This week’s New York Business Divorce examines a noteworthy decision by Justice Richard Platkin involving the break-up of a law firm organized as a professional services limited liability company, in which the court addressed the potential liability of two members to buy out a third member’s interest after they withdrew from the firm.
Continue Reading Forced to Buy Out Law Partner’s Interest In Defunct Firm, Years After Withdrawing? It Can Happen

The Appellate Division, Second Department last week decided a trio of appeals in related cases concerning the consequences of an LLC member’s withdrawal, holding that the member was not entitled to a fair-value buyout and that upon withdrawal he lost standing to maintain derivative claims. Read all about it in this week’s New York Business Divorce.
Continue Reading Operating Agreement Defeats Statutory Buyout Rights Upon LLC Member’s Withdrawal

This week’s New York Business Divorce examines the “diversity trap” in business divorce cases involving LLCs brought in federal court, highlighting a recent decision by SDNY District Judge Edgardo Ramos dismissing for lack of jurisdiction a suit between former law firm partners.
Continue Reading Beware Diversity Trap in Federal Court Business Divorce Cases Involving LLCs

This week’s New York Business Divorce highlights a trio of recent decisions involving LLC disputes concerning the membership rights of the estate of a deceased member, the intended purpose of the LLC as the basis for a dissolution claim, and the power to expel a member.
Continue Reading LLC Case Notes: Member Expulsion, Withdrawal, and LLC Purpose

The LLC majority members in Bonanni v. Horizons Investors Corp., were ordered to pay the piper in a post-trial decision earlier this month by Justice Elizabeth Emerson in a 10-year old case, finding that they had converted the plaintiff’s minority membership interest. It’s in this week’s New York Business Divorce.
Continue Reading A Decade Later, LLC’s Majority Members Pay The Price For Converting Minority Member’s Interest

A case decided last month by Justice Timothy Driscoll in Gilbert v Weintraub raises but doesn’t answer the tantalizing question whether a member of a multi-member, member-managed LLC with no operating agreement can shed fiduciary obligations and freely start a competing business by disavowing any management role in the prior business. This week’s New York Business Divorce has the story.
Continue Reading Can LLC Members Walk Away From Fiduciary Duties?