Grigsby & Associates appealed an order confirming an arbitration award of compensatory damages and attorney fees to M Securities, in a dispute relating to underwriting fees owed in a municipal bond transaction. Grigsby claimed that the award should be vacated because the defendants waived their right to arbitration after filing four lawsuits concerning the bond transaction over ten years. The Eleventh Circuit held, however, that despite the prior lawsuits, M Securities still had not “substantial[ly] invoke[d] the litigation machinery prior to demanding arbitration.” M Securities did not effectuate service against Grigsby in three of the lawsuits, and the fourth litigation did not progress beyond the filing stage. And while delay in seeking arbitration generally weighs in favor of finding waiver, it must be coupled with other substantial conduct “inconsistent with an intent to arbitrate,” which M Securities did not display here. Nor did Grigsby demonstrate prejudice given “the extremely limited nature” of the prior lawsuits. Grigsby & Associates, Inc. v. M Securities Investment, Case No. 13-15208 (11th Cir. Dec. 28, 2015).
This post written by Joshua S. Wirth, a law clerk at Carlton Fields Jorden Burt in Washington, DC.
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