Justia Class Action Opinion Summaries

Plaintiff class participates in “403(b)” retirement plans administered by Cornell University (“Cornell”). Plaintiffs brought this suit against Cornell and its appointed fiduciaries alleging a number of breaches of their fiduciary duties under the Employee Retirement Income Security Act of 1974 (“ERISA”). Plaintiffs appealed from entry of judgment in Defendants’ favor on all but one claim, which was settled by the parties. On appeal, Plaintiffs challenged: (1) the dismissal of their claim that Cornell entered into a “prohibited transaction” by paying the plans’ recordkeepers unreasonable compensation, (2) the “parsing” of a single count alleging a breach of fiduciary duty into separate sub-claims at the motion to dismiss stage, (3) the award of summary judgment against Plaintiffs for failure to show loss on their claim that Defendants breached their duty of prudence by failing to monitor and control recordkeeping costs, and (4) the award of summary judgment to Defendants on Plaintiffs’ claims that Cornell breached its duty of prudence by failing to remove underperforming investment options and by offering higher-cost retail share classes of mutual funds, rather than lower-cost institutional shares.   The Second Circuit affirmed. The court concluded that the district court correctly dismissed Plaintiffs’ prohibited transactions claim and certain duty-of-prudence allegations for failure to state a claim and did not err in granting partial summary judgment to Defendants on the remaining duty-of-prudence claims. In so doing, the court held as a matter of first impression that to state a claim for a prohibited transaction pursuant to 29 U.S.C. Section 1106(a)(1)(C), it is not enough to allege that a fiduciary caused the plan to compensate a service provider for its services. View "Cunningham v. Cornell University" on Justia Law

Appellant as next of kin and on behalf of a minor, J.T.A., and all similarly situated minors (“Appellants”), filed a class action lawsuit against the School Board of Volusia County, Florida for allegedly violating the minors’ rights to free appropriate public education (“FAPE”) in violation of the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (“IDEA”) and the Americans with Disabilities Act (“ADA”). The Appellants appealed the district court’s order dismissing their amended complaint for failure to exhaust administrative remedies under the IDEA.   The Eleventh Circuit vacated the district court’s order of dismissal and remanded the case for further proceedings consistent with the holding in Perez. The court explained that here, Appellants seek compensatory and punitive damages. The IDEA provides neither. Thus, applying Perez to this case, Appellants can proceed without attempting to exhaust administrative remedies that do not exist under the IDEA. Appellants unambiguously sought compensatory monetary damages under the ADA and not compensatory education under the IDEA. Consequently, in light of Perez, the Appellants should have been allowed to proceed with their claims regardless of the IDEA’s exhaustion requirements. View "Kimberly Powell, et al. v. School Board of Volusia County, Florida" on Justia Law

Plaintiffs s filed a class action complaint and sought to represent a class of individuals whose Healthcare Revenue tradelines had been wrongly “re-aged” by Experian. They alleged that Experian “willfully” violated its obligation under the Fair Credit Reporting Act to “follow reasonable procedures” to ensure consumer credit reports were prepared with “maximum possible accuracy” when it allowed credit reports to reflect allegedly inaccurate status dates. The district court denied Experian’s summary judgment motion. After the close of discovery, Plaintiffs moved to certify a class of all consumers “whose Experian credit reports had an account or accounts reported by [Healthcare Revenue] with an inaccurately displayed Date of Status and were viewed by one or more third parties.” The district court adopted the magistrate judge’s recommendation and denied class certification. Plaintiffs petitioned for permission to appeal the district court’s class certification order under Rule 23(f).   The Eleventh Circuit vacated and remanded. The court held that the denial of Plaintiffs' motion for class certification was an abuse of discretion because the district court’s analysis of Rule 23(b)(3)’s predominance requirement was based on its contrary interpretation of the second option in section 1681n(a)(1)(A). The court wrote that a consumer alleging a willful violation of the Act doesn’t need to prove actual damages to recover “damages of not less than $100 and not more than $1,000.” While the parties raise other issues that may ultimately affect whether the class should be certified, the district court’s order denying class certification only relied on its interpretation of section 1681n(a)(1)(A) and didn’t address these other arguments. View "Omar Santos, et al v. Experian Information Solutions, Inc." on Justia Law

In 2017, Plaintiffs-appellants Loreto and Mercedes Lagrisola applied for and obtained a loan from North American Financial Corporation (NAFC), secured by a mortgage on their residence. In 2021, the Lagrisolas sued NAFC, individually and on behalf of a class of similarly situated persons, alleging NAFC was not licensed to engage in lending in the state of California between 2014 and 2018 and asserted violations of California Business and Professions Code section 17200 and Financial Code sections 22100 and 22751. The trial court sustained NAFC’s demurrer to the FAC without leave to amend, concluding that the allegations in the FAC were insufficient to establish an actual economic injury, necessary for standing under Business and Professions Code section 17200, and that there was no private right of action under Financial Code sections 22100 and 22751. The Lagrisolas appealed, arguing the trial court erred in its judgment. On de novo review, the Court of Appeal reached the same conclusions as the trial court, and accordingly, affirmed. View "Lagrisola v. North American Financial Corp." on Justia Law

Defendant Klarna, Inc. ("Klarna") provides a "buy now, pay later" service that allows shoppers to buy a product and pay for it in four equal installments over time without incurring any interest or fees. Plaintiff paid for two online purchases using Klarna. Plaintiff incurred $70 in overdraft fees. Plaintiff brought this action on behalf of herself and a class of similarly situated consumers, alleging that Klarna misrepresents and conceals the risk of bank-overdraft fees that consumers face when using its pay-over-time service and asserting claims for common-law fraud and violations of the Connecticut Unfair Trade Practice Act ("CUTPA"). Klarna moved to compel arbitration. The district court denied Klarna's motion.   The Second Circuit reversed he district court's order and remanded with instructions to grant Klarna's motion to compel arbitration. The court explained that when Plaintiff arrived at the Klarna Widget, she knew well that purchasing the GameStop item with Klarna meant that she was entering into a continuing relationship with Klarna, one that would endure at least until she repaid all four installments. The Klarna Widget provided clear notice that there were terms that would govern this continuing relationship. A reasonable internet user, therefore, would understand that finalizing the GameStop transaction, entering into a forward-looking relationship with Klarna, and receiving the benefit of Klarna's service would constitute assent to those terms. The court explained that Plaintiff was on inquiry notice that her "agreement to the payment terms," necessarily encompassed more than the information provided on the Klarna Widget, and the burden was then on her to find out to what terms she was accepting. View "Najah Edmundson v. Klarna Inc." on Justia Law

Hackers infiltrated Wawa’s payment systems and obtained the credit and bank card data of about 22,000,000 customers. Wawa announced the breach on December 19, 2019; by the next day, attorneys had identified plaintiffs and filed the first of many class action suits seeking damages for the disclosures. Nine months later, Wawa and class counsel for the consumer-plaintiffs agreed on a settlement making $9 million in gift cards and some other compensation available to customers (of which $2.9 million was claimed) and giving $3.2 million to class counsel for fees and expenses. Objections arrived.The Third Circuit vacated the fee award. The district court must consider whether the funds made available to class members rather than the amount actually claimed during the claims process is the best measure of reasonableness and whether the fee award is reasonable in light of a “clear sailing provision,” in which Wawa promised as part of the settlement not to challenge class counsel’s request for an agreed-upon attorney’s fee award. Though not an automatic bar to settlement approval, such terms deserve careful scrutiny when calculating a reasonable fee award. The court also noted a “puzzling” fee reversion, providing that any court-ordered reduction in the attorney’s fee award would be returned to Wawa—not the class. View "In re: Wawa, Inc. Data Security Litigation" on Justia Law

Plaintiffs Carlie Sherman, Anna Gozun, and Amanda Nash appealed a district court’s denial of class certification in a forced labor action against Trinity Teen Solutions (“Trinity”), a residential treatment center for adolescent girls, and its owners and operators (collectively, “Defendants”). Plaintiffs, now adults, were all sent to Trinity as minors by their parents. Trinity advertised itself as offering a wide range of therapies for troubled adolescent girls in a ranch environment and as taking a "tough love" approach, with its residents living in primitive conditions and working on the ranch as part of their treatment experience. Plaintiffs alleged that, during their residence at Trinity, they were forced to work long hours without pay under threat of serious harm. Plaintiffs filed suit against Defendants, on behalf of themselves and a proposed class of former Trinity residents, bringing three forced labor claims under the Trafficking Victims Protection Reauthorization Act, and sought class certification pursuant to Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 23, proposing a putative class of “Plaintiffs, and all similarly situated persons who received treatment from [Trinity] and were subjected to the provision of ‘agricultural labor.’" The district court denied class certification, concluding Plaintiffs had failed to satisfy Rule 23’s commonality, typicality, and predominance requirements. After review, the Tenth Circuit concluded the district court erred by applying the incorrect legal standard to its analysis of Rule 23(a)’s commonality and typicality requirements and Rule 23(b)(3)’s predominance requirement. Therefore, it vacated the district court’s order denying class certification and remanded this case for further proceedings. View "Sherman, et al. v. Trinity Teen Solutions, et al." on Justia Law

Plaintiffs appealed the dismissal of their class action, alleging that the Ford Motor Company (“Ford”) made unlawful recordings of their private communications in violation of the Washington Privacy Act (“WPA”).   The Ninth Circuit affirmed the district court’s judgment. The panel rejected Plaintiffs’ request for remand to the Washington state court because it was based on the flawed argument that Ford “self-rebutted the assertion of Art. III jurisdiction” when it alleged that plaintiffs failed to plead a statutory injury under the WPA in its motion to dismiss. The injury-in-fact prong of Article III standing and the merits of a WPA claim are separate inquiries. With respect to constitutional injury-in-fact, the complaint’s allegations plausibly articulated an Article III injury because they claimed a violation of a substantive privacy right. Article III standing was thus satisfied, and the district court properly retained jurisdiction. Turning to the merits of the WPA claim, the panel rejected Plaintiffs’ claim that a violation of the WPA itself is an invasion of privacy that constitutes remediable injury. An invasion of privacy, without more, is insufficient to meet the statutory injury requirements of WPA Section 9.73.060. Plaintiffs must allege an injury to “his or her business, his or her person, or his or her reputation.” The court found that Plaintiffs failed to do so here. View "MARK JONES, ET AL V. FORD MOTOR COMPANY" on Justia Law

The Supreme Court denied Petitioner's petition for a writ of mandamus challenging the final approval of the settlement in the underlying class action against the State, holding that Petitioner had no right to compensation.In 1920, the federal government pledged land to native Hawaiian beneficiaries, and while Hawai'i held the homestead land in trust it breached its fiduciary duties. In the underlying class action, trust beneficiaries successfully sued the State for breach of its trustee responsibilities, and the State settled. The Supreme Court accepted a petition for a writ of mandamus, an appeal challenging final approval of the case's settlement, and held (1) because Petitioner was born beyond the statutory period to receive a payout from the settlement he had no right to compensation; and (2) because this decision ended Petitioner's appeal, the appeal before the intermediate court of appeals was moot. View "Rivera v. Honorable Cataldo" on Justia Law

The Supreme Court reversed the decision of the circuit court certifying a class action in the underlying lawsuit brought under the Patient Right-to-Know Addfct, Ark. Code Ann. 20-6-201 et seq., holding that the court abused its discretion in concluding that the predominance prerequisite of a class action had been satisfied.In his complaint, Plaintiff alleged that, after terminating his primary care physician, Dr. Anderson, St. Vincent Medical Group failed to provide Dr. Anderson with a list of his patients or to send them notice of his new location. The circuit court certified a class action. The Supreme Court reversed, holding that the circuit court erred in concluding that Plaintiff identified "a common course of conduct that affected all members of the class." View "St. Vincent Medical Group v. Baldwin" on Justia Law