Can I set aside my Palm Beach arbitration award? Third District Court of Appeals Arbitration Case.

Have you moved a Palm Beach probate dispute into arbitration?    Are you unhappy with the award? You may be able to set aside the award. Take a look at what the Third District Court of Appeal had to say about the matter in a case filed yesterday.

Arbitration

• Arbitration is an alternative dispute resolution mechanism where the parties take their dispute to a neutral arbitrator who renders a judgment that the Palm Beach court then enters and enforces.
• Arbitration is often a lot quicker than court and is less formal than an all out Delray Beach evidentiary hearing.
• A Boynton Beach court cannot order arbitration unless the parties consent usually through an arbitration clause that is part of an agreement.
• One of the largest drawbacks of arbitration is the lack of review. There is no such thing as an arbitrator of an appeal. You have to go to the state (or federal) court and tell the court how the arbitrator denied your due process.
• Do you know what actions an arbitrator can take that would violate due process?
• Another reason an arbitration award may be vacated or set aside is because the tribunal lacked jurisdiction over a particular dispute.
• Often a tribunal will only have partial jurisdiction over a dispute, for example Palm Beach Probate litigators hate to take a good jury trial into arbitration and if they can sever the issues they very well may.
• What happens when an arbitration tribunal gives you the answer you do not want? Do you know how to set aside such a decision?

Setting Aside an Arbitration Finding: Laquer v. Falcone, filed April 22, 2015

• The Third District Court of Appeals hears appeals in and for Miami-Dade and Monroe County.
• The Court heard a case regarding a dispute that went to arbitration. Basically before the arbitration went through the party who brought the action settled with all the parties. Unfortunately for her, she had a lawsuit pressed against her by one of those parties thatalso went to the same tribunal. The tribunal found for that party in the arbitration.
• On appeal the Court noted that it had very limited authority to set aside an arbitrator’s award but this was one of those cases. When the initial lawsuit was settled the court said the tribunal lost its jurisdiction as such it had no authority to offer an award.
• Do you agree? Should the counter claim be forced out of the tribunal just because the initial suit was settled?

Want to learn even more? Check out the entire case by clicking here.