{"id":149433,"date":"2020-06-24T10:09:26","date_gmt":"2020-06-24T14:09:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.thedetroitbureau.com\/?p=149433"},"modified":"2020-06-24T10:12:09","modified_gmt":"2020-06-24T14:12:09","slug":"judge-orders-gm-fca-ceos-to-meet-to-resolve-waste-of-time-lawsuit","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thedetroitbureau.com\/2020\/06\/judge-orders-gm-fca-ceos-to-meet-to-resolve-waste-of-time-lawsuit\/","title":{"rendered":"Judge Orders GM, FCA CEOs to Meet to Resolve “Waste of Time” Lawsuit"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"<\/a>
A federal judge ordered GM Chairman and CEO Mary Barra to meet with her counterpart at Fiat Chrysler to resolve GM’s lawsuit against FCA.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

A federal judge has labeled the lawsuit General Motors filed against Fiat Chrysler Automobiles, claiming the FCA had conspired with corrupt officials from the United Auto Workers to put GM at competitive disadvantage on labor costs, \u201ca waste of time.\u201d<\/p>\n

Following a hearing in U.S. District Court,\u00a0Judge Paul Borman ordered the top executive from both companies to meet during the next week to resolve their differences about the suit filed last November in which GM claimed more than $1 billion in damages because FCA had conspired with UAW officials.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat a waste of time and resources, now and for the years to come in this mega litigation, if these automotive leaders and their large teams of lawyers, are required to focus significant time-consuming efforts to pursue this “nuclear option” lawsuit, if it goes forward.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

(General Motors sues Fiat Chrysler, claims bribery of UAW cost it billions.)<\/a><\/strong><\/em><\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cI am ordering that no later than July 1, 2020, just the two CEOs, Mary Barra and Michael Manley, meet in person (social distancing), to reach a sensible resolution of this huge legal distraction,\u201d Borman said in written statement after the hearing concluded.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>
FCA Chief Exec Mike Manley has been told by a federal judge he must meet in person with GM CEO Mary Barra to find a resolution to GM’s suit against his company.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

In a statement, GM said while it had a \u201cvery strong\u201d racketeering case but GM\u2019s CEO Mary Barra was looking forward to \u201cconstructive dialogue with FCA consistent with the Court\u2019s order.\u201d<\/p>\n

FCA lawyers, in the briefs field the U.S. District Court in Detroit, have said that GM\u2019s claims bear no resemblance to what Congress had in mind in enacting the RICO law.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe agree with Judge Borman\u2019s observation that these are extraordinary times for our country, particularly in light of the COVID-19 pandemic and the tragic death of George Floyd and the spotlight it has focused on racism and social justice,\u201d FCA said in a statement after the hearing.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe also agree that FCA\u2019s focus should continue to be \u2013 as it always has been \u2013 on building great vehicles for our customers and expanding opportunities for the thousands of women and men whose livelihood depends on that focus,\u201d\u00a0the post-hearing statement said.<\/p>\n

\u201cOur view of GM\u2019s lawsuit has not changed. As we have said from the date it was filed, the lawsuit is meritless, and it should be withdrawn. We therefore acknowledge Judge Borman\u2019s concerns, and look forward to meeting to discuss them and ideally put this matter behind us.\u201d<\/p>\n

(FCA getting ready to ask court to dismiss GM lawsuit.)<\/strong><\/em><\/a><\/span><\/p>\n

In previous court filing, FCA has asked Borman to dismiss the lawsuit.\u00a0Borman has not granted FCA\u2019s motion nor has he allowed\u00a0GM\u2019s lawyers to proceed to discovery, which would give them entry into FCA\u2019s corporate records.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>
Alphons Iacobelli, right, is serving \u00a05.5 years in prison for his role in the FCA-UAW training fund scandal, including paying off the mortgage of UAW VP General Holiefield, left, who died before the scandal broke.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

However, many of FCA\u2019s corporate records already are in the hands of federal attorneys investigating the wide-ranging corruption case that has led to the criminal convictions of former FCA Vice President of Labor Relations Alphons Iacobelli and two other former executives and 10 UAW officers and officials as well as the wife of the late General Holiefield, who was a close ally of former FCA CEO Sergio Marchionne, who died in 2018.<\/p>\n

However, FCA lawyers have said that GM does not plausibly allege that FCA acquired an interest in, or maintained control of, the UAW. GM patched together a case built on documents pulled from an ongoing federal investigation into corruption in the UAW.<\/p>\n

FCA lawyers noted, \u201cRather than plausibly alleging that the UAW is a criminal enterprise controlled by FCA, GM focuses on goods and services obtained by certain former UAW employees with assistance from certain former FCA employees, which allegedly constituted \u201cprohibited payments\u201d under the federal Labor Management Relations Act.<\/p>\n

\u201cBut no matter how often GM refers to indictments and plea agreements, there is nothing in the Complaint that ties the alleged prohibited payments to negotiation of collective bargaining agreements between GM and the UAW \u2014 much less the outcome of such negotiations, which supposedly put GM at some competitive disadvantage vis-\u00e0-vis FCA. In other words, GM\u2019s own complaint establishes only that it is at most a mere bystander with regard to the alleged prohibited payments,\u201d FCA lawyers said in a brief.<\/p>\n

Borman, in offering a rationale between the GM and FCA CEOs, noted the two companies benefitted from help of U.S. taxpayers and should instead focus on helping the U.S. address its current problems.<\/p>\n

(FCA asks judge to dismiss GM lawsuit.)<\/strong><\/span><\/em><\/a><\/p>\n

In 2008, and going forward, the Federal Government focused on rescuing GM and Chrysler, by providing billions of dollars in aid.\u00a0That saved GM and Chrysler, now FCA, and tens of thousands of UAW auto workers’ jobs.\u00a0Today our country needs, and deserves, that these now-healthy great companies pay us back, by also focusing on rescuing this country and its citizens from the plagues of COVID-19, racism, and injustice, while building the best motor vehicles in the world,\u201d Borman said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

U.S. District Court,\u00a0Judge Paul Borman ordered the top executive from both companies to meet during the next week to resolve their differences about the suit filed last November in which GM claimed more than $1 billion in damages because FCA had conspired with UAW officials, reports TheDetroitBureau.com.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":20009,"featured_media":113023,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mo_disable_npp":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[7,8,5,11,13],"tags":[],"make":[51,58],"post-state":[],"category_old":[118,150,151,123,173,299,191,243,138,308,132,125,288,304,141],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thedetroitbureau.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/149433"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thedetroitbureau.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thedetroitbureau.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thedetroitbureau.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/20009"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thedetroitbureau.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=149433"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/thedetroitbureau.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/149433\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thedetroitbureau.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/113023"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thedetroitbureau.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=149433"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thedetroitbureau.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=149433"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thedetroitbureau.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=149433"},{"taxonomy":"make","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thedetroitbureau.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/make?post=149433"},{"taxonomy":"post-state","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thedetroitbureau.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/post-state?post=149433"},{"taxonomy":"category_old","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thedetroitbureau.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/category_old?post=149433"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}