Beck, Richardson and Pfeiffer Win Appellate Victory for New York Law Firm
February 20, 2009David Beck, Michael Richardson and Connie Pfeiffer successfully secured a dismissal for the New York-based law firm of Proskauer Rose from a tax shelter case in which the plaintiff was the prominent Houston trial attorney George M. Fleming.
Pfeiffer handled the appeal to Houston’s 14th Court of Appeals, which reversed the lower court’s special appearance ruling and determined that the district court did not have personal jurisdiction over Proskauer Rose. Fleming’s suit alleged that his personal investment companies, which Ernst & Young developed—and which Proskauer Rose allegedly said were more likely than not to be permissible under the tax code—resulted in huge losses when an Internal Revenue Services audit found the companies to be unlawful. The 14th Court of Appeals unanimously found that the trial court could not exercise general or specific jurisdiction over Proskauer Rose. See Proskauer Rose L.L.P. v. Pelican Trading, Inc., 2009 WL 242993 (Tex. App.—Houston [14th Dist.] Feb. 03, 2009).