derivative lawsuits

Business Partners at War in Illinois: What a Chicago Commercial Litigator Actually Does to Protect You

July 28, 2026 | Peter S. Lubin and James V. DiTommaso

By Peter S. Lubin and James V. DiTommaso

You own half of a company you helped build, and the other owner has turned on you. The distributions stopped, but the salary he pays himself did not. You asked to see the books and got silence. Maybe he changed the password on the shared drive, put his brother-in-law on payroll, or started a side venture that looks a great deal like yours. You do not know whether you are about to lose the business, your investment, or both, and every day you wait feels like a day he is using against you.

When owners go to war, the winner is usually the one who moves first and moves correctly. This is a plain guide to what an Illinois commercial litigator actually does to protect an owner in a partner dispute, in the order the work usually happens, so you know what to ask for and what to expect. The law gives you more leverage than the other side wants you to realize.

Illinois Minority Owners: How to Force a Company to Open Its Books

June 17, 2026 | Peter S. Lubin and James V. DiTommaso

You asked a simple question. Where did the money go? You own a piece of the company, the profits that used to reach you have thinned, and you want to see the financials that would explain why. The controlling owner’s answer is a wall. He tells you the records are confidential, or none of your concern, or available only if you drop your objections first. He is betting that you do not know the law gives you a key to that door.

It does. Illinois grants shareholders and LLC members an enforceable right to inspect the books and records of the company they own, and it backs that right with penalties and fee awards when a company refuses without cause. An inspection demand is often the single most useful first move in a partnership or shareholder dispute, because everything else you might claim depends on the facts those records contain.

What records can an Illinois shareholder demand?

When the Wrong Done to Your Company Is Yours to Fix: Illinois Derivative Lawsuits Explained

June 17, 2026 | Peter S. Lubin and James V. DiTommaso

You find it by accident. A vendor mentions a company you have never heard of, and a week of digging shows that your co-owner has been routing the business’s best work through a second entity he owns alone. Or the bank statements show payments to a relative for work no one did. You are furious, and you are ready to sue. Then your lawyer asks a question that changes everything. Is this your claim, or the company’s?

That question is not a technicality. In Illinois, getting it wrong can end a meritorious case before it is heard. Some wrongs done inside a company belong to you personally to sue over. Others belong to the company itself, and you may pursue them only derivatively, by stepping into the company’s shoes after clearing a set of procedural gates. Knowing the difference is the difference between recovering and being dismissed.

Direct or derivative: whose claim is it?