Breach of Contract Attorney in Minneapolis, Minnesota

Representation of Bond Orders

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The basic resolution 876 case went on for many years. It was we represented a number of bondholders who had industrial revenue bonds that had been issued by the same ____ port authority under basic resolution 876. And the port authority had issued over many, many years probably over $200 million worth of these bonds and there were over $50 million outstanding when in about 2006 the port authority wanted to terminate their obligations under the bonds and pay the bondholders a small percentage of the amounts owed and be done with it.

And we intervened on behalf of bondholders and said this is a contract, you can’t just amend and terminate a contract and not make full payment. And the legal issue in the case that went to the Minnesota Supreme Court was whether or not the port authority could use the Minnesota trust statute that allows courts to amend or alter trusts to amend and alter these bond contracts. And we lost that issue at the Ramsey County District Court, we lost that issue at the Minnesota Court of Appeals, and fortunately, the Minnesota Supreme Court took review of the case and we won a unanimous decision reversing that.

So courts can’t amend contracts, and we were ultimately successful in achieving a very favorable resolution with the port authority and our bondholders are receiving money today and they’ll continue to receive money for another 20 years.

Minneapolis commercial litigation and professional liability defense attorney Keith Broady discusses his representation of bond orderers.

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