Legal News

By Patricia Hurtado – Dec 1, 2011 6:38 AM ET Neuberger Berman Group LLC, Level Global Investors LP and Diamondback Capital Management LLC employees may face criminal charges as part of an insider- trading probe by U.S. authorities in New York, a person familiar with the matter said. The charges may be filed as early as [...]

By Chris Cooper and David Glovin – Dec 1, 2011 5:15 AM ET Michael C. Woodford resigned as a director of Olympus Corp. in the first step of a campaign to take control of the camera maker from the board that fired him as chief executive officer in a dispute over falsified accounts. “I will come [...]

By Jef Feeley – Dec 1, 2011 12:01 AM ET Rupert Murdoch and his News Corp. (NWSA) persuaded a judge to throw out an investor lawsuit seeking information about the $675 million purchase of a U.K.-based television production company owned by Murdoch’s daughter. Delaware Chancery Court Judge John Noble concluded that a suit filed by an [...]

By David Voreacos – Dec 1, 2011 12:00 AM ET Maurice R. Greenberg, the former American International Group Inc. (AIG) chief executive officer, seeks to break new ground in lawsuits challenging the U.S. takeover of the insurer in a bailout that reached $182 billion. Greenberg’s Starr International Co. sued the government Nov. 21, calling the public [...]

By Jonathan Browning and Erik Larson – Nov 30, 2011 6:54 AM ET A former reporter at News Corp. (NWSA)’s News of the World was arrested by U.K. police as part of an investigation into phone hacking at the now-defunct tabloid, a person familiar with the case said. Bethany Usher left the News of the World [...]

By Joe Schneider – Nov 30, 2011 5:00 AM ET Samsung Electronics Co. (005930), the world’s biggest smartphone maker, won a battle in its global patent war with Apple Inc. as an Australian appeals court overturned a ban on the sale of its tablet rivaling the iPad. Samsung can begin sales of its Galaxy Tab [...]

By Jim Brunsden and Ben Moshinsky – Nov 30, 2011 4:59 AM ET Owners of long-term unsecured debt in a collapsing bank would be first in line to take losses under draft plans from the European Union to protect taxpayers’ money from future bailouts. Short-term debt, with a less than one-year maturity, and derivatives should [...]

By Donal Griffin – Nov 29, 2011 7:00 PM ET Saudi businessman Ghazi Abbar, who claims in an affidavit he lost $383 million of his family’s fortune on investments with Citigroup Inc., was sold one of the transactions even though the bank questioned his ability to properly manage them, according to an internal memo. The [...]

By Linda Sandler – Nov 29, 2011 9:13 AM ET Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc., the bankrupt investment bank seeking approval for a $65 billion liquidation plan next month, named a committee to select directors to oversee the process. The selection committee of creditors’ representatives will include Thomas Tormey of Goldman Sachs Group Inc. (GS), part of [...]

By Phil Milford and Mary Schlangenstein – Nov 29, 2011 9:07 AM ET American Airlines parent AMR Corp. filed for bankruptcy after failing to secure cost-cutting labor agreements and sitting out a round of mergers that dropped it from the world’s largest airline to No. 3 in the U.S. With the filing, American became the [...]

By Jef Feeley – Nov 29, 2011 12:01 AM ET Del Monte Foods Co.’s $5.3 billion sale to a group of private-equity firms led by KKR & Co. is the target of a U.S. Justice Department antitrust probe, a lawyer who sued over the deal said in a court filing. Federal prosecutors have been “investigating [...]

By Margaret Cronin Fisk and Amanda Coyne – Nov 29, 2011 12:00 AM ET BP Plc, still facing fallout from the 2010 explosion of its Macondo well in the Gulf of Mexico, is fighting a U.S. bid to revoke its probation over a five-year-old spill in Alaska following a more recent pipeline rupture. BP pleaded guilty in [...]

By Bob Van Voris – Nov 28, 2011 11:58 AM ET Citigroup Inc. (C)’s $285 million settlement with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission over mortgage-backed securities was rejected by a Manhattan federal judge. U.S. District Judge Jed Rakoff rejected the settlement in an opinion released today. The judge has criticized the agreement for permitting [...]

By Heather Smith – Nov 28, 2011 11:25 AM ET HSBC Holdings Plc (HSBA) amended its settlement with investors in an Irish fund who lost their money in Bernard Madoff’s Ponzi scheme after the bank’s original offer was rejected by a U.S. judge in September. The amended settlement, which will be filed in U.S. District [...]

By Julie Hirschfeld Davis – Nov 28, 2011 12:01 AM ET Former Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney, who charged Republican presidential primary rival Newt Gingrich with proposing “amnesty” for certain illegal immigrants, took a nearly identical position in a 2006 Bloomberg interview, saying some foreigners who entered the U.S. illegally should be allowed to remain and [...]

By Cullen Wheatley and Taejin Park – Nov 27, 2011 11:13 PM ET Cleary, Gottlieb, Steen & Hamilton LLP, Samsung Life Insurance Co.’s adviser on South Korea’s biggest initial public offering, plans an office in Seoul now that a free trade deal is allowing foreign law firms in. Yong Guk Lee, who will move from [...]

By Jef Feeley and David Voreacos – Nov 23, 2011 9:44 AM ET Merck & Co. (MRK), the second-largest U.S. drugmaker, will pay $950 million and a unit of the company will plead guilty to a criminal misdemeanor charge to resolve a U.S. probe of its illegal marketing of the painkiller Vioxx. Merck Sharp & [...]

By Bob Van Voris – Nov 23, 2011 12:00 AM ET Citigroup Inc. (C), whose $285 million settlement with U.S. regulators over a collapsed collateralized debt obligation was faulted by a federal judge as too lenient, may have to pay more money to avoid admitting it did anything wrong, said lawyers following the case. Citigroup, [...]

By Steven Church and Romy Varghese – Nov 23, 2011 12:00 AM ET Pennsylvania will pursue a plan to put Harrisburg, its bankrupt capital, into state receivership even if a U.S. judge allows the city to seek bankruptcy protection in federal court. U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Mary D. France will hear arguments today about whether the [...]

By Tiffany Kary – Nov 23, 2011 12:00 AM ET MF Global Inc. brokerage customers, who may be missing more than $1.2 billion from their accounts, won’t be allowed to form a committee to represent their interests in bankruptcy court, a judge ruled. Customer accounts believed to hold $5.45 billion were frozen Oct. 31, the [...]