Source: http://www.justice.gov/atr/cases/f268100/268146.htm
Timestamp: 2013-05-20 00:34:56
Document Index: 516676104

Matched Legal Cases: ['§ 16', '§ 18', '§ 16', '§ 16', '§ 16', '§ 16', '§ 16', '§ 16', '§ 16']

Motion and Memorandum of the United States in Support of Entry of Final Judgment : U.S. v. L.B. Foster Company and Portec Rail Products, Inc.
PORTEC RAIL PRODUCTS, INC.	Defendant.
Pursuant to Section 2(b) of the Antitrust Procedures and Penalties Act, 15 U.S.C. § 16(b)-(h) ("APPA" or "Tunney Act"), plaintiff, the United States of America ("United States") moves for entry of the proposed Final Judgment filed in this civil antitrust proceeding. The proposed Final Judgment may be entered at this time without further hearing if the Court determines that entry is in the public interest. The Competitive Impact Statement ("CIS") filed in this matter on December 14, 2010, explains why entry of the proposed Final Judgment would be in the public interest. The United States is also filing a Certificate of Compliance, attached hereto as Exhibit A, which sets forth the steps taken by the parties to comply with all applicable provisions of the APPA and certifying that the statutory waiting period has expired.
On December 14, 2010, the United States filed a civil antitrust Complaint alleging that the proposed acquisition of Portec Rail Products, Inc. ("Portec") by L.B. Foster Company ("Foster") likely would substantially lessen competition in two separate product markets—bonded insulated rail joints ("bonded joints") and polyurethane-coated insulated rail joints ("poly joints")—in violation of Section 7 of the Clayton Act, 15 U.S.C. § 18. Foster and Portec were virtually the only manufacturers of bonded joints in the United States. The loss of competition from the acquisition likely would have resulted in higher prices, lower quality, less customer service, and less innovation in the development, manufacture, and sale of bonded joints in the United States. In addition, Foster and Portec were two of only three suppliers of poly joints in the United States. The loss of competition from the acquisition likely would have resulted in higher prices and less customer service in the development, manufacture, and sale of poly joints in the United States.
At the same time the Complaint was filed, the United States filed a Hold Separate Stipulation and Order ("Hold Separate Order") and a proposed Final Judgment, which are designed to eliminate the anticompetitive effects of the acquisition, and a CIS. The Court signed and entered the Hold Separate Order on December 15, 2010. Under the terms of the proposed Final Judgment, Foster is required to divest Portec's entire rail joint business,1 including Portec's only U.S. manufacturing facility, located in Huntington, West Virginia. Foster is also required to divest several other products currently manufactured in Portec's Huntington facility. The CIS explains the basis for the Complaint and the reasons why entry of the proposed Final Judgment would be in the public interest.
The Hold Separate Order provides that the proposed Final Judgment may be entered by the Court after the completion of the procedures required by the APPA. Entry of the proposed Final Judgment would terminate this action, except that the Court would retain jurisdiction to construe, modify, or enforce the provisions of the Final Judgment and to punish violations thereof.
The APPA requires a sixty-day period for the submission of public comments on a proposed Final Judgment. See 15 U.S.C. § 16(b). In compliance with the APPA, the United States filed the CIS on December 14, 2010; published the proposed Final Judgment and CIS in the Federal Register on December 20, 2010 (see 75 Fed. Reg. 79394); and published summaries of the terms of the proposed Final Judgment and CIS, together with directions for the submission of written comments relating to the proposed Final Judgment, in The Washington Post for seven days beginning on December 23, 2010 and ending on December 29, 2010. The sixty-day public comment period terminated on February 27, 2011, and the United States received no public comments. Simultaneously with this Motion and Memorandum, the United States is filing a Certificate of Compliance that states all the requirements of the APPA have been satisfied. It is now appropriate for the Court to make the public interest determination required by 15 U.S.C. § 16(e) and to enter the proposed Final Judgment.
The APPA requires that proposed consent judgments in antitrust cases brought by the United States be subject to a sixty-day comment period, after which the court shall determine whether entry of the proposed Final Judgment "is in the public interest." 15 U.S.C. § 16(e)(1). In making that determination in accordance with the statute, the court is required to consider:
15 U.S.C. § 16(e)(1)(A)-(B). In considering these statutory factors, the court's inquiry is necessarily a limited one as the government is entitled to "broad discretion to settle with the defendant within the reaches of the public interest." United States v. Microsoft Corp., 56 F.3d 1448, 1461 (D.C. Cir. 1995); see generally United States v. SBC Commc'ns, Inc., 489 F. Supp. 2d 1 (D.D.C. 2007) (assessing public interest standard under the Tunney Act); United States v. InBev N.V./S.A., 2009-2 Trade Cas. (CCH) 76,736, 2009 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 84787, No. 08-1965 (JR), at *3 (D.D.C. Aug. 11, 2009) (noting that the court's review of a consent judgment is limited and only inquires "into whether the government's determination that the proposed remedies will cure the antitrust violations alleged in the complaint was reasonable, and whether the mechanisms to enforce the final judgment are clear and manageable.").
As the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia has held, under the APPA, a court considers, among other things, the relationship between the remedy secured and the specific allegations set forth in the government's complaint, whether the decree is sufficiently clear, whether enforcement mechanisms are sufficient, and whether the decree may positively harm third parties. See Microsoft, 56 F.3d at 1458-62. With respect to the adequacy of the relief secured by the decree, a court may not "engage in an unrestricted evaluation of what relief would best serve the public." United States v. BNS, Inc., 858 F.2d 456, 462 (9th Cir. 1988) (citing United States v. Bechtel Corp., 648 F.2d 660, 666 (9th Cir. 1981)); see also Microsoft, 56 F.3d at 1460-62; United States v. Alcoa, Inc., 152 F. Supp. 2d 37, 40 (D.D.C. 2001); InBev, 2009 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 84787, at *3. Courts have held that:
Bechtel, 648 F.2d at 666 (emphasis added) (citations omitted).2 In determining whether a proposed settlement is in the public interest, the court "must accord deference to the government's predictions about the efficacy of its remedies, and may not require that the remedies perfectly match the alleged violations." SBC Commc'ns, 489 F. Supp. 2d at 17; see also Microsoft, 56 F.3d at 1461 (noting the need for courts to be "deferential to the government's predictions as to the effect of the proposed remedies"); United States v. Archer-Daniels-Midland Co., 272 F. Supp. 2d 1, 6 (D.D.C. 2003) (noting that the court should grant due respect to the United States's prediction as to the effect of proposed remedies, its perception of the market structure, and its views of the nature of the case); United States v. Republic Serv., Inc., 2010-2 Trade Cas. (CCH) 77,097, 2010 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 70895, No. 08-2076 (RWR), at *10 (D.D.C. July 15, 2010) (finding that "[i]n light of the deferential review to which the government's proposed remedy is accorded, [amicus curiae's] argument that an alternative remedy may be comparably superior, even if true, is not a sufficient basis for finding that the proposed final judgment is not in the public interest.").
Courts have greater flexibility in approving proposed consent decrees than in crafting their own decrees following a finding of liability in a litigated matter. "[A] proposed decree must be approved even if it falls short of the remedy the court would impose on its own, as long as it falls within the range of acceptability or is 'within the reaches of public interest.'" United States v. Am. Tel. & Tel. Co., 552 F. Supp. 131, 151 (D.D.C. 1982) (citations omitted) (quoting United States v. Gillette Co., 406 F. Supp. 713, 716 (D. Mass. 1975)), aff'd sub nom. Maryland v. United States, 460 U.S. 1001 (1983); see also United States v. Alcan Aluminum Ltd., 605 F. Supp. 619, 622 (W.D. Ky. 1985) (approving the consent decree even though the court would have imposed a greater remedy). Therefore, the United States "need only provide a factual basis for concluding that the settlements are reasonably adequate remedies for the alleged harms." SBC Commc'ns, 489 F. Supp. 2d at 17; Republic Serv., 2010 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 70895, at *2-3 (entering final judgment "[b]ecause there is an adequate factual foundation upon which to conclude that the government's proposed divestitures will remedy the antitrust violations alleged in the complaint."). Moreover, in its 2004 amendments to the Tunney Act,3 Congress made clear its intent to preserve the practical benefits of utilizing consent decrees in antitrust enforcement, stating: "[n]othing in this section shall be construed to require the court to conduct an evidentiary hearing or to require the court to permit anyone to intervene." 15 U.S.C. § 16(e)(2). The language wrote into the statute what Congress intended when it enacted the Tunney Act in 1974, as Senator Tunney explained: "[t]he court is nowhere compelled to go to trial or to engage in extended proceedings which might have the effect of vitiating the benefits of prompt and less costly settlement through the consent decree process." 119 Cong. Rec. 24,598 (1973) (statement of Senator Tunney). Rather, the procedure for the public interest determination is left to the discretion of the court, with the recognition that the court's "scope of review remains sharply proscribed by precedent and the nature of Tunney Act proceedings." SBC Commc'ns, 489 F. Supp. 2d at 11.4 The United States alleged in its Complaint that the acquisition of Portec by Foster would substantially lessen competition in the development, manufacture, and sale of bonded joints and poly joints in the United States. The remedy in the proposed Final Judgment resolves the alleged competitive effects by requiring Foster to divest Portec's rail joint business and several other products currently manufactured in Portec's Huntington facility. Foster has divested these assets to a viable purchaser approved by the United States. The public, including affected competitors and customers, has had the opportunity to comment on the proposed Final Judgment as required by law, and no comments have been submitted. There has been no showing that the proposed settlement constitutes an abuse of the United States's discretion or that it is not within the zone of settlements consistent with the public interest.
For the reasons set forth in this Motion and Memorandum and in the CIS, the Court should find that the proposed Final Judgment is in the public interest and should enter the Final Judgment without further hearings. The United States respectfully requests that the Final Judgment, attached hereto as Exhibit B, be entered as soon as possible.
Dated: March 9, 2011	Respectfully submitted,
Christine A. Hill (D.C. Bar No. 461048) U.S. Department of Justice Antitrust Division, Litigation II Section 450 Fifth Street, N.W., Suite 8700 Washington, D.C. 20530 (202) 305-2738
I, Christine A. Hill, hereby certify that on March 9, 2011, I caused a copy of the foregoing Motion and Memorandum of the United States in Support of Entry of Final Judgment to be served upon Defendants L.B. Foster Company and Portec Rail Products, Inc. by mailing the documents electronically to the duly authorized legal representatives of Defendants as follows:
Counsel for L.B. Foster Company: John H. Korns, Esquire
Wendelynne J. Newton, Esquire Buchanan, Ingersoll & Rooney PC
301 Grant Street	Pittsburgh, PA 15219
Counsel for Portec Rail Products, Inc.: Timothy M. Walsh, Esquire Steptoe & Johnson, LLP	1330 Connecticut Avenue, N.W.	Washington, D.C. 20036	(202) 429-3000	twalsh@steptoe.com
1. This excludes Portec�s Coronet products, which are manufactured in the United Kingdom and based on different specifications than the rail joints manufactured and sold by Portec in the United States. 2. Cf. BNS, 858 F.2d at 464 (holding that the court’s “ultimate authority under the [APPA] is limited to approving or disapproving the consent decree”); United States v. Gillette Co., 406 F. Supp. 713, 716 (D. Mass. 1975) (noting that, in this way, the court is constrained to “look at the overall picture not hypercritically, nor with a microscope, but with an artist’s reducing glass”). See generally Microsoft, 56 F.3d at 1461 (discussing whether “the remedies [obtained in the decree are] so inconsonant with the allegations charged as to fall outside of the ‘reaches of the public interest’”).
3. The 2004 amendments substituted the word “shall” for “may” when directing the courts to consider the enumerated factors and amended the list of factors to focus on competitive considerations and address potentially ambiguous judgment terms. Compare 15 U.S.C. § 16(e) (2004), with 15 U.S.C. § 16(e)(1) (2006); see also SBC Commc’ns, 489 F. Supp. 2d at 11 (concluding that the 2004 amendments “effected minimal changes” to Tunney Act review).
4. See United States v. Enova Corp., 107 F. Supp. 2d 10, 17 (D.D.C. 2000) (noting that the “Tunney Act expressly allows the court to make its public interest determination on the basis of the competitive impact statement and response to comments alone”); United States v. Mid-Am. Dairymen, Inc., 1977-1 Trade Cas. (CCH) ¶ 61,508, at 71,980 (W.D. Mo. 1977) (“Absent a showing of corrupt failure of the government to discharge its duty, the Court, in making its public interest finding, should . . . carefully consider the explanations of the government in the competitive impact statement and its responses to comments in order to determine whether those explanations are reasonable under the circumstances.”); S. Rep. No. 93-298, 93d Cong., 1st Sess., at 6 (1973) (“Where the public interest can be meaningfully evaluated simply on the basis of briefs and oral arguments, that is the approach that should be utilized.”).