| Breach of Contract Lawyer Mark Werbner on Law.com |
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Jenkens & Gilchrist Wins Millions in Suit Against Former IP Client Law.com - Texas Lawyer Dallas firm Jenkens & Gilchrist closed its doors on March 31, 2007, but the firm just won a jury verdict valued at more than $4 million in a breach of contract suit it filed in July 2007 against a former intellectual property client. Breach of Contract Attorney Mark Werbner in Texas Lawyer Asure Software Inc. of Austin, known as Forgent Networks until September 2007, announced the July 23 verdict late Tuesday. A jury in 134th District Judge James Stanton's court in Dallas returned the verdict awarding Jenkens $3.14 million in actual damages plus up to $1.15 million in attorney fees and prejudgment interest in Jenkens & Gilchrist PC v. Forgent Networks Inc., et al. Jenkens alleged in a second amended petition filed in June that Asure had agreed in 2004 to pay the firm a certain percentage of fees stemming from a patent licensing program -- which netted the company nearly $100 million between April 2001 and December 2004 -- but Asure stopped making payments beginning in May 2007. Plaintiffs attorney Mark Werbner, a partner in Sayles Werbner in Dallas, says the payments stopped after the firm closed in 2007. "Forgent's nonpayment was trying to exploit Jenkens & Gilchrist [after] stopping the practice of law and we felt very vindicated by the jury's finding that this was a just and proper debt that was due," Werbner says. A hearing to enter judgment before Stanton was set for Wednesday, and defense attorney Donald Taylor, a partner in Taylor Dunham & Burgess in Austin, says Asure will oppose a judgment that follows the verdict. "We do feel like the verdict was unfair and we have some complaints about the issues that were submitted and the way they were submitted," Taylor says. In a written statement, Nancy Harris, chief executive officer at Asure, writes, "Although we respect the jury's verdict, we are very disappointed in the results of the trial and are currently looking at all of our available options, including an appeal." In March 2007, Jenkens closed after negotiating a nonprosecution cooperation agreement for alleged criminal tax violations linked to the firm's former Chicago-based tax shelter practice. The firm also negotiated a civil settlement with the Internal Revenue Service and agreed it was subject to a penalty of $76 million, resulting from the firm's alleged promotion of what the IRS called "abusive and fraudulent tax shelters." http://www.law.com/jsp/article.jsp?id=1202432631437&rss=newswire Copyright 2009. Incisive Media US Properties, LLC. |