Court Opinion

ID: 9718602
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 07:27:44.774404+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:24:00.599393
License: Public Domain

JUSTICE GORDON, dissenting: I must respectfully dissent from the conclusion of the majority. The majority concedes that, under the guidelines of the NASD Code of Arbitration Procedure § 10314(a), it is unnecessary to plead any legal theories in support of the claims of the respondent, who was the petitioner in the arbitration. Yet, the majority contends that, once having pled a specific legal theory, the respondent and the arbitrators are precluded from considering any others subsequently raised. No one has pointed to any authority which, in fact, limits the latitude of the arbitrators more so when a legal theory is pled than would be the case than if the statement of claim did not plead any specific theory of action. Moreover, no one has shown any prejudice or surprise in permitting the attorney fees provision under the Illinois Securities Law of 1953 (815 ILCS 5/13 (West 1996)) being raised for the first time during closing argument before the arbitrators. Aside from being a securities dealer charged with knowledge of the securities laws, the petitioners, who were the respondents in arbitration, have demonstrated their awareness of their accountability for attorney fees in their admitted settlement offer to pay “reasonable” attorney fees. While generally offers of compromise may not be admissible as an implied admission of guilt, in this case the petitioners gratuitously disclosed their offer in their own response to respondent’s statement of claim. They cannot now seek to conceal what they had already disclosed. Inferentially, this disclosure may well reflect that petitioners, as securities dealers, were not strangers to their obligation to pay attorney fees under section 13 of the Illinois Securities Act. In any event petitioners have not demonstrated any surprise in the invocation of section 13 of the Illinois Securities Act to vitiate the determination of the arbitrators. We have long recognized that arbitration provides a valued adjunct by which the parties may seek dispute resolution from their peers who have expertise in their own industry or profession without burdening the courts. We should therefore hesitate to restrict the latitude of the arbitrator by expanding our powers of review in a manner not specifically contemplated under the provisions of the Uniform Arbitration Act.