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SEC Attempts To Stick a Thumb in the Dike with New Guidelines for Use of...
One day following the Wall Street Journal’s blockbuster article about the SEC’s increased use of administrative enforcement actions, the SEC tried to quell the growing concern that the administrative...
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Upon Further Review, SEC Memo on Use of Administrative Courts Was Indeed a...
“Upon further review,” as they say in the NFL, was the SEC’s recent “Division of Enforcement Approach to Forum Selection in Contested Actions,” entitled to a better call than we gave it in our Friday...
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SEC ALJ Says He Lacks Authority To Decide Key Constitutional Challenges
On May 14, 2014, in In the Matter of Charles L. Hill, Jr., File No. 3-16383, SEC administrative law judge James Grimes ruled that he had no authority to decide that a portion of the Dodd-Frank Act...
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SEC ALJ James Grimes Issues Important Discovery Order Against SEC
In In the Matter of Charles L. Hill, Jr., File No. 3-16383, SEC Administrative Law Judge James E. Grimes issued a subpoena requested by Mr. Hill requiring that the SEC produce materials relevant to Mr....
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SEC Broadens Constitutional Inquiry into Its Own Administrative Judges in...
On May 27, 2015, the SEC agreed to expand its own consideration of constitutionality challenges to its administrative law adjudicative process. It issued an order asking for further briefing on...
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SEC Strengthens Appointments Clause Challenge to ALJs by Admitting It Was Not...
Court filings indicate that the SEC made a significant admission relevant to the constitutionality of its administrative law court during a hearing in the case brought by Lynn Tilton to enjoin the...
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SEC ALJ James Grimes Denies Request To Certify Discovery Ruling for...
We reported several days ago that SEC administrative law judge James Grimes approved a subpoena to the SEC for materials relating to the allegations by former SEC ALJ Lillian McEwen that she was...
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Former SEC Enforcement Leaders Urge SEC To Reform Administrative Enforcement...
Two former high-level SEC enforcement officials took on the SEC today in the Wall Street Journal, addressing “how to rein in” the SEC’s move towards shifting enforcement actions from federal courts to...
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SEC “Invites” ALJ Cameron Elliot To Provide Affidavit on Conversations...
In the administrative proceeding In the Matter of Timbervest, LLC et al., File No. 3-15519, the SEC issued an order “inviting” ALJ Cameron Elliot to provide an affidavit “addressing whether he has had...
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Court Issues Preliminary Injunction Halting Likely Unconstitutional SEC...
In a breakthrough development, Northern District of Georgia federal district judge Leigh Martin May found that Charles Hill, a respondent in a pending SEC administrative proceeding, had a “substantial...
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SEC ALJ Cameron Elliot Declines To Submit Affidavit “Invited” by the Commission
On June 4, 2015, we discussed the SEC’s Order in In the Matter of Timbervest LLC “inviting” administrative Law judge Cameron Elliot to submit an affidavit “addressing whether he has had any...
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Timbervest Files Complaint and TRO Motion To Halt SEC Proceeding
Today (June 12, 2015), Timbervest, LLC filed a complaint in federal court in the Northern District of Georgia seeking a halt to its ongoing SEC administrative proceeding, In the Matter of Timbervest,...
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SEC Says It Will Appeal Hill v. SEC Decision, Seek To Stay the Case, and Try...
An SEC June 15, 2015 filing in Hill v. SEC, No. 15-cv-1801 (N.D. Ga.), informed Judge Leigh Martin May that the Commission will appeal her June 8 ruling that the administrative proceeding In the Matter...
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SEC, Desperate To Avoid Judge May, Challenges Related Case Designation in...
The SEC really wants to avoid Judge Leigh Martin May — the Northern District of Georgia judge who ruled in Hill v. SEC that the appointment of SEC ALJ James Grimes violated the appointments clause of...
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SEC Argues Common “Facts” Are Not Common “Issues of Fact”— I Kid You Not
Yesterday, we described the SEC’s desperate attempt to nullify the assignment of the case Timbervest, LLC v. SEC to Judge Leigh Martin May. That was based on the argument that the other cases already...
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SEC Gambit To Avoid Judge May in Timbervest Case Seems To Have Failed
We previously wrote about the SEC’s desperate effort to avoid the assignment of Timbervest, LLC v. SEC, Civil Action No. 1:15-CV-2106 (N.D. Ga.), to District Judge Leigh Martin May. See SEC, Desperate...
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SEC Bumbles Efforts To Figure Out How Its Own Administrative Law Judges Were...
The SEC’s handling of the controversy over whether its administrative law judges were properly appointed under the Appointments Clause of Article II of the Constitution continues to amuse, or horrify,...
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Division of Enforcement Continues To Refuse To Comply with SEC Orders in...
Two days ago, we wrote about the Division of Enforcement’s refusal to comply with an SEC adjudicative order in In the Matter of Timbervest, LLC. Instead of complying with a Commission Order to supply...
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In U.S. v. Salman, Judge Rakoff Distinguishes Newman in 9th Circuit Opinion...
In an opinion issued July 6, 2015, a Ninth Circuit panel affirmed the insider trading conviction of Bessam Salman in the case captioned United States v. Salman, No. 14-10204 (9th Cir.). The opinion is...
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New, Thorough Academic Analysis of In re Flannery Shows Many Flaws in the...
One of the most important actions by the SEC over the past year was the far-reaching majority opinion of three commissioners in In the Matter of Flannery and Hopkins, SEC Release No. 3981, 2014 WL...
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