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Cedric Kushner Promotions, Ltd. v. Don King Don King Productions, Inc. Dkp Corporation and John Does 1-10
Citations: 219 F.3d 115; 2000 U.S. App. LEXIS 15954Docket: 1999
Court: Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit; July 11, 2000; Federal Appellate Court
The legal case, Cedric Kushner Promotions, Ltd. v. Don King et al., involves a dispute between boxing promoters, with Kushner appealing a dismissal of its claims under the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act (RICO). Kushner's complaint, filed in the Southern District of New York, included allegations of violations under 18 U.S.C. § 1962(c) and § 1962(d), as well as common-law fraud and tortious interference. The District Court dismissed the RICO claims due to Kushner's failure to establish that the RICO 'person' was distinct from the RICO 'enterprise,' a requirement upheld in prior Second Circuit decisions. Kushner’s appeal focused solely on the dismissal of the § 1962(c) claim. The court's ruling emphasized that under § 1962(c), the RICO 'person' and 'enterprise' must be distinct entities. The court cited previous cases where this distinctness requirement was applied, noting that a corporation cannot be held liable under § 1962(c) when the alleged RICO enterprise consists solely of the corporation and its employees acting within their employment scope. The court affirmed the District Court's dismissal, concluding that Kushner's claims did not meet the necessary legal standards. Employees of a corporation acting together to commit predicate acts on behalf of the corporation do not form a distinct RICO enterprise separate from the corporation itself. Citing *Riverwoods*, the court determined that the distinctness requirement was not met when the alleged RICO enterprise and the RICO persons were all subsidiaries of the same parent corporation, as seen in *Discon, Inc. v. NYNEX Corp*. In the current case, DKP is identified as the RICO enterprise, while King is the RICO person, with the appeal focusing solely on King after the claims against DKP were dropped. It is undisputed that King acted within the scope of his authority at DKP, and the argument that the distinctness requirement does not apply when only the RICO person is a defendant was rejected. The court affirmed that liability under 18 U.S.C. § 1962(c) requires the RICO person to be distinct from the RICO enterprise, adhering to the precedents set in *Riverwoods* and *Discon*. The court acknowledged a conflict with decisions from other Circuits but opted to follow its own circuit's interpretation of the distinctness requirement.