A Massachusetts Court has dismissed a case which alleged that Ropes & Gray's client, the Special Committee of Independent Directors of Sycamore Networks, was complicit in a scheme to manipulate stock options.

In McMahon v. Smith, the plaintiff, a stockholder in Sycamore, brought a derivative action asserting unjust enrichment and breach of fiduciary duty (among other claims) due to allegedly improper stock option grants. By an order dated March 6, 2008, Justice H.J. Smith Jr. of the Massachusetts Superior Court for Middlesex County held that the plaintiff's claims were precluded from consideration because they were insufficiently distinct from arguments previously litigated—and dismissed—in a related case (Desimone v. Barrows, in which we also represented Sycamore's outside directors). R&G partner John Donovan and associate Bonnie McGuire handled the litigation.

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