Steve Robertson and Mandy Castle successfully defended the American Language Academy in a California lawsuit alleging breach of contract and fraud. The suit started in California state court. Believing the matter would progress at a faster pace in federal court, and with the help of local counsel, the Freisleben Law Group of Costa Mesa, a removal petition was filed.
The petition was granted and the suit continued in the U.S. District Court for the Central District of California based on diversity of citizenship and amount in controversy. A motion to dismiss was filed in lieu of an answer. Plaintiffs met the motion with an amended complaint, a vastly reduced monetary demand and a voluntary dismissal of its fraud claims.
Robertson and Castle brought a second motion to dismiss which was granted and the case was concluded in just 6 months. According to Yuni Nguyen, CFO and co-founder of the American Language Academy, “we felt like the suit had no basis and did not understand why we should even have to defend against it. We are very happy that we had the legal expertise of Steve, Mandy, Alan Freisleben and the entire Higgins Benjamin team working for us. They averted a potential disaster quickly and affordably.”
Nguyen went on to say “we are in a growing business and negotiating with potential partners all around the world every day. Some deals pan out and some do not. We are pleased to have Higgins Benjamin on our team for the unfortunate situation where a misguided potential partner brings a frivolous suit.”
The information provided above represents the result of one particular case. The outcome of any other case cannot be predicated upon a lawyer’s or a law firm’s past results.
