Justia Securities Law Opinion Summaries

The Supreme Court answered a question certified to it by the United States Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit by holding that Ohio Rev. Code 1707.43, a provision of the Ohio Securities Act, does not impose joint and several liability on persons who aided in the purchase of illegal securities but did not participate or aid in the sale of the illegal securities.Plaintiffs filed a class action lawsuit in federal court seeking to hold Defendants, two trust companies, liable under the Ohio Securities Act, Ohio Rev. Code 1707.01 et seq., for their alleged roles in a Ponzi scheme. The district court granted Defendants’ motions to dismiss, holding that the trust companies’ mere involvement in the transactions at issue was insufficient to impose liability on them under the Act. The court of appeals then certified the above question to the Supreme Court. The Court answered that section 1707.43 does not impose joint and several liability on a person who, acting as the custodian of a self-directed individual retirement account (IRA), purchased, on behalf and at the direction of the owner of the self-directed IRA, illegal securities. View "Boyd v. Kingdom Trust Co." on Justia Law