New York (April 8, 2022) Capping a two-day trial, Carter Ledyard & Milburn LLP lawyers secured a complete victory for client Dengrong Zhou as Plaintiff in Delaware Chancery Court Section 225 Action, Dengrong Zhou v. Long Deng, No. 2021-0026-JRS, 2022 Del. Ch. LEXIS 79 (Ch. Apr. 6, 2022). The case was a highly pitched battle of corporate board seats in Delaware, with many of the witnesses and documents being in Chinese.
The Court found that a group of shareholders, led by Mr. Zhou, was entitled to replace board members of iFresh, Inc. (which was listed on NASDAQ at the outset of litigation), including Defendant Long Deng, the Company’s CEO. The trial followed more than a year of complex discovery from witnesses in the United States and China, and featured allegations by Defendants that the voted shares were obtained through aiding and abetting breaches of fiduciary duty, breach of contract or fraud. The Court’s well-reasoned decision rejected all of those theories, and found that Defendants, Deng and Fang, were validly removed as directors of iFresh, with Carter Ledyard’s client entitled to recoverable prevailing party costs and expenses under Chancery Rule 54(d).
The 8-member legal team was composed of partner, Chair of the China Practice Group Pang Zhang-Whitaker, the trial team led by partners Alex Malyshev and Matt Dunn, with support from associate Meredith Spelman, partner Steve Plotnick, paralegal Mara Leff, and local counsel partner Peter Ladig and associate Sarah Andrade of Bayard P.A.