"This case has nothing to do with Texas." - So now what for Liverpool Sale?

Here's my quick response to the latest news coming out of England regarding the legal drama concerning the sale of Liverpool FC. Today, the High Court in England has determined that the Texas courts do not have jurisdiction over the matters surrounding the sale of Liverpool FC. Here's the latest coverage of the High Court's proceedings from England:

The Guardian

The Telegraph

The Independent

So does this mean the Royal Bank of Scotland and the other defendants can just ignore the temporary restraining order and move forward with the sale of the club as planned? In reality, "No."

If they move forward with the sale without getting the TRO lifted, they still risk being in contempt of court.

Since we're dealing with two courts located in two separate countries, as of now, nothing that has been issued by either court has truly overruled what the other court has done. At this point all parties involved need to be careful about violating any of the court orders that have been issued by the two courts, until one of the courts cede's authority to the other court.

So what happens now?

The defendants in the Texas case are going to have to get the TRO lifted so that they can move forward with the sale without being in contempt of the TRO - the High Court can't lift the TRO, only the Texas court can do that. The defendants will submit the orders from the High Court to the Texas court and seek to have the Texas court recognize these orders as valid. There is a process for this, which I don't have time to really delve into at the moment. Just know that there are means of getting foreign court judgments/orders recognized in Texas courts.

As I mentioned in a prior article, Texas law usually requires 3 days notice for a hearing. Under that rule, Monday would be the earliest day to have a hearing. That being said, the defendants can still try to get the matter on Friday's court docket - by doing that it would mean the 3 day notice issue could be a basis for some kind of appeal, if things get that far.

At this point, I still think we're looking at a delay in the sale of the club. But we'll keep watching and see what other legal maneuvering occurs.

UPDATE:

It is my understanding that there is a hearing set to occur in the Dallas court today. I suspect this might have to do with the earlier talk that Hicks and Gillett's team were seeking to have the court find the defendants in contempt of the TRO. It is possible that the defendants' legal counsel will be present at this hearing and take it as an opportunity to get the TRO lifted. We'll see what happens.

The Liverpool Temporary Restraining Order

In yesterday's article I discussed how personal jurisdiction in relationship to the Liverpool lawsuit works in Texas. Today, a quick glimpse at the Temporary Restraining Order. This article is meant along the lines of what Wikipedia calls a stub and is not intended as a detailed discussion of the law of temporary restraining order - this article is not legal advice, does not create an attorney-client relationship, and is not intended as attorney advertising.

In addition to filing a lawsuit in Texas state court yesterday, Tom Hicks and George Gillett, through their various holding and investment companies, also requested and obtained a temporary restraining order that essentially delays the sale of Liverpool FC to John Henry and NESV.

Temporary restraining orders are considered something of an extreme remedy and are only issued in certain instances. In essence, a plaintiff has to show the court that if it does not issue a TRO then some imminent event or action is about to occur that basically hurts the plaintiff or the plaintiff's claim in an irreparable manner. In this instance it is the completion of the sale, which had been scheduled for Friday October 15, 2010.

Since TROs are issued solely on the oath (and bond) of one party, they don't last long, in fact the court has to have a hearing, where the defendant can contest the matter, within 14 days. In the Liverpool matter, the hearing is set for Monday October 25th. The defendants can try to get the court to move the hearing up to an earlier date, but unlikely that a hearing would be held before Monday.

There are indications that the defendants will be pursing their own legal avenues in English court today, seeking injunctive relief that would prevent or limit the ability of the Hicks & Gillett to move forward with their Texas litigation. The immediate impact of any such order by the English courts would result in something of a standoff that will still make it difficult to move forward with the sale of Liverpool this week.

Assuming that the English court rules against Hicks & Gillett, it doesn't remove the fact that there is a valid (under Texas law), standing order in a Texas court and failure to comply with that order could result in costly contempt charges or prolonged additional litigation over which court has ultimate authority. To protect themselves, the defendants in the Texas litigation will need to get the Texas court to lift the TRO before completing the sale of the club. To do this, they can try to get a hearing as soon as possible, and due to notice requirements, that will probably be no earlier than Monday.

Alternatively, if the English court forbids Hicks & Gillett from pursuing their Texas litigation, the defendants can wait till the 25th to see if Hicks & Gillett allow the TRO to expire on its own. If Hicks & Gillett disobey the English court order and move forward with the Texas litigation, then they would be in contempt of the English court and subject to penalties under English law.

As the attorney in the interview below notes, the Texas court will not completely ignore what has occurred in the English courts and could give judicial notice to those results. However, the Texas litigation is not at that stage in the process yet, and until then, NESV and Royal Bank of Scotland are smart to comply with any orders of the Texas court.

These proceedings highlight not only the international nature of big business these days but the international nature of the English Premier League, and the types of litigation nightmares that can result when there is no contractual choice of law provision governing disputes between parties.

The sad reality of this matter is that it has gone this far and has entered a realm that is a nightmare to Liverpool fans and a legal/financial minefield for the parties who own, run, and operate Liverpool.

CLICK HERE to jump to an interview another Texas attorney did on BBC 5 Live's Wake up to Money.

Hicks & Gillett File Suit in Texas to Disrupt Liverpool Sale - Is there Jurisdiction?

The past few weeks have been a bit of a roller coaster ride for fans of Liverpool Football Club. There's been plenty of articles for detailing the ownership saga at Liverpool, and for the sake of time I won't rehash the recent events except to say that earlier today it appeared that all hurdles in England had been cleared and that John Henry and New England Sports Ventures would become owners of Liverpool, pushing out Tom Hicks and George Gillett. However, in a last attempt to either foil the sale or get more money out of the club, Hicks and Gillett have filed a civil lawsuit in the District Court of Dallas County, Texas, 160th Judicial District, and have obtained a Temporary Restraining Order from said court.

Before I delve into the pleadings and related law in an effort to give Liverpool fans in particular and football fans in general an idea of what's going on, here's the disclaimer:

While I am licensed to practice law in the State of Texas nothing in this article is intended as or should be read as legal advice. Nothing in this article creates an attorney-client relationship between the author and any reader. Furthermore, this article is not written for or intended to serve as an attorney advertisement.

Now that we've gotten that out of the way, time to start making sense of these proceedings. (Please forgive any spelling or grammar mistakes since time and not proofreading is my priority here.)

My initial idea was to tackle all the issues presented by this lawsuit in one article, but then realized it would be better to break the different aspects of these proceedings down into a series of articles. Since everyone is questioning whether a Texas court has the authority to stop the sale of Liverpool to John Henry and NESV, I'm going to address the issue of court jurisdiction and, to a lesser extent, venue in this article.

In response to some of the comments both on and offline, I feel the need to point out that in the United States, anyone can file a lawsuit, no matter how valid that lawsuit ends up proving. At this stage in the proceedings, the Court doesn't really care about the validity of the plaintiffs' claims and allegations - there are several procedural steps that have to occur before the court starts examining the legal validity of the lawsuit. Keep in mind that something like 90% of the lawsuits filed in the United States never reach trial, they are either resolved in pre-trial motions, like summary judgment, or settled. Finally, do not think of the Texas Court, by issuing the temporary restraining order, as overruling the English Court. All the Texas Court looked at was a narrow range of criteria that is needed for it to issue a temporary restraining order. To be blunt, at this point in the process in Texas, the Texas Court really doesn't care what has happened in the English Court System - it will care, but that will be down the road in the procedural process the parties will have to travel.

Please keep in mind that when I worked in civil litigation, I always approached issues by examining my opponent's strongest issue(s) and creating something of a worst case scenario that I had to fight against in order to win. In this article, and in future articles, I might not always paint the kind of picture that Liverpool fans want to see, but please don't take that as my personal opinion or feelings on this matter. Also, keep in mind that in lawsuits, earlier procedural matters tend to favor the plaintiff but as the matter progresses the procedural playing field starts to shift in favor of the defendant. What this means is that it is not easy to get a case "dismissed" quickly.

The general rule is that if you file a lawsuit against somebody you have to file said lawsuit either: (1) where the defendent is located, (2) where the property in dispute is located, or (3) where the acts or omissions giving rise to the lawsuit occurred.

On the face of the pleadings, only one party to this lawsuit has clear contacts with Texas, that is Kop Investment, one of the plaintiffs, which has its principal place of business in Texas. Courts in Texas have what is called personal jurisdiction over persons or entities that have "continuous and systematic contacts with Texas." I know, that phrase is rather vague.

Probably the best way to explain what these "contacts" are is to point out what the defendants' in this case can do to fight jurisdiction. Before filing anything else, including an answer, the defendants can fight Texas court jurisdiction by filing a "Special Appearance," in which they argue that there is no personal jurisdiction because:

(1) defendants are not Texas residents;

(2) defendants have not had minimum contacts with Texas; and

(3) even if the defendants had some contact with Texas, traditional notions of fair play and substantial justice would be offended if the court exercised jurisdiction over the defendants.

Clearly, the defendants are not Texas residents so . . . What does "minimum contacts" mean? What are traditional notions of fair play and substantial justice? Well, there are no bright line rules or definitions to be applied in determining what these terms mean. Instead, it is resolved on a case by case basis.

Based solely on the pleadings, the Royal Bank of Scotland and NESV have business contacts with Texas and Martin Broughton attended meetings in Dallas concerning Liverpool FC. Is this enough to establish minimum contacts? Courts and judges are territorial and they don't like limiting their power. Depending on how these issues are fleshed out, I could see a scenario or two where the Court finds that there are minimum contacts that enable it to exercise jurisdiction over the defendants. It doesn't help that in arguing that there are not minimum contacts, the defendants are forced into the unenviable task of having to prove a negative.

One of the first things I learned in my Civil Procedure class in law school was that most procedural disputes, and many substantive disputes, are resolved by the court balancing and weighing different interests. In determining the issue of whether the exercise of jurisdiction over the defendants is fair or unfair, the court weighs the interests of its state/community, the plaintiffs' interests, the defendants' interests, and the resulting costs/burdens. The reality is that when a Texas Court finds that minimum contacts exist for it to exercise jurisdiction, it will rarely find that doing so is unfair to the defendants. The seeming finality of the legal proceedings in England would likely lead the Texas court towards leaning in the plaintiffs' favor on this issue.

So, yes, under Texas law, a Texas court can have jurisdiction over this dispute. So, what does that mean? What happens if the defendants ignore the temporary restraining order and move forward with the sale?

They can be found in contempt of court, which, in this case, means the defendants could be facing fines, possibly substantial fines. Since NESV and the Royal Bank of Scotland do business in the United States, it's highly unlikely that they will ignore the temporary restraining order.

So, what happens if the Texas court finds it has jurisdiction? Expect the defendants to file a motion to remove these proceedings to the United States District Court. This issue will most likely be the topic of my next article in this series.

Since this discussion of the jurisdictional issue, which please remember is a procedural issue, isn't the most positive from the perspective of Liverpool fans, I want to try to end on a more positive note for Liverpool fans.

It's highly unlikely that this lawsuit will stop the sale of Liverpool to John Henry and NESV. It may slow that process down and it may result in more money being thrown in the direction of Hicks and Gillett, but it the end Liverpool should be free of those two.

Video: Italy - Serbia 2012 Euro Qualifier Suspended Due to Violence

Today's 2012 Euro Qualifier between Italy and Serbia in Genoa started after a thirty-five minute delay and only lasted seven minutes before the match was suspended due to fan violence. While Italian football has seen its fair share of fan violence in recent years, today's incidents were apparently caused by travelling Serbian fans who threw flares onto the pitch, threw flares at Italian fans (see the picture above), threw fireworks onto the pitch, burned a flag, and started dismantling barriers.

The violence, which appears to be an organized protest against the Serbian National Team, started prior to the match when Serbian fans threw flares at the team bus, resulting in an injury to Serbian goal keeper Vladimir Stojković.

At this point, it appears that fans of Red Star FC are being blamed for today's violence, as articles point out that Stojković recently left Red Star to join its fierce rival Partizan FC. UEFA's investigation into this matter will clarify the veracity of such claims.

In light of today's incidents, UEFA is likely to deem this match a 3-0 victory in favor of Italy.

Today's violence by Serbian fans comes on the heels of violence related to a gay pride parade that was held in Belgrade this past weekend. Sunday's violence in Belgrade is apparently being blamed on pro-fascist elements in Serbia.

As a side note, Neven Subotic, who grew up in Salt Lake City, Utah, was on the Serbian starting lineup for today's match.

Here is video from Genoa:

Achtung United States, Meet your New Midfielder, Jermaine Jones

After what feels like years of speculation, Jermaine Jones finally suited up for the U.S. National Team in Saturday night's 2-2 draw with Poland at Soldier Field in Chicago.

My first impression of how the young German born midfielder did in his first outing with the Red, White, & Blue - promising. The obvious contribution from Jones was his ability to make long, accurate passes, including one to Jozy Altidore that lead to the US's first goal in the 12th minute. As Jones adjusts to his teammates, and vice versa, his passing skills should help the team to stretch the field and more bite to their attack.

Until our next chance to watch Jones (probably on Tuesday when US plays Colombia), here's a glimpse at his past in Germany:

And They Call Soccer Fans Hooligans - The Friday Fights

Soccer fans aren't the only sports fans that cause trouble:

Toronto F.C. - Post Match Video After 2-1 Victory Over Houston Dynamo

On Saturday September 18, 2010, before a crowd of 16,435 at Robertson Stadium in Houston, Texas, Toronto FC managed to keep its playoff hopes alive with a 2-1 victory over the Houston Dynamo.

The Dynamo's Brian Ching scored the match's first goal in the 18th minute, but in the end it was former Dynamo player Dwayne De Rosario who won the match for Toronto with goals in the 60th and 94th minutes.

Here's some video from the Toronto locker room following the match, courtesy of Erin Dutka:

Dominic Kinnear: Season's Over

Houston Dynamo Coach Dominic Kinnear's press conference following the Dynamo's 2-1 loss to Toronto FC on Saturday September 18, 2010.

Episode 20 of the Zygo Soccer Report: Dynamo 1 - 2 Earthquakes

The San Jose Earthquakes came to Houston on Sunday night and beat the Dynamo, 2-1. Here's some post match audio from Eddie Robinson, Brad Davis, and Dominic Kinnear. Additionally, I give some brief thoughts on the Bob Bradley contract extension.

Landon Donovan & The Needless Markup League

I was still scratching my head over the events, or, more appropriately, lack of events, leading up to Monday night's announcement that US Soccer and Bob Bradley had agreed to a four year contract extension when I heard that, according to Martin Rogers of Yahoo! the retail price tag Major League Soccer had apparently affixed to Landon Donovan's head was $16 million. Since I have four years to express my opinion on keeping Bob Bradley around for another World Cup cycle with no evidence of US Soccer testing the waters of the international coaching market, the greed of MLS owners is a more immediate concern and priority in my opinion.

Anyone who is familiar with my opinions on labor issues in the world of professional sports knows that 99.99% of the time I'm on the side of labor; therefore, it should not be surprising that I'm outraged by the King's Ransom of a transfer fee that MLS has apparently placed on Landon Donovan, arguably one of the best American soccer players of his generation. Not only does this price tag show the blatant hypocrisy of MLS, which loathes having to pay transfer fees to bring players from other leagues to MLS, but should also serve as a bright red warning flag to young, talented players who are currently playing in MLS.

For almost ten years now, the fact that Landon Donovan was one of the best American Soccer players has been apparent. While his difficulties finding his true form in Germany are well documented, Donovan has proven to be a top tier player for MLS and the US National Team. It wasn't until this past Spring that the soccer world got to witness Donovan turning on his magic in a top flight foreign league, and the fact that this occurred at Everton in the English Premier League only gave Donovan a global stage on which to excel as he prepared for South Africa 2010.

In order to get MLS to agree to a loan deal with Everton, it appears that Donovan had to cave into MLS's demand for a four year contract extension, thereby preventing him from heading to Europe on a free transfer while still at the peak of his playing career. In the end it appears that by agreeing to the contract extension, Donovan made a Faustian deal that allowed him a small window of glory in the EPL, but a deal that will ultimately keep him in MLS until the owners no longer have any use for him. The amount of interest from top flight foreign clubs in the 28 year old Donovan will dwindle exponentially over the next four years, to the point that MLS will likely sell him off to the highest bidder after the 2014 World Cup finals in Brazil. So long as MLS overprices Donovan on the transfer fee market, the most he can hope for is one or two more short loan stints in Europe.

I hope that MLS proves me wrong and Donovan secures a good transfer before he turns 30, but more importantly, I hope that young, talented players in MLS have followed the Donovan situation closely and have taken it seriously. I suspect that it is my latter hope that will prove more realistic, in fact, based on recent Houston Dynamo history, I know that many of the younger players wised up to the MLS transfer situation long before I had.

In recent years, Houston Dynamo fans have seen players like Bobby Boswell, Nate Jaqua, and Joseph Ngweyna explore options in Europe following the expiration of their respective MLS contracts. More recently, Dynamo fans have seen Stuart Holden and Ricardo Clark, core Dynamo players, chose to follow their soccer dreams in Europe instead of signing new MLS contracts. As it stands, Dynamo fans are already debating whether Geoff Cameron will head to Europe when his contract expires after the 2011 MLS season or sign a contract extension.

My advice to Geoff Cameron, one of the most underpaid players in MLS, is: "Head East across the Atlantic young man!"

In fact, that's my advice to pretty much any young player in MLS with dreams of playing in Europe. If a MLS player believes he has the talent to play in Europe, he should always check out his options there after his MLS contract expires. Choosing to go on trial in Europe does not close the door on signing a new contract with MLS, but signing a new MLS contract before checking out Europe could result in MLS quashing the dream and the player left asking himself, "What if?"