Antitrust Law Daily Wrap Up, WORTH NOTING—Other Antitrust and Trade Regulation developments, (Jan 10, 2025)

By WK Editorial Staff

A periodic roundup of other items of interest to the Antitrust and Trade Regulation community.

ANTITRUST NEWS: The Department of Justice on January 8 opposed a request for early termination from supervised release from Neeraj Jindal, the former owner of a therapist staffing company, who was found guilty of obstructing a federal proceeding regarding alleged wage fixing of physical therapists in the Dallas-Fort Worth metropolitan area. Jindal, who was acquitted of conspiring to fix prices., filed the motion for early termination after serving about two years of his three-year term of supervised release “without incident.” According to the Justice Department, the sentence was significantly below advisory guidelines, which called for imprisonment. The Justice Department contended that the defendant should not be “rewarded, for merely complying with part of his term of sentence” (U.S. v. Jindal, No. 4:20-CR-358-ALM (E.D. Tex. Jan. 8, 2025)).

ANTITRUST NEWS: During remarks at a Brooking Institution event, FTC Chair Lina Khan stressed the importance she sees in the “broader tradition of anti-monopoly” policies in the U.S. and the “recognition that real liberty means freedom from economic coercion and from the arbitrary exercise of unaccountable power.” Khan argued that recent decades have shown that there are serious costs from straying from a commitment to economic fairness, opportunity, and freedom and to pursuing policies that favor consolidated and centralized markets over competitive ones. During a subsequent discussion with Bill Baer, Khan defended the overall record of the FTC and Justice Department in recent antitrust lawsuits, saying the agencies have “racked up pretty significant wins.” Also, Khan believes “this is just a really striking moment right now where there has been this bipartisan concern about what happens when we allow markets to become very dominated by fewer companies,” she said, adding that there is a “deeper and deeper recognition” regarding “how antitrust enforcement, in particular, can make sure that people are not being subjected to unchecked coercion. It’s been great to develop relationships with states on both sides of the aisle around this issue.”

ANTITRUST NEWS: Timothy Baugher, the president of Asphalt Specialists LLC (ASI), a company engaged in providing asphalt paving services in Michigan, has agreed to plead guilty to participating in a conspiracy with other individuals, ASI, and another provider of asphalt paving services, Allied Construction Company, Inc., the primary purpose of which was to rig bids for contracts to provide asphalt paving services in Michigan, the agency announced. Baugher and his co-conspirators communicated with each other and agreed in advance which paving services vendor would win a given competition for a contract award. They then allegedly exchanged price information to enable co-conspirators to submit non-competitive bids to potential customers and submitted non-competitive bids with prices higher than the prices submitted by the agreed-upon winning co-conspirator. The information charging Baugher stated that the conspiracy that Baugher and the co-conspirators engaged in was “a per se unlawful, and thus unreasonable, restraint of interstate trade and commerce in violation of Section 1 of the Sherman Act.” The United States agreed to recommend a sentence of no greater than the bottom of the Sentencing Guidelines incarceration range as determined by the court and a criminal fine of $20,000. Baugher agreed to cooperate fully and truthfully with the United States in the prosecution of the case and investigation into violations of antitrust and federal criminal laws involving asphalt paving services in Michigan and elsewhere (U.S. v. Baugher, No. 2:24-cr-20504-GAD-DRG (E.D. Mich. Jan. 8, 2025)).

ANTITRUST NEWS: The parties in the case brought by Saint Francis Hospital & Medical Center, Inc. (St. Francis) alleging that Hartford HealthCare Corp. and its subsidiaries (HHC) engaged in wrongful anticompetitive behavior under the Sherman Act, the Clayton Act, and Connecticut state antitrust law, by suppressing competition in order to attain and maintain healthcare dominance in the Hartford area have agreed to end their litigation. Their stipulation of dismissal filed with the court reported that they have reached a mutually acceptable resolution of the action with each party to bear their respective costs and attorney fees. St. Francis’ complaint accused HHC, whether directly or through its subsidiaries, of acquiring numerous physician practices, demanding that acquired and other physicians, on pain of penalty, refer all or virtually all of their cases to HHC, regardless of patient interest, and threatening and intimidating physicians who did not follow HHC “dictates” (Saint Francis Hospital and Medical Center, Inc. v. Hartford Healthcare Corp., No. 3:22-cv-00050-SVN (D. Conn. Jan. 2, 2025)).

ACQUISITIONS & MERGERS NEWS: The UK Competition and Markets Authority has opened an investigation into South African conglomerate The Bidvest Group’s proposal to acquire a washroom products business.

CONSUMER PROTECTION NEWS: The FTC announced that the agency will host a virtual open meeting on January 14 at 11 a.m. ET. The Commission will consider issuing a request for public comment on 6(b) orders related to the housing market. These orders would examine the magnitude of single-family rental investor holdings and to assess mega-investor strategies. Also, the Commission will consider whether to issue a policy statement clarifying its view that the Clayton Act’s labor exemption application does not turn on whether a worker is formally classified as an employee or independent contractor. The proposed policy statement will make clear that workers’ organizing and collective bargaining activity may be protected from antitrust liability when what is at issue is the compensation for their labor or their working conditions. Finally, the Commission will consider issuing a second interim staff report highlighting additional staff findings from the Commission’s 6(b) study on the contracting practices of pharmacy benefit managers, or PBMs. The second interim report expands on staff’s initial findings regarding specialty drugs.

CONSUMER PROTECTION NEWS: The U.S. Supreme Court granted the solicitor general’s request to participate in oral argument as amicus curiae in the case of McLaughlin Chiropractic Association v. McKesson Corp. (Dkt. 23-1226), which involves a private dispute under the Telephone Consumer Protection Act and raises the question of whether the Hobbs Act requires a federal district court in such a case to accept the FCC’s interpretation of the TCPA. The Supreme Court also granted the solicitor general’s request for divided argument. Oral argument has been set for Jan. 21.

Attorneys: Michael Loterstein, U.S Department of Justice, for the U.S. Brent Snyder (Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati) for Timothy Baugher. William S. Fish, Jr. (Hinckley, Allen & Snyder LLP) for Saint Francis Hospital & Medical Center, Inc. Patrick M. Fahey (Shipman & Goodwin LLP) for Hartford HealthCare Corp.

Companies: The Bidvest Group; McLaughlin Chiropractic Association; McKesson Corp.; Hartford HealthCare Corp.; Saint Francis Hospital & Medical Center, Inc.

News: Antitrust AcquisitionsMergers AntitrustDivisionNews ConsumerProtection FederalTradeCommissionNews MichiganNews