Photo of Peter A. Mahler

Peter A. Mahler is a litigator focusing on business divorce cases involving dissolution and other disputes among co-­owners of closely held business entities, such as limited liability companies, corporations, and partnerships. Peter represents both control and non-control owners, often involving family-owned businesses. Frequently counseling business owners prior to litigation, he advises them of their rights and also assists in designing and negotiating an amicable separation between parties. Peter’s counsel helps avoid litigation by means of a buy-out, sale, or division of business assets.

 

 

There are many hurdles to bringing a business divorce case in federal court based on diversity of citizenship. This week’s New York Business Divorce examines one case in which the would-be federal litigant almost – but not quite – made it through the door of a federal courthouse.
Continue Reading For Want of a Penny: Business Divorce Case Almost Makes it Into Federal Court

The hard-fought business divorce between brothers Nissim and Avraham Kassab makes its fifth appearance in five years with this week’s post highlighting a recent decision by Justice Timothy Dufficy dismissing for the third time Nissim’s effort to dissolve an LLC that owns vacant realty in downtown Jamaica, Queens.
Continue Reading Third Time’s Not a Charm in LLC Dissolution Case

This week’s New York Business Divorce features an interesting decision by Commercial Division Justice Lawrence Knipel addressing the standing of the individual members of a dissolved LLC to petition for the winding up of a limited partnership in which the LLC is a majority limited partner.
Continue Reading No Mulligan But No Matter for LLC’s Majority Members After Voluntary Dissolution

Are stock appraisals done for estate tax purposes discoverable in stock valuation proceedings or other types of shareholder disputes involving the shares of a deceased stockholder or of someone who inherits shares from the estate? A recent appellate decision on the topic is the springboard for this week’s post.
Continue Reading Disclosure of Estate Tax Stock Appraisals in Shareholder Disputes

This week’s New York Business Divorce offers its annual Winter Case Notes with synopses of half a dozen recent decisions in business divorce cases involving minority shareholder oppression, books and records proceedings, and more.
Continue Reading Winter Case Notes: Oppression of the “Gifted” Minority Shareholder and Other Recent Decisions of Interest

This week’s New York Business Divorce highlights an important decision denying a dissolution petition brought by the 50% member of a realty-holding LLC on the ground that his own deliberate conduct in breach of the operating agreement created the conditions alleged as a basis for dissolution.
Continue Reading The Bad-Faith Petitioner Defense Makes Successful Debut in LLC Dissolution Case

You won’t want to miss this week’s New York Business Divorce featuring a recent decision in which the court found minority shareholder oppression based on “disrespectful and unfairly disproportionate treatment of a female shareholder by the male majority in a closely held corporation.”
Continue Reading Minority Shareholder Oppression in the #MeToo Era