The lawyers behind two class actions against clothing retailer Surfstitch breached their duties to act in the best interests of shareholders, and their conduct should bar them from pocketing more than $6 million claimed in costs and commission in the protracted litigation, a court has heard.
A judge’s decision to throw out a shareholder class action against engineering company Worley is a loss for plaintiffs lawyers and could result in fewer listed companies willing to settle cases alleging they breached their disclosure obligations, but the ruling is not likely to have a significant chilling effect on securities litigation.
Medical device maker Covidien has lost a bid to have the applicant in a product liability class action over allegedly defective pelvic mesh front $300,000 as security for its legal costs in the event it wins the case.
A sense of frustration with current uncertainty in the caselaw and inconsistency in the approaches of judges was a prominent theme that emerged from personal interviews with 30 experienced class action practitioners conducted over two months by Dr Peter Cashman and Amelia Simpson of the University of New South Wales.
A Victoria Supreme Court class action will soon be filed against fertility clinic Monash IVF seeking compensation for women who allegedly had viable embryos discarded thanks to inaccurate genetic testing.
Construction firm Icon Co has won a coverage dispute with its insurers over $31 million in losses stemming from Sydney’s ill-fated Opal Tower, whose residents were evacuated after cracks appeared in the tower’s walls on Christmas Eve in 2018.
A contradictor appointed in two class actions against 7-Eleven will argue before the Full Federal Court that the court has power both in equity and under the Federal Court of Australia Act to make common fund orders in class actions on settlement or judgment.
A Sydney lawyer has lost her bid to vacate an upcoming hearing in her appeal of a judge’s finding that investors who sank $12.3 million into a fraudulent sports betting scheme run by convicted conman Peter Foster lost money because of her failure to come forward with the truth.
A judge has sided in part with QBE Insurance and pared back a class action over allegedly worthless add-on insurance sold by ANZ to credit card and personal loan customers.
A judge has dismissed a lawsuit brought by Arnold Bloch Leibler seeking to use information from its legal work on Slater & Gordon’s $1.2 billion acquisition of UK firm Quindell to defend itself in a class action brought by the plaintiffs firm’s shareholders.