Commercial Litigation Update

The statute of limitations is a powerful threshold defense for defendants in civil litigation.  Article 2 of New York’s Civil Practice Law and Rules (“CPLR”) and other New York statutory provisions set forth deadlines by which parties must “interpose” their claims, lest they be barred from pursuing them.

The CPLR is clear that limitations periods are not to be trifled with—not even courts can extend them: “An action . . . must be commenced within the time specified in this article unless a different time is prescribed by law or a shorter time is prescribed by written ...

Our colleague Stuart Gerson of Epstein Becker Green has a new post on SCOTUS Today that will be of interest to our readers: "A Unanimous Court Rules That District Courts Can't Modify Appellate Cost Awards."

The following is an excerpt:

The case of City of San Antonio v. Hotels.com L.P. has ended with a long opinion, reaching a simple and direct conclusion. A unanimous Supreme Court, in an opinion written by Justice Alito, has held that Fed. R. App. P. 39 does not permit a district court to modify or eliminate an allocation of costs awarded by a court of appeals to a successful ...

Our colleagues Gregory Keating and Francesco DeLuca of Epstein Becker Green have a new post on Workforce Bulletin that will be of interest to our readers: "Massachusetts Case Highlights Importance of Clear Communication in Compensation Plans."

The following is an excerpt:

Preparing the terms of employee compensation can be a resource-intensive task requiring input from stakeholders across numerous departments, including human resources, finance, and legal. However, as the Massachusetts Appeals Court’s recent decision in Alfieri v. Merrimack Pharmaceuticals ...

On June 19, 2019, the New York State Senate and Assembly passed legislation that would, if signed into law, broaden the scope of last year’s ban on clauses requiring employees to arbitrate sexual harassment claims so as to prohibit such clauses with respect to all types of discrimination claims. As reported on this blog, this ban on mandatory arbitration clauses was deemed invalid, as contrary to federal law, by the June 26, 2019 decision of the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York in Latif v. Morgan Stanley & Co. LLC, et al. (S.D.N.Y. No. 18-11528). It is too early ...