593 F. Supp. 2d 834 - Braunstein v. Pickens’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

Most-quoted passages

The sentences later courts lift from this opinion, ranked by how many decisions quote each — the parts of the opinion doing the work. These counts are smaller than the citation total above because most of the 1 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. “Defendant claims that, “[t]he simple statement in the Hypothecation Agreement is, ‘Pickens shall not remain personally liable for any deficiency.’ This is a one sentence statement. It does not have any contingencies surrounding it.” The Court disagrees. If this were, in fact, “a one sentence statement,” without “any contingencies surrounding it,” then Defendant would have been immediately released from any obligation as soon as Plaintiffs signed the Hypothecation Agreement. However, this would have run directly counter to the express purpose of the Hypothecation Agreement, which was to ensure that Defendant paid the small fraction of the damages he had allegedly caused to Plaintiffs [as] he had previously promised. Here, Defendant seeks to avoid this obligation. The most logical reading of the portion of the Hypothecation Agreement in question is that Defendant would be released from his obligation upon sale of the stock.... Plaintiffs clearly were not simply releasing Defendant from his obligations. Instead, they were seeking some security that Defendant would in fact perform these obligations, by reserving the right to sell the shares of stock in question to obtain what was due to them. Here, the stock was never sold, Defendant acknowledges that no attempt to sell the stock was ever [made], and Defendant acknowledges that the stock is no longer in Plaintiffs’ possession. Exactly why Plaintiffs’ counsel demanded the shares of stock and then refused possession and sale of the”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majority
   e.g. Braunstein v. Pickens

2. “Plaintiffs essentially seek a judgment affirming Defendant’s obligation to pay them $250,000 plus the relevant interest rate under the promissory note. The essential facts that form the basis of Plaintiffs’ claim is undisputed — Plaintiffs obtained a judgment against Defendant for $2,886,994.64 plus interest and attorneys’ fees, but agreed to drop that judgment in exchange for the $250,000 plus interest provided for in the promissory note. Defendant acknowledged that he defaulted on this amount. The only question, therefore, was whether mailing Plaintiffs the stock certificate discharged all obligation on the part of Defendant. ... [Mjailing the stock certificate without any sort of endorsement failed to confer the legal rights upon the Plaintiffs which are attendant to owning stock. Since Plaintiffs could take no legal action with regard to the stock, Defendant was still the proper legal owner of the stock, and when Plaintiffs then specifically refused to accept the stock as a discharge of Defendant’s obligations under the promissory note and filed a legal action, Defendant remained the actual owner of the stock in the Code Corporation. Therefore, Defendant still owes Plaintiffs the $250,000 plus interest he promised to pay them under the terms of the promissory note.”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majority
   e.g. Braunstein v. Pickens

3. “Plaintiffs raised [the “endorsement” theory] in their Motion to Amend and their Motion for Summary Judgment, which were filed simultaneously. This was a purely legal question, which Defendant had ample opportunity to address but chose not to, and an issue on which the facts were plainly clear and in need of no further discovery. Defendant does not dispute that he mailed Plaintiffs the stock certificate without properly transferring it through endorsement. No additional amount of time, discovery, or legal debate would change these undisputed facts, nor would it change the court’s holding that -without a proper legal transfer of the stock shares, Plaintiffs could not have sold the shares and therefore the portion of the Hypothecation Agreement which Defendant’s entire case is reliant upon never came into play and thus offers him no protection.”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majority
   e.g. Braunstein v. Pickens