Bailey Brauer Quarterly Newsletter – March ’15
Firm News - March 2015 Bailey Brauer client JBS USA LLC and Swift Pork Co. won the dismissal of a nuisance lawsuit filed by multiple plaintiffs over the JBS Louisville Pork Plant’s use of a parking lot near the processing plant in the Butchertown area of Louisville, Kentucky. Attorney Clayton Bailey was a guest speaker at the 2015 Louisiana Poultry Seminar held in Shreveport, Louisiana. Attorney Alex Brauer was named to the 2015 Texas Rising Stars list, marking the sixth consecutive year that attorney Brauer was selected by the publisher of Rising Stars. Attorney Ben Stewart was featured in articles published by the Dallas Morning News and The Texas Lawbook addressing shadow banking and a recent decline in Texas business bankruptcy filings. Texas law may be changing regarding the ability to recover attorney’s fees in breach of contract cases. In the past, successful plaintiffs in breach of contract cases were able to recover their reasonable attorney’s fees from defendants under Section 38.001 of the Civil Practice and Remedies Code. Recent decisions from the Houston Court of Appeals and a Dallas federal district court may limit this ability if the defendant is a partnership or limited liability company. Texas law follows the “American Rule” when it comes to recovery of attorney’s fees in a litigation matter. The American Rule provides that each party must pay its own attorney’s fees. You may have heard that despite the American Rule, parties in Texas can recover their attorney’s fees if they are the prevailing plaintiff in a breach of contract case. This ability generally arises in one of two ways: (1) the contract at issue contains a clause providing that the prevailing party in a dispute can recover its