Denial of Motion to Disqualify Counsel Doesn’t Bar Later Legal Malpractice Suit- No Issue Preclusion (IL ND)

Eckert v. Levin, et al., 2015 WL 859530 (N.D.Ill. 2015), a case I featured earlier this week, gives some useful guidance on when collateral estoppel or “issue preclusion” bars a second lawsuit between two parties after a judgment entered against one of them in an earlier case. The case’s tortured history included the plaintiff getting …

Settlement Agreement Construed Like Any Other Contract

  This one naturally resonated with me as I’ve experienced how time-consuming and expensive it is to monitor and enforce a settlement agreement that, in theory, ended the case. In Sprint Nextel v. AU Electronics, Inc., 2014 WL 2580, the parties executed a written settlement agreement ending litigation involving defendants’ illegal sale of Sprint cell phones.  The agreement required …

How to Enforce Settlement Agreements In Federal Court

I once represented a plaintiff in a Federal question case (based on the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act) that settled with the defendant making installment payments over time.  In the settlement agreement, I took great pains to emphasize that if the defendant missed a payment, I could immediately move to reinstate the case and accelerate the settlement amount plus fees …