Top Defense Results: McCourt v. McCourt

Five months after Los Angeles Dodgers executive Jamie McCourt accepted $130 million plus other assets in a divorce settlement, her ex-husband, team owner Frank McCourt, sold the team for a record $2 billion.

The sale prompted Jamie McCourt to file a motion to vacate the judgment and seek hundreds of millions more on the grounds of fraud and other claims. She argued that she had been misled about the value of the team and asked for $770 million more.

Sullivan & Cromwell LLP partner Robert A. Sacks entered the dispute to defend against these claims. As a Dodgers executive, Jamie McCourt had extensive access to documentation, but the value of the team was "inherently uncertain," he said.

"In discovery, she had been provided with innumerable analyses of various rights the team had," the Los Angles-based partner added.

"Documents she claimed she didn't see had been produced to her lawyers during discovery in the divorce, she just hadn't bothered to personally read them," he said.

After a hearing, Los Angeles County Superior Court Judge Scott Gordon sided with Sacks, denying Jamie McCourt's claim that she had been misled. McCourt v. McCourt, BD514309 (Los Angeles Sup. Ct., filed Oct. 27, 2009).

The couple, who are the parents of four children, split in January 2012.

Plaintiff's attorney Bertram Fields, who had served as Jamie McCourt's counsel earlier in the proceedings but left, returned to argue this motion on her behalf.

For his part, he believes that a higher court will take up his intended appeal for a different resolution. "We always said this was a case that would be decided by an appellate court if not the Supreme Court, so we are pursuing that remedy," he said.

- Chase Scheinbaum

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