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Essential Corporate News – Week ending 23 May 2025
The Companies and Limited Liability Partnerships (Annotation) Regulations 2025 and an accompanying Explanatory Memorandum were published on 14 May 2025.
The doctrine of in pari delicto bars a party that has been damaged as a result of its own intentional wrongdoing from recovering those damages from “another party whose equal or lesser fault contributed to the loss.” Rosenbach v. Diversified Grp., 85 A.D.3d 569, 570 (1st Dep’t 2011).
The doctrine finds its roots in two rationales. First, courts are not inclined to interject and resolve “a dispute between two wrongdoers” as in pari delicto seeks to avoid the courts from becoming the “referee between thieves.” Kirschner v. KPMG, 15 N.Y.3d 446, 464 (2010). Second, the doctrine denies judicial relief to the one engaged in illegal conduct. Bateman Eichler, Hill Richards v. Berner, 472 U.S. 299, 306 (1985).
The term comes from the Latin maxim “in pari delicto potior est conditio defendentis,” which means “in a case of equal or mutual fault … the position of the defending party … is the better one.” While the doctrine’s original focus was on illegal acts and illegal contracts, as discussed below, it has since been significantly expanded to other types of wrongdoing, including civil wrongs.
Read the full article from New York Law Journal, "Conduct that falls within the doctrine of "in pari delicto"."
Publication
The Companies and Limited Liability Partnerships (Annotation) Regulations 2025 and an accompanying Explanatory Memorandum were published on 14 May 2025.
Publication
In a recent decision, Matco Tools Corporation v. Canada (Attorney General), the Federal Court has overturned a Commissioner of Patents (the Commissioner) decision regarding a patent applicant failing to meet the “due care” standard in the context of an unpaid maintenance fee.
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