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.

 

 

Few recent cases in the business divorce field are as important as last week’s appellate affirmance in the Shapiro case, allowing majority LLC members to adopt an operating agreement that binds non-signatory minority members. Get the story in this week’s New York Business Divorce.
Continue Reading Thinking About Becoming a Minority Member of a New York LLC Without an Operating Agreement? Think Again

New York’s highest court last week agreed to hear an appeal in a case that raises important issues concerning wrongful dissolution, damages, and valuation discounts under New York’s partnership law. Learn more in this week’s New York Business Divorce.
Continue Reading Court of Appeals to Decide Controversial Partnership Dissolution Case

This week’s New York Business Divorce previews and links to the latest podcast episode of the Business Divorce Roundtable featuring an interview with business appraiser Greg Barber following publication of his intriguing article in the NY State Bar Association Journal on the hot topic of marketability discounts in statutory fair-value proceedings.
Continue Reading Marketability Discount Revisited: Interview With Greg Barber

Brooklyn’s newest Commercial Division Justice, Sylvia G. Ash, last month handed down an interesting decision denying a petition for judicial dissolution of an LLC brought by a 25% member alleging freeze-out. Catch up with the latest developments in this week’s New York Business Divorce.
Continue Reading Another Frozen-Out Minority LLC Member’s Petition for Dissolution Bites the . . . Sushi?

A recent decision by Justice Martin Ritholtz addresses a novel claim by one of two 50% LLC members for breach of fiduciary duty by a non-member designated by the operating agreement as tie-breaker to resolve member deadlock. It’s in this week’s New York Business Divorce.
Continue Reading She’s a Tie-Breaker, She’s a Risk Taker

The LLC freeze-out merger has been referred to by one scholar as “hidden statutory expulsion.” In a decision last month featured in this week’s New York Business Divorce, Manhattan Commercial Division Justice Charles Ramos refused to enjoin a freeze-out merger challenged by minority members of an LLC who claimed that it violated the LLC’s operating agreement.
Continue Reading Court Finds No Breach of Operating Agreement, No Basis to Enjoin LLC Freeze-Out Merger