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

Mealey's Class Actions

June 25, 2024
Judge: Securities Class Claims Against Crypto Firm Barred By Repose Statute

SAN FRANCISCO — A federal judge in California largely granted a motion from an issuer of crypto tokens and its CEO to dismiss class action securities claims against them, finding that the lead investor plaintiff failed to show that the crypto token at issue was first offered after the cutoff date for a statute of repose in the Securities Act of 1933.
June 25, 2024
U.S. Supreme Court Won’t Review $2.67B Health Insurance Antitrust Settlement

WASHINGTON, D.C. — The U.S. Supreme Court on June 24 denied two petitions by objectors who separately challenged the release of future claims and reasonableness of the attorney fee award in a $2.67 billion health insurance settlement.
June 25, 2024
Va. Official Tells High Court Attorney Fees Not Owed For Preliminary Injunction

WASHINGTON, D.C. — The plain text of 42 U.S. Code Section 1988(b) does not allow for attorney fees to be awarded only for a preliminary injunction as it does not provide the ruling on the merits or final judgment necessary to prevail, the commissioner of the Viriginia Department of Motor Vehicles argues in his U.S. Supreme Court petitioner brief, challenging a ruling by a divided Fourth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals that the Virginians who filed a putative class complaint over a now repealed statute regarding the suspension of driver’s licenses were the prevailing parties.
June 25, 2024
Pet Food Makers Argue Customers’ Amended Complaint Doesn’t Defeat Jurisdiction

WASHINGTON, D.C. — Two pet food companies accused in a putative class complaint of misleading consumers on the quality and value of prescription pet food filed a petitioner brief in the U.S. Supreme Court on June 24 arguing that an amended complaint that eliminated all references to federal law did not divest a federal trial court of subject matter jurisdiction.
June 24, 2024
7th Circuit OKs Appeal On Representative Capacity Question In ERISA Row

CHICAGO — Without explanation, a Seventh Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals panel allowed an interlocutory appeal regarding what the petitioner argues is a question of first impression for the circuit regarding whether a plaintiff whose class certification motion was denied due to conflict within the proposed class can pursue plan-wide relief in a representative capacity under provisions of the Employee Retirement Income Security Act.
June 24, 2024
Attorney Fees In ERISA Class Settlement Are Cut To 30% Of $6.1M Common Fund

BIRMINGHAM, Ala. — Granting final approval of a $6.1 million class settlement over alleged mismanagement of a retirement plan, an Alabama federal judge awarded attorney fees of $1.83 million rather than the requested $2,033,333.13.
June 24, 2024
Class Counsel Get A Third Of $6M Settlement In Case Over Bank’s Former ESOP

CHARLOTTESVILLE, Va. — Granting final approval of a $6 million settlement in an Employee Stock Ownership Plan (ESOP) case that the plaintiff estimated will give dozens of class members awards averaging more than $30,000, a Virginia federal judge approved paying from that total $2 million for attorney fees plus $104,186.34 for litigation costs.
June 21, 2024
Stalking Victims Defend UCL Claims Against Apple Over AirTag Use

SAN FRANCISCO — A group of putative class plaintiffs who claim that Apple Inc.’s “AirTag” tracking devices were used to stalk them oppose Apple Inc.’s motion to dismiss their second amended complaint (SAC), asserting that they have cured pleading deficiencies identified by a California federal court and have sufficiently alleged injury under California’s unfair competition law (UCL) and established that California law applies to both in-state and out-of-state plaintiffs.
June 21, 2024
Summary Judgment Bid Fails In ERISA Row Focused On Fund Managers’ ESG Efforts

FORT WORTH, Texas — A bench trial is scheduled to start June 24 in a high-profile class action over environmental, social and governance (ESG) considerations and the purported proxy voting activism of investment management firms, with a Texas federal judge denying the defendants’ summary judgment motion on June 20.
June 21, 2024
Golden Corral Employees File Consolidated Complaint Over 2023 Data Breach

RALEIGH, N.C. — One month after six lawsuits against Golden Corral Corp. were consolidated in North Carolina federal court, a group of its present and former employees on June 20 filed a consolidated complaint alleging that the restaurant chain acted negligently by not properly protecting their personally identifiable information (PII) from a data breach that they assert could have been avoided if the company had employed proper security measures.
June 21, 2024
Judge Allows Minors’ Data Collection Claims Against Google And Subsidiaries

SAN FRANCISCO — A California federal judge denied Google LLC and its advertising subsidiaries’ motion to dismiss a nationwide putative class action brought against them by minors for collecting their personal data before the age of 13 in violation of California’s unfair competition law (UCL) and other states’ consumer protection laws.
June 21, 2024
Revised $195,000 Class Deal Gets Initial OK In Suit Alleging Fraudulent Policies

SANTA ANA, Calif. — Ruling various revisions sufficient, a California federal judge granted preliminary approval to a $195,000 settlement in a suit over alleged fraud involving captive reinsurance, also modifying the preliminarily certified settlement class.
June 20, 2024
J&J Says Talc Plaintiffs Lack Power, Precedent To Block Bankruptcy

TRENTON, N.J. —Talc plaintiffs waited too long to raise meritless claims of allegedly fraudulent corporate restructurings and lack the power to ask a district court to prevent a bankruptcy filing, Johnson & Johnson (J&J) and related entities tell a federal court in New Jersey in opposing injunctive relief.
June 20, 2024
Mortgage Discrimination Case Against Navy Federal Credit Union Partially Dismissed

ALEXANDRIA, Va. — A Virginia federal judge has granted partial dismissal of a racial discrimination loan case against the Navy Federal Credit Unition by nine individuals and struck their motion to certify the case as a class action.
June 19, 2024
$4.5M Settlement Ends Class Suit Over Indefinite Jail Due To Poverty

ST. LOUIS — A federal judge in Missouri on June 18 granted final approval of a $4.5 million class settlement in a lawsuit by individuals who allege that they were held in Ferguson, Mo.’s jail solely because they are impoverished and were unable able to make monetary payments for minor offenses such as traffic tickets.
June 19, 2024
Judge Rejects AI Hiring Firm’s Attack On Class Jurisdiction Ruling

CHICAGO — An artificial intelligence hiring platform’s contacts in Illinois satisfy Ford Motor Co. v. Mont. Eighth Jud. Dist. Ct. and provide for jurisdiction in the state, a federal judge said June 18 in denying a motion for reconsideration of a ruling denying a motion to dismiss.
June 19, 2024
JPMDL To Mull Consolidation Of Cases Alleging Benzene In Acne Products

WASHINGTON, D.C. — The U.S. Judicial Panel on Multidistrict Litigation (JPMDL) will meet in Portland, Maine, on July 25 to decide whether to consolidate for pretrial purposes 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.
June 19, 2024
2nd Dismissal Ruling In ERISA Forfeiture Reallocation Cases Disagrees With 1st

SAN JOSE, Calif. — Taking issue with the only other dismissal ruling in recent Employee Retirement Income Security Act cases filed against retirement plan sponsors for allegedly not putting forfeited nonvested matching contributions toward administrative expenses, a California federal judge granted dismissal with leave to amend a complaint that she called “a swing for the fences.”
June 19, 2024
Engineering Firm Insists It Owed No Duty To Flint Water Bellwether Plaintiffs

ANN ARBOR, Mich. — An engineering firm that is a defendant in the litigation over the lead-contaminated water crisis in Flint, Mich., filed a reply brief on June 18 in Michigan federal court reiterating its insistence that it did not owe a duty of care to a group known as the Bellwether III plaintiffs because under Michigan law, a professional generally owes a duty only to clients, and the firm’s client was the city of Flint.
June 19, 2024
Medical Supply Company Seeks Extension For Response In TCPA FCC Rule Appeal

WASHINGTON, D.C. — A medical supply company accused of sending unsolicited faxes in violation of the Telephone Consumer Protection Act (TCPA) on June 18 filed a request in the U.S. Supreme Court for an additional month for its response to a chiropractic practice’s petition for a writ of certiorari seeking a decision on whether the Federal Communications Commission’s interpretation of the TCPA must be accepted, a question that the practice says the high court was set to rule on five years ago.
June 19, 2024
Star Tribune’s $2.9M Video Privacy Protection Act Class Settlement Granted Final OK

MINNEAPOLIS — A federal judge in Minnesota granted final approval of a $2.9 million settlement to be paid by Star Tribune Media Co. LLC to end class claims alleging that it violated the Video Privacy Protection Act (VPPA) when it shared its website subscribers’ video viewing history with Facebook.
June 19, 2024
California Class Complaint Accuses Apple Of Paying Women Less Than Men

SAN FRANCISCO — Apple Inc. “systematically” pays females employees lower wages than similarly situated male employees, a putative class complaint filed in a California court by two female employees alleges.
June 18, 2024
In Latest Suit, Women Seek Medical Monitoring Over Johnson & Johnson Talc

TRENTON, N.J. — Women filed a putative class action in a New Jersey federal court against various Johnson & Johnson (J&J) entities on June 17 alleging fraud and misrepresentation among other claims and seeking medical monitoring for all women who used talc-based products on their genital area over a four-year period starting in 1960 and have not yet filed suit against the companies.
June 18, 2024
9th Circuit Affirms Dismissal Of Power Monitoring Claims Against Solar Company

SAN FRANCISCO — A Ninth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals on June 17 affirmed the dismissal of a consumer’s putative class action suit against a solar panel manufacturer for violation of California’s unfair competition law (UCL) and other laws, finding that the manufacturer did not guarantee that it could provide power production monitoring indefinitely and explicitly warned customers that its third-party monitoring service could be phased out.
June 18, 2024
2nd Circuit Vacates Addition Of Former Subsidiary In Wage Class Case, Remands

NEW YORK — A trial court erred when it joined an employer’s former subsidiary as a necessary party in a wage-and-hour putative class suit and when it dismissed the case for lack of jurisdiction under the Class Action Fairness Act (CAFA), the Second Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals ruled in a summary order, vacating the judgment in the former employee’s case and remanding for further proceedings.