Victoria’s Secret Stores, LLC and Victoria’s Secret Direct, LLC (collectively “Victoria’s Secret”) appealed an order of the district court remanding the putative class action to state court. Victoria’s Secret removed the action to the federal district court under the Class Action Fairness Act, 28 U.S.C. Section 1332(d)(2). Plaintiff moved to remand the case to state court, arguing that Victoria’s Secret failed to show that the amount in controversy exceeds $5 million.   The Eighth Circuit accepted the appeal under 28 U.S.C. Section 1453(c)(1), and affirmed. The court explained that when a plaintiff contests the amount in controversy after removal, the party seeking to remove under the Class Action Fairness Act must establish the amount in controversy by a preponderance of the evidence. Here, the parties debate whether the amount in controversy should be measured only from the plaintiffs’ perspective—i.e., the aggregate value of the claims to the class members—or whether a district court may determine the amount from either party’s point of view, and thus may consider the amount from the defendant’s perspective—i.e., the total potential cost to the defendant if the plaintiffs prevail. The company presented no data or other evidence to support a reasonable inference that the number of class members who would become repeat purchasers is likely to be sufficient to generate at least $1.7 million in disputed tax. Without a non-speculative basis to infer that the requested injunction would bring the amount in controversy between these parties over $5 million, the district court properly concluded that it lacked jurisdiction. View "Abraham Lizama v. Victoria's Secret Stores, LLC" on Justia Law

Fox and others failed to pay some of their property taxes. The counties foreclosed on and sold their properties and kept all of the sale proceeds, sometimes tens of thousands of dollars beyond the taxes due. Fox filed this class action. While Fox’s class action was pending, the Michigan Supreme Court held that the counties’ practice violated the Michigan Constitution’s Takings Clause. The Michigan legislature then began crafting a statutory process for recovering the proceeds. ARI then began contacting potential plaintiffs about pursuing relief on their behalf. Meanwhile, the district court certified Fox’s class. ARI instructed the law firm it hired to opt-out ARI-represented claimants and pursue individual relief on their behalf. Fox believed that ARI was improperly soliciting class members.The district court ordered ARI to stop contacting class members and allow 32 class members to back out of their agreements with ARI. The Sixth Circuit affirmed in part. The district court has the authority to protect the class-action process and did not abuse its discretion when it acted to protect class members from ARI’s post-certification communications. While most of the order was justified, the district court abused its discretion by allowing class members who hired ARI before the class was certified to rescind their agreements. View "Fox v. Saginaw County," on Justia Law

The Universal Health Services Retirement Savings Plan is a defined contribution retirement plan. Qualified employees can participate and invest a portion of their paycheck in selected investment options, chosen and ratified by the UHS Retirement Plans Investment Committee, which is appointed and overseen by Universal. Named plaintiffs, on behalf of themselves and all other Plan participants, sued Universal under the Employee Retirement Income Security Act, 29 U.S.C. 1132(a)(2)3 and 1109, alleging that Universal breached its fiduciary duty by including the Fidelity Freedom Fund suite in the plan, charging excessive record-keeping and administrative fees, and employing a flawed process for selecting and monitoring the Plan’s investment options, resulting in the selection of expensive investment options instead of readily-available lower-cost alternatives. They also alleged certain Universal defendants breached their fiduciary duty by failing to monitor the Committee.The Third Circuit affirmed class certification, rejecting an argument that the class did not satisfy the typicality requirement of Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 23(a), given that the class representatives did not invest in each of the Plan’s available investment options. Because the class representatives allege actions or a course of conduct by ERISA fiduciaries that affected multiple funds in the same way, their claims are typical of those of the class. View "Boley v. Universal Health Services Inc" on Justia Law

Plaintiff filed a putative class action lawsuit against brokerage firm Hornor, Townsend & Kent (“HTK”) and its parent company The Penn Mutual Life Insurance Company. The complaint alleged that HTK breached its fiduciary duties under Georgia law and that Penn Mutual aided and abetted that breach. The district court concluded that the Securities Litigation Uniform Standards Act (“SLUSA”) barred Plaintiff from using a class action to bring those state law claims.   The Eleventh Circuit affirmed the district court’s dismissal. The court explained that SLUSA’s bar applies when “(1) the suit is a ‘covered class action,’ (2) the plaintiffs’ claims are based on state law, (3) one or more ‘covered securities’ has been purchased or sold, and (4) the defendant [allegedly] misrepresented or omitted a material fact ‘in connection with the purchase or sale of such security.’”Here, the only disputed issue is whether Plaintiff’s complaint alleges a misrepresentation or omission. The court reasoned that the district court correctly dismissed the actions because the complaint alleges “an untrue statement or omission of material fact in connection with the purchase or sale of a covered security." View "Jeffrey A. Cochran v. The Penn Mutual Life Insurance Company, et al" on Justia Law

Plaintiffs, a group of individuals affected by power outages during Hurricane Ida, filed a state court class-action lawsuit against various energy companies. The energy companies removed the case to federal court. The district court then granted Plaintiff's motion to remand the case back to state court. The energy companies appealed on various grounds, including under the Class Action Fairness Act ("CAFA").The Fifth Circuit dismissed the portion of the energy companies' appeal that did not fall under CAFA, finding a lack of jurisdiction. However, CAFA permits a district court to review a district court's decision to remand a case. Thus, the court held that it had jurisdiction to review the CAFA-related bases for the energy companies' appeal. Upon a review of the proceedings below, the court held that the district court properly remanded the case back to state court. View "Stewart v. Entergy Corporation" on Justia Law

The Supreme Court held that the additional hour of pay an employer must pay an employee if the employer unlawfully makes the employee work during all or part of a meal or rest period constitutes "wages" that must be reported on statutorily-required wage statements during employment and paid within statutory deadlines when an employee leaves the job.Plaintiff, who was suspended from his job as a guard after leaving his post to take a meal break. Plaintiff filed a putative class action on behalf of employees of Defendant seeking an additional hour of pay, so-called "premium pay," for each day on which Defendant failed to provide employees a legally-compliant meal break. The trial court determined that Defendant had violated the meal break laws for a certain period and that a failure to pay meal break premiums could support claims under the wage statement and timely payment statutes. The court of appeal reversed in part. The Supreme Court remanded the case, holding (1) the court of appeal erred in concluding that extra pay for missed breaks does not constitute "wages" to be reported on wage statements during employment; and (2) the seven percent default rate of prejudgment interest set by the state Constitution applies to amounts due for failure to provide meal and rest breaks. View "Naranjo v. Spectrum Security Services, Inc." on Justia Law

The First Circuit affirmed the judgment of the district court dismissing all claims in this dispute between brokerage customers of Defendant, who purchased special Puerto Rico securities during a recession but before the bond market crash, holding that there was no error in the proceedings below.Plaintiffs brought a securities class action against Defendant, asserting claims under federal securities laws and Puerto Rico law. The district court entered judgment dismissing the federal law claims with prejudice and the state law claims without prejudice. The First Circuit affirmed, holding that Plaintiffs' claims that there were allegedly material omissions on the part of Defendant were not actionable. View "Ponsa-Rabell v. Santander Securities, LLC" on Justia Law

Following a False Claims Act lawsuit against Stericycle, customers were leaving and the price of Stericycle’s common stock dropped. On behalf of the company’s investors, Florida pension funds filed a securities fraud class action against Stericycle, its executives, board members, and the underwriters of its public offering, alleging that the defendants had inflated the stock price by making materially misleading statements about Stericycle’s fraudulent billing practices. The parties agreed to settle for $45 million. Lead counsel moved for a fee award of 25 percent of the settlement, plus costs. Petri, a class member, objected to the fee award, arguing that the amount was unreasonably high given the low risk of the litigation and the early stage at which the case settled. Petri moved to lift the stay the court had entered while the settlement agreement was pending so that he could seek discovery regarding class counsel’s billing methods, the fee allocation among firms, and counsel’s political and financial relationship with a lead plaintiff, a public pension fund.The district court approved the settlement and the proposed attorney fee and denied Petri’s discovery motion. The Seventh Circuit vacated. The district court did not give sufficient weight to evidence of ex-ante fee agreements, all the work that class counsel inherited from earlier litigation against Stericycle, and the early stage at which the settlement was reached. The court upheld the denial of the objector’s request for discovery into possible pay-to-play arrangements. View "Petri v. Stericycle, Inc." on Justia Law

The First Circuit affirmed the order of the district court entering summary judgment in favor of RentGrow, Inc. and dismissing Plaintiff's complaint alleging that RentGrow willfully violated the Fair Credit Reporting Act (FCRA), 15 U.S.C. 1681-1681x, holding that summary judgment was properly granted.Plaintiff commenced a civil action in the United States District Court for the District of Massachusetts, sued on her own behalf and as the representative of a putative class of similarly situated persons, alleging that Defendant was liable for both negligent and willful noncompliance with the FCRA. The district court entered summary judgment in Defendant's favor, denied class certification, and dismissed the action. The First Circuit affirmed, holding that Plaintiff did not meet her burden of adducing competent evidence sufficient to prove each and every element of her claim. View "McIntyre v. RentGrow, Inc." on Justia Law

In January 2019, Ali brought this civil rights action against Chicago and several police officers, alleging that the officers followed a city policy “of refusing to release on bond an arrestee taken into custody on an arrest warrant issued by an Illinois state court outside of Cook County.” Days before the deadline for completing fact discovery, Ali moved to certify a class. The district court granted the city’s motion to strike, noting that Ali had not added class allegations to his complaint. Ali sought leave to amend his complaint to include class allegations, arguing that he did not have evidentiary support for the existence of the city policy until a November 2019 deposition. The city replied that it had acknowledged the policy months earlier. The district court denied Ali's motion. Weeks later, Ali settled his case.On January 25, the district court dismissed the case without prejudice. Also on January 25, Miller moved to intervene under Rule 24, asserting that he was a member of Ali’s proposed class. With his motion to intervene pending, Miller filed a notice of appeal from the January 25 order. On March 24, with that appeal pending, the district court denied Miller’s motion to intervene as untimely. The Seventh Circuit affirmed. There was no operative class action complaint. Miller’s motion to intervene was untimely; he is not a party to the lawsuit and cannot pursue other challenges. View "Miller v. City of Chicago" on Justia Law