Looking ahead, there are a number of Business Court cases in which summary judgment motions have been fully briefed and in which rulings should be issued over the next few months. In alphabetical order, with links to the Business Court electronic file, they are:
Edgewater Services, Inc. v. Epic Logistics, Inc.: dispute between competing third party logistics companies in the transportation industry including claims involving trade secrets, joint venture, tortious interference with contract by hiring employee subject to non-compete, tortious interference with prospective economic advantage, and unfair and deceptive trade practices.
Griffin Management Corp. v. Carolina Power and Light Co.: plaintiff, a supplier of personnel to Progress Energy and Duke Energy, alleges a destruction of its business through actions by those companies and plaintiff’s competitor. It’s hard to tell what issues are before the court, because 21 of the last 22 filings were made under seal. Only those with appropriate security clearance (or at least a secret decoder ring) will be able to read the opinion.
JDH Capital, LLC v. Flowers: the issues include the binding effect of a letter of intent, whether a joint venture existed, and the legal effect of oral statement “we have a deal.”
Land v. Land: shareholder dispute involving claims for breach of fiduciary duty, and issues of statute of limitations and laches.
Leiber v. Arboretum Joint Venture, LLC: commercial paper issues inolving actual and apparent authority, conversion of checks by an allegedy unauthorized agent, and liability of drawee and drawer banks for payment over claimed unauthorized endorsements of checks. In addition to the Motion on the principal claims, Bank of America and Wachovia are slugging it out here on who should end up holding the bag in the event of an adverse ruling on the agency question.
Marotta v. Datacraft Solutions, Inc.: issues include shareholder’s right to vote for election of directors and whether an amendment to the corporation’s Articles of Incorporation created dissenters’ rights.
Miller & Long Co., Inc. v. Intracoastal Living, LLC: construction law case involving issues of collection on payment bond and enforcement of claim of lien.
Mitchell, Brewer, et al v. Brewer: issues regarding beakup of law firm that was a limited liability company.
Novo Nordisk Pharmaceutical Industries, Inc. v. Carolina Power & Light Company: issue of enforceability of provision limiting or excluding liability in a tariff approved by the North Carolina Utility Commision.
This summary is not meant to be anything near a complete description of the issues pending in these cases.
There are furthermore eight cases in which Motions to Dismiss are awaiting ruling. I might write about those cases another time if I decide that a forward looking post like this is worthwhile. You are welcome to give me input on that if you want, either directly (msperling@brookspierce.com) or by commenting below.