James M. Barton
James focuses his practice on complex commercial litigation and
insurance coverage disputes. He has experience in a variety of high
value litigation, including corporate acquisition disputes,
valuation proceedings, restrictive covenant enforcement suits, and
mortgage backed securities claims. James's commercial litigation
experience includes:
- Breach of Contract Litigation (Michigan) - Recovered the full
value of a multi-million dollar bad-faith lawsuit settlement on
behalf of an insurer from the third party administrator whose
failures led to the bad faith lawsuit.
- Restrictive Covenant Litigation (Illinois) - Obtained a
multi-million dollar recovery on behalf of individual brokers whose
prior firm was seeking to deny them compensation and enforce
onerous restrictive covenants following their departure to a
competitor firm.
- Breach of Contract Litigation (New York) - Represented one of
three competing corporate groups in expedited injunctive
proceedings in a three-way lawsuit lawsuit over the management and
negotiated sale of a failing biofuel company.
- Derivative Litigation (New York) - Represented outside
directors in expedited injunctive proceedings in which plaintiffs
sought-and failed-to block a related-party transaction as unfair to
the subsidiary and its stockholders.
James represents both insurers and policy holders in coverage
analysis and litigation both large and small. James's insurance
coverage experience includes:
- Declaratory Judgment (California) - Represented an insurer in
declaratory judgment proceedings to determine coverage for a class
action lawsuit seeking more than $2 billion in damages for
violation of California privacy laws regarding the operation of
toll roads.
- Declaratory Judgment (Indiana) - Represented a manufacturer /
policy holder in a declaratory judgment action against more than 20
insurers to determine coverage under dozens of policies spanning
more than a decade for two product liability class action lawsuits
seeking hundreds of millions.
- Coverage Analysis (California) - Analyzed and advised on
competing principles of California law as applied to a
multiple-insured, multiple-claim exposure in excess of policy
limits arising from the 2017 California Railroad Fire.