Employee Ownership Legal Digest
Corey Rosen (11)

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Corey Rosen

Suit over Price Paid to Former ESOP Participants Can Continue

In Daly v. W. Monroe Partners, Inc., No. 21 C 6805 (N.D. Ill. Mar. 15, 2023), a district court allowed a former employee of West Monroe Partners to continue, although it ruled for the defendant on some issues. West Monroe, a management consulting firm, had been 100% owned by its ESOP until 2021, when it sold 50% of its stock to an investor and terminated its ESOP. Daly and other plaintiffs were former employees who had their shares repurchased for $515 each just prior to the investment. The plaintiffs alleged that West Monroe had received a number of offers, and that the share price should have reflected the higher price these offers promised.

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Corey Rosen

Plaintiffs Can Proceed with Lawsuit over Sale of ESOP Company

In Rush v. GreatBanc, No. 19-cv-00738 (N.D. Ill., Dec. 16, 2022),a district court allowed a lawsuit to proceed claiming the sale of an ESOP company was for too little money. The company was 100% ESOP-owned until sold in 2016. Rush, representing the class of ESOP participants, was a vice president at the time. The plaintiffs contend that the board should have sought a higher bid and that selling to a strategic buyer would have yielded $55 million more. The plaintiffs are suing the trustee, the board, and several executives.

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Corey Rosen

Employee Can Amend Complaint in ESOP Valuation Case

In Novosel v. Azcon Inc. Employee Benefits Plan Committee, No. 21 C 3080, (N.D. Il, E.D., Jan. 9, 2023), an employee was allowed to amend her complaint that she was underpaid for her ESOP shares because of an interim valuation that reduced the value of her stock by $53,000. Some of her claims had been dismissed in a prior ruling, as we discussed in an article in our April 2022 issue. The interim valuation had been performed because of hits to the company’s earnings as a result of the pandemic. The court had dismissed claims based on whether the company could do an interim valuation, but allowed the plaintiff to amend her complaint to focus on the terms of her severance agreement with the company concerning what valuation date applied. In this ruling, the court allowed her to proceed on an amended version of the complaint on that basis.

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Corey Rosen

ISCO Plaintiffs Lose Request to Court to Reconsider Arbitration Decision

In Best et al v. James., No. 320-cv-299-JRW (W.D. Ky., Jan. 9, 2023) a court again ruled that plaintiffs must agree to arbitrate their claims against executives of ISCO Industries concerning the buyback of company shares from the ESOP. In a prior 2019 decision, Swain v. Wilmington Trust N.A., a federal judge approved a $5 million settlement with a class of employees at ISCO Industries who alleged the ESOP had overpaid for the shares. The settlement amounted to about $12,000 per employee, minus legal fees and taxes. The plaintiffs said the arbitration ruling ignored the 6th Circuit ruling in Hawkins v. Cintas, which concluded that arbitration rights that apply to the plan, not individual employees, cannot be forfeited. The judge rejected that reading of the company’s arbitration provisions, but allowed the employees 30 days to revise their compliant.

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Corey Rosen

Insurance Issues in ESOP Cases Become More Common

Insurance for ESOP companies and fiduciaries has become more common in recent years, with courts limiting claims often because of contract exclusions, as in Martin Resource Management Corp. v. Federal Insurance Co., (5th Cir., Aug. 6, 2021); Gemini Insurance v. Potts, No. 2:16-cv-612 (S.D. Ohio Jul. 15, 2020); and Great American Fidelity Insurance Company v. Stout Risius Ross, Inc., No. 19-cv-11294 (E.D. Mich., Aug 23, 2021). In Ross v. Aspen Insurance, No. 21 Civ. 4412 (ER) (S.D. N.Y., March 18, 2022), a district court ruled that Aspen Insurance did not have a duty to indemnify and defend Stout Risius Ross (SRR) or actions arising out of its valuation work for Wilmington Trust, which acted as the trustee for an ESOP at Constellis, Inc. SRR asked the court for a declaratory judgment against Aspen requiring it to pay insurance. The policy provided that coverage is subject to a “prior knowledge condition.” Aspen said that the Wilmington suit was known to SRR, so it knew there was a claim, and thus it did not have to provide coverage. SRR unsuccessfully argued that Wilmington had never before claimed its services were deficient, that SRR and Wilmington had a long-standing professional relationship, and that Wilmington had never before threatened litigation (and, in fact, had argued that the valuation SRR did was appropriate).

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Corey Rosen

Settlement Approved in Maine Oxy Case

In Walsh v. Maine Oxy Acetylene Supply, No. 2:20- incv-00326NT  (D. Me. Dec. 13, 2022), parties reached a $6.5 million settlement in a case in which plaintiffs contended that the ESOP trustee and the CEO of the company terminated an ESOP at an improperly low price to orchestrate a favorable deal for members of the board to buy back the 49% of the company  the ESOP then owned. 

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Corey Rosen

ESOP trustee loses motion to send case to arbitration

In Lloyd v. Argent Trust, No. 1:22-cv-04129-DLC (S.D. NY, Dec. 6, 2022), a district court refused to send to arbitration a suit claiming Argent Trust allowed an ESOP to overpay for its purchase of stock in W BBQ at an inflated price. Argent said that the plan had an arbitration clause, but the judge ruled that would deny plaintiffs rights afforded under ERISA. Argent plans to appeal.

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Corey Rosen

Class approved in Gannett 401(k) employer stock lawsuit

In Stegemann v. Gannett, No. 1:18-cv-00325-AJT-JFA (E.D. Va., Nov. 17, 2022) a district court dismissed a motion for summary judgment from Gannett corporation arguing that plaintiffs could not be certified as a class in a long-running case involving employees at a Gannett spinoff, Tegna. After the spinoff, employees who no longer worked at Tegna, including Gannett employees, could not buy more Tegna stock, but they could continue to hold it, as well as sell and invest in other assets in the 401(k) plan. Tegna stock dropped sharply, and employees sued, saying the trustees should have sold the shares in the plan even absent employee directions. The Tegna stock fund was eventually removed as one of the plan’s 401(k) options.

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Corey Rosen

Bankers Trust of South Dakota decisively defeats appeal on Tharanco ESOP lawsuit

In Plutzer v. Bankers Trust Company of South Dakota et. al., No. 22-561-cv (2nd Cir., Nov. 21, 2022) a court dismissed a claim against Bankers Trust of South Dakota, the trustee for the ESOP at Tharanco Group. In 2015, an ESOP bought 100% of Tharanco for $133 million. The sale was fully leveraged, and the stock dropped to $13 million the next year. It rose in the following years, but dropped down to $9.8 million in 2019. The plaintiff essentially argued that the decrease was sufficient cause to move to the next stage of a trial. The court ruled that the mere statement of a claim followed by “threadbare” justification is insufficient to show the plaintiff could demonstrate actual harm. Defendants argued that, among other things, the drop in value was a result of leverage.

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