Horizontal cartel / hub-and-spoke conspiracy operating through vertical or dual-distribution arrangements

OR · 15usc1:x-horizontal-cartel-via-dual-distribution

Even after Leegin placed vertical resale price maintenance under the Rule of Reason, a horizontal cartel among competing retailers or manufacturers Policed via vertical agreements remains per se unlawful.

Exact element source

Every contract, combination in the form of trust or otherwise, or conspiracy

Source: docroot/ir/usc/title15.jsonl#title15_sec1; Unicode character offsets [57:133] (end exclusive); SHA-256 9c248965c2c712de1e3f3d52a17be4c90dfdcac5d3f9fea0b7220b164e2c2973.

All variants

Recorded DB variant labels, including zero-count variants
Variant	Description	Merits instance blocks	Distinct cases	Example cases (up to 3 per group)
not-preserved/manufacturer-owner-also-retailer		0 Satisfied 0; not satisfied 0; excluded context 1	0	No counted merits examples Excluded context examples: /us/551/0877-01 — Supreme Court of the United States · 2007 — background/procedural

How courts decided this element

Annotation blocks, including explicitly excluded context
Case	Element	Holding and scope	Variant	Exact source quotations
/us/551/0877-01 — Supreme Court of the United States · 2007	Horizontal cartel / hub-and-spoke conspiracy operating through vertical or dual-distribution arrangements	not_reached Excluded from merits counts background / procedural party: PSKS, Inc., d/b/a Kay's Kloset (terminated discounting retailer; plaintiff, respondent); theory: horizontal cartel among competing retailers: the manufacturer's owner is also a competing retailer; subject: party=PSKS, Inc., d/b/a Kay's Kloset (terminated discounting retailer; plaintiff, respondent); theory=horizontal cartel among competing retailers: the manufacturer's owner is also a competing retailer Alternative horizontal theory (manufacturer's president owns competing retail stores) raised for the first time in the Supreme Court; a second route to the agreement/per-se elements, not considered because not raised below.	not-preserved/manufacturer-owner-also-retailer	Leegin’s president, Jerry Kohl, also has an interest in about 70 stores that sell Brighton products. Source: `docroot/ir/caselaw/us_551.jsonl#/us/551/0877-01`; Unicode character offsets [1405:1505] (end exclusive); SHA-256 `6dc0b5ffec12ec474152aa4935b052042835b8bd19a739a908c122c1a115df37`. Evidence kind: fact; polarity: supports; absent flag: 0; quoted-rule flag: 0 (1 = tagged; 0 = not tagged) Respondent did not make this allegation in the lower courts, and we do not consider it here. Source: `docroot/ir/caselaw/us_551.jsonl#/us/551/0877-01`; Unicode character offsets [52949:53041] (end exclusive); SHA-256 `6dc0b5ffec12ec474152aa4935b052042835b8bd19a739a908c122c1a115df37`. Evidence kind: held; polarity: not recorded; absent flag: 0; quoted-rule flag: 0 (1 = tagged; 0 = not tagged)

Court interpretations

interpretation

If there is evidence retailers were the impetus for a vertical price restraint, there is a greater likelihood that the restraint facilitates a retailer cartel or supports a dominant, inefficient retailer.

/us/551/0877-01 — Supreme Court of the United States · 2007

If there is evidence retailers were the impetus for a vertical price restraint, there is a greater likelihood that the restraint facilitates a retailer cartel or supports a dominant, inefficient retailer.

Source: docroot/ir/caselaw/us_551.jsonl#/us/551/0877-01; Unicode character offsets [32676:32880] (end exclusive); SHA-256 6dc0b5ffec12ec474152aa4935b052042835b8bd19a739a908c122c1a115df37.