Class Action
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September 21, 2018
GrubHub Drivers Say They’re Exempt From Arbitration
Dozens of GrubHub Inc. drivers asked an Illinois federal judge to pump the brakes on the restaurant delivery app’s motion to send their proposed class action to arbitration Thursday, arguing that they fall under a transportation worker exemption to federal arbitration law.
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September 21, 2018
Revel Systems Agrees To $2.75M Deal In OT Suit
Revel Systems has agreed to a $2.75 million deal to end claims that the point of sales system company had flouted both federal and state law because it allegedly didn’t properly pay a group of inside sales representatives overtime for a certain period.
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September 21, 2018
Investment Firm Says Securities Law Keeps Suit In Fed. Court
An investment firm facing claims it concealed conflicts of interest when transferring investor money into a mutual fund told an Illinois federal court on Friday the Securities Litigation Uniform Standards Act bars a proposed class of investors from moving the case back to state court.
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September 21, 2018
9th Circ. Heats Up TCPA Debate With Broad Autodialer Take
The Ninth Circuit's decision Thursday to endorse an extremely broad definition of what constitutes an autodialer under the Telephone Consumer Protection Act opens the door not only for more litigation to thrive under the statute, but also for the U.S. Supreme Court or Federal Communications Commission to step in and deliver some long-sought clarity, attorneys say.
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September 21, 2018
Judge Probes NCAA VP On Athlete Pay Rules At Trial
A California federal judge on Friday repeatedly questioned an NCAA vice president on the specifics of its pay rules during a landmark antitrust trial over the association's limits on student compensation, pointing to apparent discrepancies between financial aid limits the NCAA has imposed on its various conferences.
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September 21, 2018
DirecTV User Fights To Keep Law, Audit Firms In RICO Case
An auditor and a law firm accused of extorting hundreds of people by demanding money for alleged misuse of DirecTV showed a pattern of racketeering activity that should prevent them from escaping a proposed class action, a consumer told a New Jersey federal judge Friday.
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September 21, 2018
Class Alleges Genworth Is Sinking Own Long-Term Care Unit
Insurance holding company Genworth Financial was hit with a putative class action in Delaware Chancery Court on Friday by holders of long-term care policies from one of its subsidiaries, who allege that the parent company is sabotaging their benefits by fraudulently transferring the subsidiary’s assets to its other units.
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September 21, 2018
Sandia Can't Pause Discovery In Gender Bias Action
A New Mexico federal judge has denied Sandia Corp.'s motion to stay discovery in a proposed class action from female employees accusing the nuclear weapons research lab operator of systemic bias, finding that allowing discovery to continue would let the case wrap up sooner.
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September 21, 2018
Calif. Gov. Signs Wildfire Bills, Limiting PG&E Liability
California Gov. Jerry Brown signed a package of bills Friday that aim to help the state prevent and recover from catastrophic wildfires, including a controversial bill that critics call a bailout for Pacific Gas and Electric Co. but that its author says is needed to save the liability-burdened utility from bankruptcy.
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September 21, 2018
Health Care Network Wants Religious Exemption Suit Canned
OSF HealthCare System urged an Illinois federal judge to toss a proposed class action accusing it of failing to properly fund its retirement plans while wrongly claiming a religious exemption in the Employee Retirement Income Security Act, arguing that the participants bringing the suit didn’t “meaningfully address” a relevant Tenth Circuit ruling.
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September 21, 2018
9th Circ. Takes Up Microsoft Women's Class Cert. Appeal
The Ninth Circuit on Thursday granted female Microsoft workers’ request that it review the denial of class certification in their pay bias suit, setting the stage for the court to weigh what it takes to show a companywide policy of discrimination under the U.S. Supreme Court’s Dukes decision.
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September 21, 2018
Barrick Gold Escapes Investor Class Action Over Mine Spill
A New York federal judge granted Barrick Gold Corp.’s motion to dismiss a class action claiming the company misstated problems that led to a chemical spill at its Veladero mine in Argentina, finding the company’s allegedly misleading public statements were either forward-looking or not inherently false.
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September 21, 2018
Miami Beach Restaurant Servers Win Cert. In Tips Suit
A Florida federal judge has preliminarily certified a class of servers at a Miami Beach restaurant who claim they were forced to share their tips with their employer and were not paid for all hours worked in violation of the Fair Labor Standards Act.
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September 21, 2018
New EB-5 Fraud Suit Against Fla. Man Targets Condo Project
A Florida man is once again facing accusations of EB-5 visa program fraud after a group of Chinese investors accused him of stealing their funds after throwing around promises for a condominium development that ultimately remained unimproved and empty, causing their petitions for U.S. residency to be denied.
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September 21, 2018
Consumer Seeks Full 3rd Circuit Redo Of Toxic Talc Ruling
Alleging that the Third Circuit contradicted its own prior rulings and created a split with the Ninth Circuit by dismissing a Johnson & Johnson consumer’s proposed class action over talcum powder as “buyer’s remorse,” the customer’s attorneys on Friday asked for the full court to rehear the case.
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September 21, 2018
Migrant Workers Seek Approval Of Sauerkraut Co. Settlement
Counsel for more than 200 Mexican migrant workers urged a Wisconsin federal court on Friday to approve a proposed class action settlement of more than $900,000, which would resolve two lawsuits accusing the world’s largest sauerkraut producer of violating migrant protection laws in its handling of workers on temporary nonagricultural visas.
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September 21, 2018
Chancery Judge Says Goldman Settlement Makes No Sense
A Delaware Chancery Court judge expressed confusion Friday over the nature of a settlement proposed among a shareholder of Goldman Sachs Group Inc. and the company's directors, saying the deal didn't make sense and didn't offer a balanced result because the board members weren't giving up the stock awards at the center of the excessive compensation complaint.
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September 21, 2018
Schwab Dodges Fiduciary Claims In Benefits Suit
A California federal judge has trimmed fiduciary duty and failure to monitor claims from a proposed class of plan participants accusing Charles Schwab & Co. Inc. of mismanaging its retirement savings and investment plan, but allowed prohibited transaction claims against the company to proceed.
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September 21, 2018
Lyft Drivers Move For $1.95M Settlement Over Premium Pay
A group of drivers for Lyft Inc. asked a California federal judge to approve the ride-hailing service's $1.95 million settlement of a class action suit alleging the company underpaid drivers who were supposed to receive prime-time premium pay, with about 33 percent of the payout going toward the class' attorneys' fees and expenses.
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September 21, 2018
Banks Fight Equifax's Bid To Ax Data Breach Claims
Financial institutions on Thursday urged a Georgia federal court to deny Equifax Inc.'s bid to toss their claims in multidistrict litigation stemming from a massive 2017 data breach, saying the money and time spent to protect their customers' data is a valid injury directly tied to Equifax's allegedly deficient data security measures.
Expert Analysis
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Cloud Computing Clearly The Future For Small Firms
While in-house technology investments on the scale and complexity needed to compete with large firms remain cost prohibitive for small and midsize law firms, cloud-based services offer significant cost savings and productivity gains with little to no capital investment, says Holly Urban of Effortless Legal LLC.
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Leveraging Today's Lateral Associate Market
With the Milbank/Cravath pay scale once again equalizing compensation at many Am Law 100 firms, there is even more pressure for firms to differentiate themselves to top lateral associate candidates. This presents strategic considerations for both law firms and lateral candidates throughout the recruitment process, says Darin Morgan of Major Lindsey & Africa.
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'One A Day' Will Not Keep Plaintiffs Away
In a ruling earlier this month concerning Bayer's "One A Day" vitamin gummies, a California state appeals court clarified how the defendant cannot rely on the fine print to escape a mislabeling claim at the pleadings stage. In doing so, the court appears to have laid a road map for how to defeat class certification in such cases, say Robert Guite and Jay Ramsey of Sheppard Mullin Richter & Hampton LLP.
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Q&A
Back To School: Stanford's Jeff Fisher Talks Supreme Court
In this series featuring law school luminaries, Stanford Law School professor Jeffrey Fisher discusses his motivation for teaching, arguing before the U.S. Supreme Court and what the court might look like if Judge Brett Kavanaugh is confirmed.
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Genetic Data Holds Opportunities And Risks For Litigants
A recently published research paper concludes that a significant proportion of patients with malignant mesotheliomas carry inherited mutations in cancer-associated genes. Well-informed lawyers on both sides of the aisle can effectively use such data to materially alter the outcome of cases, say Kirk Hartley and David Schwartz of ToxicoGenomica.
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Opinion
Orexigen Decision At Odds With High Court Jurisprudence
The Ninth Circuit's decision last month in Khoja v. Orexigen Therapeutics — placing constraints on the record a court may consider in deciding falsity and scienter under the securities laws — countermands the U.S. Supreme Court’s direction to courts in Omnicare and Tellabs, say attorneys with BakerHostetler.
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Calif.'s New Rules For Lawyers Move Closer To ABA Model
The first comprehensive overhaul of California's Rules of Professional Conduct in nearly 30 years becomes operational on Nov. 1. Some of the new rules mirror the model language used by the American Bar Association, but many continue to reflect California’s unique approach to certain ethical questions, says Mark Loeterman of Signature Resolution LLC.
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Know The Limits To Atty Public Statements During A Trial
The balancing act between protecting attorneys’ speech rights and ensuring unbiased adjudications was highlighted recently in two cases — when Michael Cohen applied for a restraining order against Stephanie Clifford's attorney, and when Johnson & Johnson questioned whether a Missouri talc verdict was tainted by public statements from the plaintiffs' counsel, says Matthew Giardina of Manning Gross & Massenburg LLP.
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In Calif., Questions Remain On Law Firm Conflict Waivers
In Sheppard Mullin v. J-M Manufacturing Co., the California Supreme Court ruled last month that a law firm's failure to disclose a known conflict with another current client did not categorically disentitle the firm from recovering fees. But the court didn’t provide hoped-for guidance on how to write an enforceable advance conflict waiver, says Richard Rosensweig of Goulston & Storrs PC.
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Q&A
A Chat With Faegre Client Development Chief Melanie Green
In this monthly series, Amanda Brady of Major Lindsey & Africa interviews management from top law firms about the increasingly competitive business environment. Here we feature Melanie Green, chief client development officer at Faegre Baker Daniels LLP.