UNITED STATES 14 September 2020 Major League Baseball Properties
United States District Court, Southern District of New York, 14 September 2020, 1:19-cv-8669-MKV
(Major League Baseball Properties, Inc. v. Corporacion de Television y Microonda Rafa, S.A.)
UNITED STATES 14 September 2020 Major League Baseball Properties
Major League Baseball Properties sought confirmation of an AAA award under the New York Convention. The respondent did not dispute that the petitioner had made a threshold showing of an award in its favor and had properly moved to have the award confirmed in federal court. Rather, it opposed confirmation on the grounds that there were "critical disputed issues of fact" with respect to the selection of the sole arbitrator, and the arbitrator's process for determining attorneys' fees. This, it claimed, made summary judgment improper. The Court disagreed. It reasoned that the selection process did not raise a question of fact, because whether the arbitration tribunal was properly constituted was not a disputed fact here but rather a contested legal conclusion drawn from facts that were not disputed. The Court concluded that the appointment of the arbitrator had taken place according to the applicable AAA rules. Further, the defendant did not point to a single disputed fact pertaining to the award of attorneys' fees, simply describing that decision as "erroneous" and "improper". This argument was unsuccessful, because the Court held that the determination of attorney fees in the present case did not constitute manifest disregard of the law.
The court discusses the principle that the procedure for the enforcement of awards under the Convention is governed by the lex fori, as well as procedural issues (such as the competent enforcement court) not falling under the specific cases of ¶¶ 302-307.