Mealey's Class Actions : Mealey's : Legal News & Analysis

Mealey's Class Actions

August 08, 2024
California Laundry Facility Pays $1.1M To Settle EEOC Hiring Discrimination Claims

LOS ANGELES — A California laundry facility’s $1.1 million settlement of discriminatory hiring claims by the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission and approved by a federal judge in California brings the total settlement for a class of workers who the EEOC said were not hired based on their race and national origin or were subjected to segregated jobs based on their gender to $3.3 million as the temporary staffing agency used by the laundry facility settled the claims against it in April.
August 08, 2024
9th Circuit Reverses Dismissal Of ERISA Case Over Structured Alpha Funds

SAN FRANCISCO — Reversing dismissal of a putative class action against the fiduciaries of union carpenters’ retirement plans, a Ninth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals panel said in an unpublished memorandum disposition that the carpenters “have sufficiently alleged a relative loss based on” investments “in two volatility hedge funds managed by Allianz Global Investors U.S. LLC.”
August 08, 2024
Restaurants’ Lanham Act Claims Against Grubhub Largely Survive Dismissal Motion

CHICAGO — A federal judge in Illinois said seven of nine restaurants who brought trademark violation claims in a putative class complaint against Grubhub Inc., alleging that the company included their names and logos on its food delivery app without the restaurants’ permission, failed to show that they have a protectible trademark interest, while the claims from the remaining two restaurants are adequately pleaded.
August 07, 2024
$9.39M White Castle Finger Scan Class Settlement Granted Final Approval

CHICAGO — A federal judge in Illinois granted final approval to a $9,394,440 settlement to be paid by White Castle System Inc. to end a class complaint by an employee who alleged that the fast food company’s finger scan policy violated the Illinois’ Biometric Information Privacy Act (BIPA).
August 07, 2024
Wash. Judge Issues Clarifying Order After 3 Post-Verdict Orders In Wage Class Suit

SEATTLE — A Washington judge on Aug. 6 clarified one of three post-verdict orders issued July 31 following an April $98 million jury verdict for health care workers in a wage and hour class suit and a May judgment of more than $229 million and denied supplemental judgment pending resolution of the total costs awarded.
August 07, 2024
J&J Tells 3rd Circuit Asbestos-Talc Securities Class ‘Reverse-Engineered’ Case

PHILADELPHIA — An asbestos-talc securities class produced none of the type of new and corrective disclosures required for class certification and instead “reverse-engineered” their case by working backward from price drops and identifying media reports and verdicts supporting the case, Johnson & Johnson and its executives told the Third Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals in urging reversal of class certification.
August 06, 2024
Applebee’s Accused Of Charging Online Customers Hidden Fees In Putative Class Suit

SAN FRANCISCO — A customer filed a putative class action complaint in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California accusing Applebee’s Restaurants LLC and its parent company of violating California’s unfair competition law (UCL) and other laws by charging delivery order customers a “carefully concealed” 11% service fee.
August 06, 2024
Judge: Investors Cite Only Opinions, Not Falsehoods, In Medical Stock Drop Suit

NEW YORK — A federal judge in New York granted a pharmaceutical company’s motion to dismiss a putative class complaint brought against it by investors who claimed the company and certain of its executives issued misleading statements about a drug it was developing for a kidney disease; the judge found that “nearly every one” of the statements cited by the investors was an unactionable forward-looking statement.
August 05, 2024
Former Employees Say Philadelphia Inquirer Liable For Breach Of Records

PHILADELPHIA — In a consolidated putative class complaint filed in a Pennsylvania federal court, three employees or former employees of the Philadelphia Inquirer LLC bring claims against the newspaper, saying it is liable for damages caused by a data breach the newspaper did not disclose to subscribers and employees for nearly a year.
August 05, 2024
NFL Granted Judgment After $4.7 Billion Verdict For ‘Sunday Ticket’ Classes

LOS ANGELES — A federal judge in California granted a motion for judgment as a matter of law filed by the National Football League Inc. (NFL), NFL Enterprises LLC and individual teams following a $4.7 billion jury verdict for classes of residential and commercial subscribers to DirecTV LLC’s “NFL Sunday Ticket” on Sherman Act claims, opining that the testimony of two experts should have been excluded “based on their flawed methodologies” and that without those testimonies “no reasonable jury could have found class-wide injury or damages.”
August 05, 2024
3rd Circuit Appeal Filed Over Summary Judgment, Exclusion Ruling In ERISA Fees Row

PHILADELPHIA — An Employee Retirement Income Security Act class action over allegedly excessive record-keeping fees is being taken to the Third Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals, with the named plaintiff filing a notice of appeal regarding a denial of summary judgment ruling that involved excluding an expert whose testimony has had mixed fates under Daubert v. Merrell Dow Pharmaceuticals challenges in other courts.
August 05, 2024
Judge: Investor’s Claim Medical Company Lied About AI To Raise Stock Price Fails

HARTFORD, Conn. — An investor who brought a putative class complaint against a medical company, claiming it misled investors both about its artificial intelligence data platform and its own financial results, failed to illustrate in his amended complaint how some of the alleged misstatements were false and also failed to show that any of them were knowingly made, a Connecticut federal judge held, dismissing the complaint without prejudice.
August 02, 2024
JPMDL Denies Request To Centralize Cases Alleging Benzene In Acne Products

WASHINGTON, D.C. — The U.S. Judicial Panel on Multidistrict Litigation (JPMDL) on Aug. 1 declined to centralize cases that allege that users of benzoyl peroxide (BPO) products for the treatment of acne vulgaris, including creams, washes, scrubs and bars, were inadequately warned about the presence of benzene after finding that many allegations will be specific to the individual defendants.
August 02, 2024
Nicotine Pouch Consumer Files Putative Class Action Alleging False Youth Marketing

HARTFORD, Conn. — A consumer of Zyn nicotine pouches filed a putative class action in Connecticut federal court accusing Philip Morris International Inc. (PM) and Swedish Match North America LLC of violating Florida consumer protection statutes by targeting youth and deceptively advertising the products as a “safer and healthier alternative to smoking.”
August 02, 2024
Wells Fargo, Execs Sued Under ERISA For Prescription Drug Prices, PBM Fees

MINNEAPOLIS — In a putative class action similar to one pending against Johnson and Johnson, former participants in a Wells Fargo & Co. health plan filed a suit in Minnesota federal court under the Employee Retirement Income Security Act over alleged mismanagement of prescription drug benefits, with a focus on the plan’s pharmacy benefits manager (PBM).
August 02, 2024
Data Breach Class Suits Against Health Care Provider, IT Vendor Consolidated

SCRANTON, Pa. — A federal judge in Pennsylvania has consolidated nine putative class actions against Geisinger Health and its third-party information technology services vendor stemming from the Nov. 29 discovery that a former employee of the vendor had accessed and acquired the personally identifiable information (PII) and personal health information (PHI) of individuals who received health care from the provider.
August 02, 2024
Plaintiff Amends Complaint, Again, Claiming Coca-Cola’s Fruit Drinks Contain PFAS

WHITE PLAINS, N.Y. — A plaintiff who had his class action complaint against the Coca-Cola Co. dismissed has filed a second amended complaint in New York federal court, alleging that various fruit drinks made by the company contain per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS). In the new pleading, the plaintiff lists more drink products that allegedly contain PFAS.
July 31, 2024
Judge Nixes Claim That Facial Recognition In Samsung App Violates Data Privacy Law

CHICAGO — A federal judge in Illinois has granted a motion to dismiss a class action lawsuit against Samsung Electronics America Inc. brought by individuals who allege that facial recognition technology in Samsung’s Gallery photo application violates the Illinois Biometric Information Privacy Act (BIPA), ruling that the allegations are “insufficient” to show that the data constitute a biometric identifier or biometric information.
July 31, 2024
Class Complaint Accuses Mormon Church, Nonprofit Of Misusing Donations

SALT LAKE CITY — The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and a nonprofit entity created to hold and invest donations continue to misuse donations, including hiding assets through the use of shell companies, despite already settling similar charges brough by the Securities and Exchange Commission in February 2023, self-described donors allege in a consolidated class complaint filed in a federal court in Utah.
July 31, 2024
Investor: CrowdStrike Misled Investors About Testing Before Global Tech Outage

AUSTIN, Texas — A retirement system says in a putative class complaint filed on July 30 in a Texas federal court that a cybersecurity company and certain of its executives issued misleading claims to investors about its internal testing systems before a recent software glitch caused a global outage of computers on the Microsoft Windows operating system, leading to a steep drop in value for the company’s stock.
July 31, 2024
9th Circuit Reverses Order That Found Inmate Class Covered By Calif. Labor Code

SAN FRANCISCO — A Ninth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals panel reversed a trial court’s order which found that nonconvicted inmates who perform work for a private company without pay are covered by California’s Labor Code; the ruling came approximately three months after the California Supreme Court found in answering a question certified by the appellate panel that the inmates have no claim for minimum wages or overtime pay under current state law.
July 31, 2024
8th Circuit Reverses Attorney Fees Awarded In T-Mobile Data Breach Settlement

ST. LOUIS — A trial court abused its discretion in striking one of two objections to the $78.75 million attorney fees portion of a $350 million data breach class settlement between customers and T-Mobile US Inc., an Eighth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals panel ruled, opining that the fees awarded were “unreasonable.”
July 31, 2024
$284 Million Price-Fixing Financial Aid Settlements Granted Final Approval

CHICAGO — Settlements by 10 private universities totaling $284 million in a class case accusing more than a dozen schools of “participating in a price-fixing cartel that is designed to reduce or eliminate financial aid as a locus of competition” were granted final approval by a federal judge in Illinois.
July 31, 2024
Staffing Agency Seeks U.S. High Court Clarity On Class Certification, TCPA Scope

WASHINGTON, D.C. — A staffing agency awarded summary judgment on only its individual claim under the Telephone Consumer Protection Act (TCPA) for an unwanted faxed advertisement filed a petition for a writ of certiorari in the U.S. Supreme Court seeking a ruling on whether “administrative feasibility” is a prerequisite or only a factor to be weighed when deciding class certification and seeking a decision on the scope of a “telephone facsimile machine” under the TCPA.
July 30, 2024
Judge Won’t Dismiss Stock Loss Claims Over ‘Sham’ Wells Fargo Interviews

OAKLAND, Calif. — A California federal judge on July 29 denied a motion by Wells Fargo & Co. and certain of its executives to dismiss a putative class complaint brought by a group of shareholders, holding that the shareholders adequately established that the company was aware of a widespread practice of using fake interviews to give the impression of complying with internal diversity hiring practices before news about the interviews led to a drop in stock value.