Compagnie des Grands Hotels d'Afrique SA v Starman Hotel Holdings LLC - United States District Court District of Delaware Case No 1-18-cv-00654-SB-SRF - Memorandum Opinion - 8 August 2023
Country
Year
2023
Summary
BIBAS, Circuit Judge, sitting by designation.
Limited liability is the heart of the corporate form. Corporations may struggle, fail, and even breach contracts without forfeiting it. So disregarding limited liability by piercing the corporate veil is an extreme step. Courts will do so only when a corporation has abused its status egregiously.
Woodman, a Moroccan hotel-management corporation, breached its contract with Moroccan hotel-owner Compagnie. Because Woodman is broke, Compagnie now seeks to recover from Woodman's Delaware parent, Starman. But Woodman did not egregiously abuse its corporate status; it just failed. And failure alone does not justify the extreme remedy of veil piercing. So I deny Compagnie's motion for summary judgment and grant Starman's.
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COMPLAINT - Plaintiff Compagnie des Grands Hôtels d'Afrique S.A. ("CGHA") brings this action under the Convention on the Recognition and Enforcement of Foreign Arbitral Awards of June 10, 1958 ("New York Convention") to enforce against Defendant Starwood Capital Group Global I LLC ("Starwood Capital Group") and Starman Hotel Holdings LLC ("Starman") an arbitral award dated May 6, 2015, by the ICC International Court of Arbitration in London, United Kingdom in favor of CGHA against Woodman Maroc S.à.r.l. ("Woodman" or "Judgment-Debtor Woodman").