Hon. Stuart E. Palmer (Ret.) joins JAMS after a highly regarded 22 year career as a Justice of the Illinois Appellate Court and Judge of the Circuit Court of Cook County, Illinois. Throughout his judicial career, Justice Palmer presided over the trials and settlement of many of the most complex matters that came before the courts, including thousands of civil and criminal matters at all stages of litigation. As a chancery judge and an appellate justice, Palmer received consistent high praise for his handling of a wide variety of complex commercial disputes.
Throughout his career on the bench, Justice Palmer has been a proponent of pretrial settlement as well as arbitration in order to avoid the expense, delay and uncertainty of protracted litigation.
Justice Palmer has special business/commercial expertise in the following areas/matters:
Representative Matters
Presided over and settled numerous matters involving:
- Breach of contract disputes in the areas of internet commerce, licensing, mechanics liens and letters of credit
- Interpretation of contractual provisions and the covenant of good faith and fair dealing, including:
- a claim for damages and request for injunctive relief which resulted from a leading internet reservations site that removed two nationally recognized rental car companies from the opening page of its website during a dispute
- a licensing dispute involving the NCAA surrounding the use of the term "March Madness" on a cellular network
- presided over and settled several mortgage foreclosure actions that involved claims of mortgage fraud in the area of mortgage rescues
- presided over the breach of contract claim and declaratory judgment action involving a local superstar athlete and an individual claiming breach of an agreement not to sue
- Corporate/Partnership matters including:
- Presided over numerous LLC and partnership disputes from the injunctive relief stage, accountings and through trial, including:
- Dissolutions/disassociations
- Claims of fraud and breach of fiduciary duty, including the pre-trial litigation and trial of a dispute between the members of an LLC that controlled a major entertainment complex in Chicago involving claims of fraud and for punitive damages
- Presided over the trial of an accounting request by a dissatisfied partner concerning his multimillion dollar investment in an apartment complex in a suburb north of Chicago.
- Shareholders rights and shareholders derivative actions
