The Federal Arbitration Act provides for motions to confirm (9 U.S.C. § 9) or to vacate or modify (9 U.S.C. §§ 10, 11) an arbitration award, but the motions are not all subject to the same deadline. A motion to confirm may be filed within a year after the award is made, whereas the window…
Year: 2021
A Debtor by Any Other Name? Court Certifies Question to Florida Supreme Court
Florida law provides that a UCC-1 financing statement is “seriously misleading” if it does not include the debtor’s correct name, unless “a search of the records of the filing office under the debtor’s correct name, using the filing office’s standard search logic, if any, would disclose” the financing statement notwithstanding the misnomer. But how much…
Court Affirms Order Unsealing “Unguarded Emails”
The Eleventh Circuit reiterated the importance of access to judicial proceedings—including, in the case at hand, “unguarded emails expressing personal opinions,” in Callahan v. United Network for Organ Sharing, 2021 U.S. App. LEXIS 34201 (11th Cir. Nov. 17, 2021). The underlying dispute arose from a revised organ donation policy approved by the defendant United Network…
Dual Jobs and Dueling Opinions: Divided Panel Reverses Summary Judgment in Employer’s Favor in FLSA Case
A divided panel of the Eleventh Circuit reversed summary judgment for the employer on an employee’s Fair Labor Standards Act (“FLSA”) claims in Rafferty v. Denny’s, Inc., 13 F.4th 1166 (11th Cir. 2021). Lindsay Rafferty, who had been a Denny’s server, claimed that the restaurant violated the FLSA in paying her sub-minimum wage for time…
FDCPA Standing Case To Be Reheard En Banc
The full court will rehear Hunstein v. Preferred Collection & Mgmt. Svcs., Inc., in which a panel of the court determined that a consumer had standing to challenge under the FDCPA a debt collector’s provision of information to a third-party mail service. You can read our prior post on the case here.
Settlement Release Negotiations and Actions of Third-Party Claimants Are Both Relevant in Bad Faith Actions
In Pelaez v. Government Employees Insurance Co., 2021 U.S. App. LEXIS 28312 (11th Cir. Sept. 20, 2021), the Eleventh Circuit upheld summary judgment for GEICO in a Florida bad faith case. Merely offering an overbroad release to a third-party claimant was insufficient to establish bad faith in the totality of the circumstances, which included GEICO’s…
“European Wax Center” Trademark Dispute Clarifies “Confusingly Similar” Test Under the ACPA
A divided Eleventh Circuit panel affirmed a district court’s order granting summary judgment in favor of the defendant in a trademark dispute involving the Anti-Cybersquatting Consumer Protection Act (“ACPA”), Boigris v. EWC P&T, LLC, 2021 U.S. App. LEXIS 23399 (11th Cir. Aug. 6, 2021). The case further clarifies the test for whether marks are “confusingly…
Full Court Nixes Appeal of Antitrust Immunity Ruling
Sitting en banc, the Eleventh Circuit unanimously held in SmileDirectClub, LLC v. Battle, 2021 U.S. App. LEXIS 21393 (11th Cir. July 20, 2021), that an interlocutory appeal may not be taken under the collateral order doctrine from the denial of the state-action antitrust immunity conferred by Parker v. Brown, 317 U.S. 341 (1943). The case…
“Pinnacle” Trademark Dispute Offers Lessons in Trademark Trial Procedure
The court vacated a $550,000 jury verdict in a trademark dispute teeming with procedural issues, Pinnacle Advertising & Marketing Group, Inc. v. Pinnacle Advertising & Marketing Group, LLC, 2021 U.S. App. LEXIS 22770 (11th Cir. Aug. 2, 2021), but kept alive the possibility of injunctive relief for the plaintiff on remand. The case is a…
Federal Presumption of Arbitrability Limited to Disputes That Are Immediate, Foreseeable Results of Contractual Performance
After concluding that the most natural reading of an arbitration agreement did not cover the dispute in Calderon v. Sixt Rent a Car, LLC, 2021 U.S. App. LEXIS 20854 (11th Cir. July 14, 2021), the Eleventh Circuit held more broadly that the Federal Arbitration Act’s strong presumption of arbitrability applies only if “the dispute in…