risinger’s complaint. Risinger v. SOC LLC et al., CV12-63 (Nev. Dist. Ct., filed Jan. 13, 2012).
“Defendants had deliberately understaffed and underbid the job to such a degree that a readily ascertainable class of thousands of armed guards were forced to work months at a time without a day off, for in excess of 14 hours per day, and in extremely hazardous conditions, without any additional pay (indeed, not even the pay promised),” the plaintiffs’ motion for class certification reads. “And this reality was not revealed to the potential class members until after they had agreed to overseas employment and until after they had been physically transported to the war zone in Iraq.”
Few employment suits like these have been brought successfully, but Risinger’s lawyers at Early Sullivan Wright Gizer & McRae LLP say they are optimistic that the class could be certified, and trigger a Domino effect for the industry.
“If we prevail on our motion to certify a class and get farther along in these case, I wouldn’t be surprised if there were more suits,” said Scott E. Gizer, a partner at Early Sullivan.
SOC’s attorneys at Littler Mendelson PC did not immediately respond to request for comment.
With hundreds of billions of dollars doled out to defense contractor firms since the start of military action in Afghanistan and Iraq, federal prosecutors have aggressively policed malfeasance, landing large settlements for the U.S. government. But the prosecutors have primarily focused on fraud perpetrated against the government, rather than labor violations.
Often, bad conduct is tackled in qui tam or whistleblower lawsuits that seek to enjoin an action to the hammer of criminal charges by giving the government the opportunity to insert themselves into a case, according to white collar practitioners who do military contractor defense work. Just in the last month, the Department of Justice announced two significant settlements with defense contractors. Just last week, federal prosecutors from the Southern District said they’d reached an agreement with Glenn Defense Marine Asia, a contractor providing services to the U.S. Navy, that has the company forfeiting some $35 million dollars plus restitution to be determined at the sentencing of its CEO Leonard Glenn Francis, who pleaded guilty to conspiracy, briery and fraud charges.
These cases have cumulatively netted hundreds of millions – likely billions – of dollars in recouped money for the federal government that was gained through allegedly fraudulent means.
“It’s not a fact that there’s an uptick in defense contractor prosecutions, but there’s certainly aggressive investigations into the behavior of government contractors,” said Seth A. Rosenthal, a Venable LLP partner in Washington D.C. “The contracting community is definitely on notice about it.”
But while government prosecution of contractor wrongdoing has a strong track record of success, private, civil suits against these companies are less tested. Only last year a labor case involving Raytheon Co. was thrown out of court by a federal judge who said the plaintiffs did not have grounds to bring the suit.
That case, Robinson v. Raytheon Technical Services Co. LLC et al., CV13-12705 (Mass. Dist. Ct., filed Oct. 24, 2013), in the U.S. District Court for the District of Massachusetts is different than the SOC case, however, because it dealt strictly with overtime claims. The suit against SOC also includes multiple allegations of breach of contract, which is what has the case on the verge of class certification.
Gizer said the evidence his firm has seen in discovery shows SOC could not have been unaware of the environment and work schedule they were putting plaintiffs in because it was essentially contained in their bid proposal to the government.
“These guys represented to our clients that their position would be six days a week and 12 hours a day and from what we’ve seen SOC knew that not to be the case,” Gizer said. “The bid contracts they submitted show they could not have believed that.”
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.”
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