A judge has ordered that the ACCC’s case alleging Retail Food Group misled franchisees be run on a sample basis, saying the regulator’s opposition to the idea “smacks of a lack of confidence in its own case.”
The directors of mortgage aggregator Connective Services have been hit with indemnity costs for their “outrageous conduct” in pursuing litigation against a company shareholder, including giving false statements and destroying evidence.
Mercedes-Benz will defend ACCC proceedings alleging it exposed consumers to serious injury or death by failing to comply with obligations under a compulsory recall of potentially deadly Takata airbags by arguing the recall was invalid.
Two directors of mortgage aggregator Connective engaged in oppressive conduct towards a minority shareholder and Macquarie Bank was a “knowing participant” when it acquired $5 million worth of shares in the company, the NSW Supreme Court has found.
It has been described as the darkest chapter in Victoria’s legal history, an exemplar of all that is terrible with class actions in Australia. A case of greedy lawyers who found their golden egg in a group of retirees who had lost their life savings, never thinking the chickens might come home to roost. Until now.
Allowing former senior barrister Norman O’Bryan to reopen his defence in the Banksia class action while “avoiding the witness box” was clearly prejudicial, and futile to boot, a judge has said in his reasons for refusing the silk’s last-minute application.
Once high-flying barrister Norman O’Bryan might seek to challenge a refusal by the judge overseeing the Banksia class action to revisit his abandoned defence and accept into evidence a document he claims proved he did not secretly hold shares in the funder behind the case.
The litigation funding company controlled by the late solicitor Mark Elliott has told a court of its “remorse and regret” for its misconduct in the Banksia Securities class action, a case that has been described as the “darkest chapter in Victoria’s legal history”.
The son of Banksia class action funder Mark Elliott was no Michael Corleone of the Godfather, and was not knowingly complicit in an alleged scheme masterminded by his father to defraud group members and destroy evidence, his lawyer has told a court.
Barrister Norman O’Bryan SC has failed in his last-ditch bid to reopen his defence in the Banksia class action to submit evidence he says shows he did not retain an interest in the litigation funder behind the case.