imageA dilemma

A price-fixer cheats his buyers, but he may also do something worse — frighten them into doing nothing about it.

Last week, the Third Circuit made a ruling that will calm victims’ fears. Instead of bringing a claim they don’t want to prosecute, the court held, they may freely assign it to someone who does. And they may do so with or without payment for the assignment.

Background

The case that produced the decision arose from an effort by Eaton Corporation, the dominant maker of heavy-duty truck transmissions, to squelch competition by an upstart, ZF Meritor. Tauro Brothers Trucking sued Eaton for treble damages under sections 1 and 2 of the Sherman Act. Tauro alleged that Eaton had killed ZF Meritor with contract terms that tied buyers exclusively to Eaton.

But four years into the case, Eaton moved to dismiss on the ground that Tauro lacked standing to sue. Because Tauro did not buy transmissions directly from Eaton, the motion argued, it failed to meet the Supreme Court’s limitation on antitrust standing in Illinois Brick Co. v. Illinois, 431 U.S. 720 (1977), to direct buyers.

Tauro replied that it had a valid assignment from R&R, a firm that sold Eaton transmissions to Tauro after buying them directly from Eaton.

The district court granted the motion, holding the assignment no good on the ground that Tauro gave R&R nothing for it. A valid assignment, the court held, required “consideration”.

Reversal

The Third Circuit reversed.

It started by stressing that “federal common law” — not state law — governed the question of what makes an assignment of federal antitrust claims valid. Wallach v. Eaton Corp., No. 15-3320, slip op. at 15 n.11 and accompanying text.

The panel next adopted the American Law Institute’s Restatement (Second) of Contracts (1981) “as a starting point for fashioning rules of federal common law” regarding the validity of antitrust claim assignments. Id. at 20.

Because the Restatement does not require the owner of a right of action to receive something in return for assigning it, the court held, the lack of consideration for R&R’s express assignment to Tauro did not matter. Tauro had standing. Id. at 28-29.

Implications

The panel supported its ruling on the ground that it will aid enforcement of antitrust law. Their honors noted:

Part of creating incentives for private antitrust suits is making federal courts a welcome forum for such litigation, and erecting the barrier of consideration threatens to shut out otherwise meritorious suits from resolution. True, in some circumstances, consideration could spur such private suits because an assignee who pays valuable consideration for the right to sue might be more likely to actually bring suit in order to recoup its investment. But in situations like the one at issue in this case, if a direct purchaser is uninterested in pursuing its claims, whether because it deems them valueless or because it cannot afford the expense of litigation, an otherwise willing and interested assignee might be discouraged from pursuing the suit in the direct purchaser’s stead if it were required to provide consideration.

Id. at 26.

The court did not point out that “the expense of litigation” may include concern about the direct buyer’s ongoing relationship with her supplier, the Sherman Act violator. But I hear questions about the effect of bringing a case all the time. Will the powerful antitrust cartel take revenge?

An assignment can help take away worry. By transferring the claim to a third party, the direct purchaser puts distance between herself and the fight over the antitrust violation. She also avoids friction as well as expense and administrative burden of litigation, including party discovery.

As the court held in Wallach v. Eaton Corp., the claim owner may assign the antitrust claims without receiving consideration in return. But she also has the option of requiring some kind of payment. That may take the form of a lump-sum, but it may also consist of a right to a share of proceeds from litigation and settlement of the claims.

The Supreme Court has okayed assignments of federal claims to an entity that aggregates many claims and promises to pay proceeds, if any, to the assignors. Sprint Communications Co., L.P. v. APCC Services, Inc., 554 U.S. 269 (2008).

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Photo of Barry Barnett Barry Barnett

Clients and colleagues call Barry Barnett an “incredibly gifted lawyer” (Chambers and Partners) who is “magic in the courtroom” (Who’s Who Legal), “the top antitrust lawyer in Texas” (Chambers and Partners), and “a person of unquestioned integrity” (David J. Beck, founder of Beck…

Clients and colleagues call Barry Barnett an “incredibly gifted lawyer” (Chambers and Partners) who is “magic in the courtroom” (Who’s Who Legal), “the top antitrust lawyer in Texas” (Chambers and Partners), and “a person of unquestioned integrity” (David J. Beck, founder of Beck Redden).

Barnett is a Fellow in the American College of Trial Lawyers, and Lawdragon has named him one of the top 500 lawyers in the United States three years in a row. Best Lawyers in America has honored him as “Lawyer of the Year” for Bet-the-Company Litigation (2019 and 2017) and Patent Litigation (2020) in Houston. Based in Texas and New York, Barnett has tried complex business disputes across the United States.

TRIAL COUNSEL
Barnett’s background, training, and experience make him indispensable to his clients. The small-town son of a Texas roughneck and grandson of a Texas sharecropper, Barnett “developed an unusual common sense about people, their motivations, and their dilemmas,” according to former client Michael Lewis.

Barnett has been historically recognized for his effectiveness and judgment. His peers chose him, for example, to the American College of Trial Lawyers and American Law Institute. His decades of trial and appellate work representing both plaintiffs and defendants have made him a master strategist and nimble tactician in complex disputes.

Barnett focuses on enforcement of antitrust laws, the “Magna Carta of free enterprise,” in Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall’s memorable phrase. “Barry is one of the nation’s outstanding antitrust lawyers,” according to Joseph Goldberg, a member of the Private Antitrust Enforcement Hall of Fame. Named among Texas’s top ten antitrust lawyers of 2023, Business Today calls Barnett a “trailblazer” among the “distinguished legal minds” who “dedicate their skill and expertise to the maintenance of healthy competition in various sectors” of the Lone Star State’s booming economy. Barnett is also adept in energy and intellectual property matters and has battled for clients against a Who’s Who list of corporate behemoths, including Abbott Labs, Alcoa, Apple, AT&T, BlackBerry, Broadcom, Comcast, Dow, JPMorgan Chase, Samsung, and Visa.

Barnett commands a courtroom with calm and credibility and “is the perfect lawyer for bet the company litigation,” said Scott Regan, General Counsel of former client Whiting Petroleum. His performance before the Supreme Court in Comcast Corp. v. Behrend prompted the Court to withdraw the question on which it had granted review. The judge in a trial involving mobile phone technology called Barnett “one of the best” and that his opening statement the finest he had ever seen. Another trial judge told Barnett minutes after a jury returned a favorable verdict against the county’s biggest employer that he was one of the two best trial lawyers he’d ever come across—adding that the other one was dead.

COMPLETE PACKAGE
A versatile trial lawyer, Barnett knows how to handle a case all the way from strategic pre-suit planning to affirmance on appeal. He’s tried cases to verdict and then briefed and argued them when they went before appellate courts, including the Second, Third, Fifth, and Tenth Circuits, the Supreme Court of Louisiana, and (in the case of Comcast Corp. v. Behrend) the Supreme Court of the United States.

Barnett is a sought-after public speaker, often serving on panels and talking about topics like the trials of antitrust class actions and techniques for streamlining complex litigation. He also comments on trends in commercial litigation and the implications of major rulings for outlets such as NPR, Reuters, Law360, Corporate Counsel, and The Dallas Morning News. He’s even appeared in a Frontline program about underfunding of state pensions, authored chapters on “Fee Arrangements” and “Techniques for Expediting and Streamlining Litigation” (the latter with Steve Susman) in the ABA’s definitive treatise on Business and Commercial Litigation in Federal Courts, 5th, and commented on How Antitrust Enforcers Might Think Like Plaintiffs’ Lawyers.

HARD GRADERS
Clients and other hard graders have praised Barnett for his courtroom skills and legal acumen.

A client in a $100 million oil and gas case, which Barnett’s team won at trial and held on appeal, said Barnett and his team “presented a rare combination of strong legal intellect, common sense about right and wrong, and credibility in the courtroom.” David McCombs at Haynes and Boone said Barnett “has a natural presence that goes over well with juries and judges.”

Even former adversaries give Barnett high marks. Lead opposing counsel in a decade-long antitrust slugfest said “Barry is a highly skilled advocate. He understands what really matters in telling a narrative and does so in a very compelling manner.”

CIVIC ENGAGEMENT
Barnett relishes opportunities to collaborate with all kinds of people. At the Center for American and International Law (CAIL), founded by a former prosecutor at Nuremberg in 1947 and headquartered in the Dallas area, he has served on the Executive Committee, co-chaired the committee that produced CAIL’s first-ever strategic plan, supported CAIL’s Institute for Law Enforcement Administration and other development efforts, and proposed formation of a new Institute for Social Justice Law. CAIL’s former President David Beck said “Barry is extremely bright” and is “very well prepared in every lawsuit or professional task he undertakes.”

Barnett is also a Trustee of the New-York Historical Society, a Sterling Fellow at Yale, a member of the Yale University Art Gallery’s Governing Board, a winner of the Class Award for his work on behalf of his college class, and a proud contributor to the Yellow Ribbon Program at Harvard Law. Barnett’s pro bono work includes leading the trial team representing people who are at greatest risk of severe illness and death as a result of being exposed to the novel coronavirus SARS-CoV-2 while being detained in the Dallas County jail—work for which he received the NGAN Legal Advocacy Fund RBG Award.

At Susman Godfrey, Barnett has served on the firm’s Executive Committee, Employment Committee, and ad hoc committees on partner compensation, succession of leadership, and revision of the firm’s partnership agreement. He also twice chaired the Practice Development Committee.

KEEPING PERSPECTIVE
Barnett understands that clients face many pressures. Managing the stress is important, especially in matters that take years to resolve. He encourages clients to call him whenever they have a question or concern and to keep the inevitable ups and downs in perspective. He wants them to know that he will do his level best to help them achieve their goals. He also strives to foster trust and to make working with him a pleasure.

Cyrus “Skip” Marter, the General Counsel of Bonanza Creek in Denver and a former Susman Godfrey partner and client, said Barnett is “excellent about communicating with clients in a full and honest manner” and can “negotiate for his clients from a position of strength, because he is not afraid to take a case through a full trial on the merits.” Stacey Doré, the President of Hunt Utility Services and a former client, said that Barnett is “an excellent trial lawyer and the person you want to hire for your bet-the-company cases. He is client focused, responsive, and uniquely savvy about trial and settlement strategy.” A New York colleague said, “Barry is a joy to work with as co-counsel. He tackles complex procedural and factual hurdles capably, efficiently, and without drama.”

PERSONAL
Barnett’s wide-ranging experience and calm, down-to-earth approach enable him to connect with clients, judges, jurors, witnesses, and even opposing counsel. He grew up in Nacogdoches, Texas. He co-captained his high school varsity football team as an All-East Texas middle linebacker while also serving as the Editor of Key Club’s Texas-Oklahoma District, won the Best Typist award, took the History Team to glory, and sang in the East Texas All Region Choir. As Dan Kelly of client Vistra Corp. put it, Barnett is “a great person to be around.”

Barnett is steady and loyal. He has practiced at Susman Godfrey his entire career. He and his wife Nancy live in Dallas and enjoy spending time in Houston and New York. Their daughter works for H-E-B in Houston, and their son is a Haynes and Boone transactions lawyer in Dallas.

As a member of Ivy League championship football teams in his junior and senior years at Yale and a parent of two Yalies, Barnett has no trouble choosing sides for “The Game” in November. And he knows how important fighting all the way to the end is. On his last play from scrimmage, in the waning minutes of The Game on Nov. 22, 1980, he recovered a Crimson fumble.

Yale won, 14-0.