Augusta Lawyers Handle Business Litigation to Remedy Commercial Disputes

Resourceful attorneys manage a wide variety of contentious issues

All businesses inevitably have conflicts with partners, vendors, distributors, suppliers, and even consumers. When disputes arise, you want quick, effective resolution that protects your company’s rights and reputation. Since 1988, the attorneys at Joseph T. Rhodes Law Firm have helped businesses in the greater Augusta area resolve business and commercial disputes and get back to productive operation. If you are at odds over a breach of contract, trade secret misappropriation or trademark infringement, we can take decisive steps to mitigate the harm, recover compensation and protect your rights.

Proven advocates help businesses achieve remedies for breach of contract

A breach of contract occurs when a party fails to perform as promised. Many alleged breaches are not breaches at all but misunderstandings that result when a contract is not specific enough to convey precisely what each party has promised. When this happens, it’s often best to have our business law attorneys reform the contract, putting in more exact language. At other times, the breach is nonmaterial. In other words, the failure to perform might be annoying, but it doesn’t cause economic harm to the nonbreaching party.

When the breach is material, the breaching party has harmed the nonbreaching party, who has a right to a legal remedy, which can include:

• Specific performance — This action is a court order to perform the terms of the contract. A court will only order this remedy if it is practicable and will not cause undue hardship to the breaching party.
• Damages —The breaching party pays the nonbreaching party an amount equal to the loss in the value of the contract due to the breach.
• Restitution — The breaching party pays an amount equal to the nonbreaching party’s partial performance of the contract.
• Liquidated damages — These are amounts written into the contract that one party must pay the other for a foreseeable breach of performance.

If you have suffered a breach or you have arguably breached a contract, our attorneys provide the capable representation you need to get through this incident with minimal loss, so you can quickly get back to business.

Skilled counselors protect clients from business torts

A business tort is an unlawful act that harms your company. A business tort can be intentional or negligent, and includes:

• Fraud — A party makes a deliberate misrepresentation to induce you to take some action that benefits them but harms your business.
• Negligent misrepresentation — Similar to fraud, negligent misrepresentation occurs when a party is careless about presenting facts. The result is the same, but the law does not deal as harshly with negligence as it does with deliberate deception.
• Breach of fiduciary duty — Often, it is an officer of the company who has embezzled company funds or has mismanaged assets, causing the value of the company to drop.

If you have been harmed by a business tort, you have grounds for a lawsuit to recover for your losses.

Knowledgeable attorneys handle IP infringement

Another area of frequent litigation, especially in the digital age, is intellectual property infringement. This includes:

• Trade secret theft
• Trademark infringement
• Copyright infringement

If someone has stolen a trade secret, we can help you assert your rights under the Defend Trade Secrets Act. If someone has infringed your trademark or disparaged your product on the internet, we can pursue a take-down order of the offending post from various platforms. If someone has infringed your copyrighted material, for example from your website advertising, we can pursue damages and/or injunctive relief.

Contact an experienced business litigation attorney in Augusta for a free initial consultation

Joseph T. Rhodes Law Firm helps business clients enforce their rights in commercial disputes in Richmond, Columbia and Burke counties. To learn how we can help with a variety of contract, business tort, and intellectual property matters, call 706-496-1616 or contact us online to schedule a free initial consultation at our Augusta office.