Articles Posted in DOJ Antitrust Highlights

On February 6, 2008, Ohio-based Alliance National Limited Partnership, which does business as DeMilta Iron & Metal Ltd. (“DeMilta Iron”), and its owner, Francis DeMilta, were indicted by a federal grand jury for conspiring to allocate scrap metal suppliers in Northeast Ohio. The indictment charges Mr. DeMilta and the company with participating in a conspiracy…

On January 24, 2008 the DOJ announced that it will require Pearson Plc to divest assets relating to three clinical testing markets in order to proceed with Pearson’s proposed $950 million acquisition of Harcourt Assessment. The DOJ claimed that the deal would have resulted in higher prices to purchasers of clinical tests, including many school…

Two U.S. Department of Defense (“DOD”) contractors were arrested in New York City on January 6, 2008, and charged with conspiring to steal information relating to DOD contracts to supply fuel to DOD aircraft worldwide. Two contractor firms and a third individual are also charged with participating in the conspiracies. The Department said the conspiracies…

On November 7, 2007, the Department of Justice announced that Mister A.C. Ltd. (Mister A.C.), a Rockville Center, N.Y. heating, ventilation and air conditioning (HVAC) services company and its owner, Michael Vignola, pleaded guilty in U.S. District Court in Manhattan for rigging bids to NYPH from approximately 2002 until January of 2006. Mr. Vignola also…

On October 24, 2007, the Department of Justice (“DOJ”) announced that it will require two of the nation’s largest newsprint manufacturers – Abitibi-Consolidated Inc. and Bowater Inc.- to divest a newsprint mill in Arizona. As originally laid out, the DOJ alleged that the $1.6 billion transaction would have considerably hampered competition in the production and…

On November 13, 2007, the Department of Justice announced that it reached a settlement that will require Vulcan Materials Company and Florida Rock Industries Inc. to divest eight quarries that produce coarse aggregate in Georgia, Tennessee and Virginia and one distribution yard in Virginia in order to proceed with their proposed $4.6 billion merger. The…

On October 9, 2007 the Federal Trade Commission entered into a settlement agreement with Kyphon, Inc. (“Kyphon”) that allows Kyphon to acquire the spinal assets of Disc-O-Tech Medical Technologies, Ltd. and Discotech Orthopedic Technologies, Inc. (collectively “Disc-O-Tech”). According to the complaint filed with the settlement agreement, the post-merger U.S. market for minimally invasive vertebral compression…

On September 27, FirstGroup plc entered into a settlement agreement with the DOJ for First Group to sell off a large school bus contract and associated assets in Alaska in order to progress with its acquisition of Laidlaw International Inc. Without the settlement agreement, the DOJ believed the transaction raised competition concerns in the provision…

On September 20, 2007, Mr. Jacobi, the president and owner of Jacobi Industries Inc., pled guilty to a felony charge of conspiring to rig bids on U.S. Department of Defense (“DOD”) contracts for military tiedown equipment and cargo securing systems. Under the plea agreement, Mr. Jacobi agreed to pay a criminal fine of $20,000, and…

On September 17, Thomas O. Barnett, Assistant Attorney General for the Department’s Antitrust Division, issued a statement scrutinizing the Court of First Instance of the European Communities (“CFI) decision to affirm the substance of the European Commission’s (“EC”) March 2004 decision against Microsoft. Mr. Barnett said that “in light of the United States’ own antitrust…