A “volunteer” shareholder, or one acting on his or her own interest and not the corporation’s behalf, who hires an attorney to inform a board about a way to improve business, but does not file a lawsuit, is not entitled to attorney fees under the corporate benefit doctrine, the Delaware Court of Chancery has ruled.
The court issued the opinion when it denied a shareholder’s request for attorney fees after a Queens, N.Y., financial company corrected its disclosure statements in response to the shareholder’s letter.
