Alumni Magazine - Spring 2008 - (Page 72) Persons, who was elected student body president while at Tech and worked as sports editor for the Technique. “Emory law school had an excellent night program with the same faculty as the day classes, so I went there two nights a week. Then I quit my job at Southern Bell and went full time to finish my last year and graduated in 1967.” A senior partner with Alston & Bird in Atlanta and past chair of the firm’s litigation practice, Persons specializes in securities litigation at the trial and appellate levels, in particular defending companies in class-action suits. His most recent case attracted national attention as Persons headed Scientific Atlanta’s legal defense team in Stoneridge Investment Partners vs. Scientific Atlanta and Motorola. At issue was whether or not third-party vendors with no disclosure or reporting obligations to investors could be held liable for the actions of the primary violator of the law. No Liability Under Law he defense was bolstered by 15 amicus curiae briefs submitted by interested parties including NASDAQ, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and the National Association of Manufacturers. The plaintiff’s side included an equal number of amicus filings. The case arose after investors in Charter Communications sued the cable TV company, arguing that it had fraudulently inflated earnings reports. After settling with Charter, investors filed a classaction suit against Scientific Atlanta and Motorola, charging the two vendors with aiding Charter’s scheme to defraud. For its part, Scientific Atlanta was alleged to have sold digital cable boxes to Charter at inflated prices, then used the overpayments to purchase advertising on Charter’s system. The litigation began in 2003 and worked its way through the federal court in St. Louis, the 8th Circuit Court of Appeals and then to the Supreme Court. Along the way there were disparate rulings on the similar legal issue in different cases in the 9th and 5th Circuit Courts of Appeal. In a landmark 5-3 decision issued Jan. 15, the high court decided in favor of the defendants. The court found that Scientific Atlanta and Motorola were too far removed from any investor deception at Charter to justify liability by them under the law. This narrow reading of the federal securities statute means that defrauded investors must direct their legal efforts toward the offending corporation itself and not third parties, even if they allegedly participated in the scheme. Justice Stephen G. Breyer did not participate in the decision. Siding with the majority, Justice Anthony M. Kennedy wrote, “It was Charter, not [Scientific Atlanta and Motorola] that misled its auditor and filed fraudulent financial statements. Nothing [the vendors] did made it necessary or inevitable for Charter to record the transactions as it did.” T “You have to be able to step back, figure out what the end game is and stay on course,” Alston & Bird associate Robert Long says. “Oscar does that with a grace and professionalism that makes it look easy.” 72 Georgia Tech Alumni Magazine • Spring 2008
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