Defence minister Peter Dutton has won $35,000 in damages in a defamation case over a tweet accusing him of being a rape apologist, with a judge finding the tweet conveyed that the minister “excuses rape”.
Ashurst has picked up a leading insolvency partner from Norton Rose Fulbright who advised on the restructure of the beleagured Arrium Group.
A judge overseeing a climate change class action against the government will be invited to visit the Torres Strait to see the alleged erosion of sacred sites, but before then the Commonwealth is seeking details on when it allegedly knew of the effects of global warming and the scope of its alleged duty of care.
Melbourne-based joint venture Shepparton Partners Collective has lost its appeal of a $1.2 million judgment that found it infringed software developer QAD’s copyright by failing to pay a transfer fee to retain the licence after it acquired the iconic SPC Ardmona cannery in Victoria from Coca-Cola Amatil for $40 million.
ASIC has won its bid to wind up accused Sydney fraudster Melissa Caddick’s company and appoint final receivers to realise her assets, paving the way for some repayment to the dozens of family and friends who invested with Caddick and are still owed $23.5 million.
Bristol-Myers Squib unit Celgene Corporation has sued Indian generics giant Dr Reddy’s Laboratories for allegedly threatening to infringe eight patents for its blockbuster cancer drug Revlimid, which raked in US$12 billion for the US-based company in revenue last year.
IP Australia has won its appeal of a judge’s decision to allow four Aristocrat patents for its popular Lightning Link electronic poker machine to proceed to grant, with the Full Court finding the invention merely implemented an abstract idea on a computer and was not patentable.
Mayfair 101 director James Mawhinney is seeking disciplinary action against ASIC’s lawyers over a media release accusing him of breaching a 20-year ban on raising funds and which disclosed the regulator had asked a court to hold him in contempt.
A former partner at accounting firm Pitcher Partners has told a court that he had issues working with Ernst & Young on an audit of law firm Slater & Gordon, calling the Big 4 firm “uncooperative”.
A former partner at accounting firm Pitcher Partners has testified during a shareholder class action trial that he should have questioned statements about the viability of Slater & Gordon’s $1.2 billion Quindell acquisition, but ran out of time because its audit of the firm went “off the rails”.