Top 10 Litigation, Mediation & Arbitration Headlines from North America 2008 and 2009 have seen the continued upwards trend of securities class action filings that began in 2007. There were 210 federal securities class actions filed in 2008, an increase of 29% over 2007. A derivative action is actually two causes of action: it is an action to compel the corporation to sue and it is an action brought by a shareholder on behalf of the corporation to redress harm to the corporation. Employers are learning the hard way that gaining access to private employee information during workplace investigations can lead to lawsuits, liability and headaches. In a recent ruling from the bench, Judge James M. Peck of the United States Bankruptcy Court for the Southern District of New York held that Metavante Corporation’s suspension of payments under an outstanding swap agreement with Lehman Brothers Special Financing Inc. (“LBSF”) was not safe harbored, and instead violated the automatic stay of section 362(a) of the Bankruptcy Code. Two recent cases, Mazzarolo v. BMO Nesbitt Burns ltée and Gale v. ScotiaMcLeod, are more examples of case law that emerged from the high tech crash. The U.S. Supreme Court yesterday heard oral arguments in "Bilski v. Kappos", a case that could reshape the scope of what can be patented and that will almost certainly have broad implications for the patentability of business methods. Being sued is never pleasant. And, for most companies, being sued for patent infringement is the worst kind of pain. While discrimination and sexual harassment cases have historically dominated the labor litigation arena, the number of wage and hour cases has risen dramatically over the past decade. The so-called Upjohn warning takes its name from the seminal Supreme Court case Upjohn Co. v. United States, in which the court held that communications between company counsel and employees of the company are privileged, but the privilege is owned by the company and not the individual employee. On October 14th, a Delaware Court of Chancery judge issued an 88-page opinion granting summary judgment to two insureds, Warren Pumps LLC ("New Warren") and Viking Pump, Inc. ("New Viking"), on critical issues of allocation and a corporate successorship. | 
