Justia Class Action Opinion Summaries

At issue was what standard applies in determining whether workers should be classified as employees or as independent contract for purposes of California wage orders.Two drivers filed this purported class action alleging that Dynamex Operations West, Inc. had misclassified its delivery drivers as independent contractors rather than employees. The trial court ultimately certified a class action embodying a class of Dynamex drivers who, during a pay period, did not themselves employ other drivers and did not do delivery work for other delivery businesses or for the drivers’ own personal customers. The court of appeal upheld the trial court’s class certification order. The Supreme Court affirmed, holding (1) the trial court properly concluded that the “suffer or permit to work” definition of “employ” contained in the wage order may be relied upon in evaluating whether a worker is an independent contractor; (2) in determining whether, under the suffer or permit to work definition, a worker is properly considered the type of independent contractor to whom the wage order does not apply, it is appropriate to look to the so-called “ABC” test utilized in other jurisdictions; and (3) the trial court’s certification order was correct as a matter of law under a proper understanding of the suffer or permit to work standard. View "Dynamex Operations West, Inc. v. Superior Court of Los Angeles County" on Justia Law

Judith Chavez and other registered nurses (nurses) sought class certification in their wage action against their employer, Our Lady of Lourdes Hospital at Pasco d/b/a Lourdes Medical Center and John Serle (Lourdes). The trial court denied class certification, and the Court of Appeals affirmed. At issue before the Washington Supreme Court was whether the trial court properly found that the nurses failed to satisfy the predominance and superiority requirements necessary for class certification. The Court held the trial court abused its discretion by finding that individual issues predominate and by failing to compare alternative methods of adjudication. Furthermore, the Supreme Court held that predominance was met because the dominant and overriding issue in this litigation was whether Lourdes failed to ensure the nurses could take rest breaks and second meal periods and could record missed breaks. Superiority was met because a class action was superior to other methods of adjudication for the resolution of these claims. View "Chavez v. Our Lady of Lourdes Hosp. at Pasco" on Justia Law

The Castillos were employed and paid by GCA, a temporary staffing company, to perform work on-site at Glenair. Glenair was authorized to and did record, review, and report the Castillos’ time records to GCA so that the Castillos could be paid. In a wage and hours putative class action, the Castillos characterized GCA and Glenair as joint employers. While their case was pending, a separate class action brought against, among others, GCA resulted in a final, court-approved settlement agreement, “Gomez,” which contains a broad release barring settlement class members from asserting wage and hour claims such as those alleged by the Castillos against GCA and its agents. The Castillos are members of the Gomez settlement class and did not opt out of that settlement. The Castillos claims against Glenair involve the same wage and hour claims, for the same work done, covering the same time period as the claims asserted in Gomez. The court of appeal affirmed summary judgment rejecting the Castillo suit. Because Glenair is in privity with GCA (a defendant in Gomez) and is an agent of GCA, the Gomez settlement bars the Castillos’ claims against Glenair as a matter of law. View "Castillo v. Glenair, Inc." on Justia Law

Plaintiff Tony Muro entered into an employment contract with defendant Cornerstone Staffing Solutions, Inc. (Cornerstone). The contract included a provision requiring that all disputes arising out of Muro's employment with Cornerstone to be resolved by arbitration. It also incorporated a class action waiver provision. In response to this case, which was styled as a proposed class action and alleged various Labor Code violations, Cornerstone moved to compel arbitration and dismiss the class claims. Relying heavily on Garrido v. Air Liquide Industrial, U.S. LP, 241 Cal.App.4th 833 (2015), the trial court concluded the contract was exempted from the operation of the Federal Arbitration Act (FAA; 9 U.S.C. 1 et seq.) and was instead governed by California law. It further determined that the California Supreme Court's decision in Gentry v. Superior Court, 42 Cal.4th 443 (2007) (overruled by 59 Cal.4th 348(2014)) continued to provide the relevant framework for evaluating whether the class waiver provision in the contract was enforceable under California law. After applying Gentry to the record here, the court found the class waiver provision of the contract unenforceable and denied the motion to compel arbitration. Cornerstone appeals, but finding no error, the Court of Appeal affirmed. View "Muro v. Cornerstone Staffing Solutions" on Justia Law

At issue was whether all state employees, respective of when they retired, were entitled to have their benefits recalculated in accordance with Longley v. State Employees Retirement Commission, 931 A.2d 890 (Conn. 2007).A two-count complaint brought (1) an administrative appeal from the decision of the State Employees Retirement Commission denying a petition for declaratory ruling filed by Plaintiffs, and (2) a declaratory judgment action on behalf of a class, represented by Plaintiffs, of all state employees who retired and began collecting pensions before October 2, 2001. The trial court ruled in favor of Plaintiffs in the administrative appeal but denied relief for the class. The Supreme Court affirmed in part and reversed in part and remanded the judgment with direct to render judgment for the Commission on the administrative appeal, holding (1) Plaintiffs’ claims for recalculation of benefits were time barred; and (2) neither Plaintiffs not the class were entitled to relief. View "Bouchard v. State Employees Retirement Commission" on Justia Law

QVMC is a full-service hospital. Lampe and McNair, QVMC nurses, filed suit, alleging: violation of Business and Professions Code 17200; violation of Labor Code sections 206, 218, 226, 510, 1194, and 1198; failure to pay meal break penalties under Labor Code sections 226.7 and 512; inaccurate wage statements under Labor Code section 226; violation of the Private Attorney General Act (PAGA) under Labor Code sections 2698–2699; unpaid wages due to illegal rounding under Labor Code sections 218, 510, 1194, 1197 and 1198; and failure to provide meal breaks under Labor Code sections 226.7 and 512. They moved to certify an “overtime class” of employees who earned overtime bonuses where QVMC failed to properly calculate their regular rate of pay, and alternative work schedule employees who were asked to leave work between the eighth and twelfth hour of their shift and were not paid overtime wages; a “meal break” class with a subclass of all employees who signed meal break waivers; and a “wage statement” class to include any QVMC employee who received a pay stub. The court of appeal affirmed denial of certification, agreeing that individualized issues predominated and the claims could not be proven efficiently as a class. View "Lampe v. Queen of the Valley Medical Center" on Justia Law

The trial court denied class certification in a wage and hour suit challenging whether U.S. Bank properly classified its business banking officers (BBOs) as exempt employees under the outside salesperson exemption. The exemption applies to employees who spend more than 50 percent of their workday engaged in sales activities outside their employer’s place of business. The trial court concluded plaintiffs failed to demonstrate that the case is manageable as a class action, stating that it had no evidence establishing uniformity in how BBOs spent their time, despite surveys conducted by the plaintiffs and other voluminous evidence. Plaintiffs satisfied the requirements of ascertainability, numerosity, and adequacy of representation but failed to show common questions of law or fact predominated over individual issues, so class treatment was not superior to other means of resolving the claims. The court of appeal affirmed. A 2015 survey was unreliable for the purpose of showing that common issues would predominate at trial. The trial court properly focused on manageability issues pertaining to the affirmative defenses, while fully understanding plaintiffs’ theory of liability. View "Duran v. U.S. Bank National Association" on Justia Law

ABM, a facility services company with employees throughout the U.S., has thousands of janitorial workers at hundreds of California job sites. Plaintiffs, present or former ABM employees, on behalf of themselves and similarly situated Californians, filed suit in 2007, alleging that ABM violated California labor laws by failing to properly record and compensate employees for meal breaks; requiring employees to work split shifts without appropriate compensation; and failing to ensure that employees were reimbursed for expenses incurred when traveling between work sites. In 2010, plaintiffs moved for class certification of a general class of ABM workers and subclasses of such workers who had been subjected to particular violations. The court found plaintiffs’ expert evidence inadmissible, denied the class certification motion, and denied plaintiffs’ motion under Code of Civil Procedure 473(b), to supplement the evidence concerning the expert's qualifications. The court of appeal reversed, concluding that materials submitted before the class certification hearing were sufficient to qualify plaintiffs’ expert in database management and analysis; it was error for the court to completely disregard plaintiffs’ proffered expert evidence of common practice, rather than accepting it for what it was and weighing it against any individualized inquiries that might properly have defeated plaintiffs’ request for class certification. The proposed classes were ascertainable and plaintiffs’ allegations presented predominantly common questions. View "ABM Industries Overtime Cases" on Justia Law

Plaintiffs brought a collective lawsuit against Jimmy John’s on behalf of all assistant store managers nationwide for violations of the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA). Jimmy John’s owns just 2% of their stores; the rest are operated by franchisees. Jimmy John’s claimed that it did not maintain employment records for franchisee-employees and did not have contact information for the vast majority of putative collective members. The parties ultimately agreed that Jimmy John’s would send a letter to the non‐party franchisees asking for contact information for their assistant managers. Eventually, about 600 franchisee and 60 corporate employees joined the suit. The court bifurcated discovery, with the first phase to focus on the joint-employer issue. Two years into the litigation, plaintiffs filed separate lawsuits against their franchisee employers in district courts nationwide, asserting the same claims, arguing that the FLSA statute of limitations was running continuously on those claims. The district court subsequently enjoined plaintiffs from pursuing their lawsuits against the franchisee employers until their claims against Jimmy John’s were resolved. The Seventh Circuit reversed, rejecting arguments that the injunction was authorized under the court’s inherent equitable powers or the All Writs Act because it was necessary to prevent duplicative litigation, avoid inconsistent rulings, and protect the court’s pretrial orders regarding discovery and notice procedures. View "Lucas v. Jimmy John's Enterprises, LLC" on Justia Law

The Supreme Court held that the circuit court’s order certifying a class action filed by Employees failed to comply with Ark. R. Civ. P. 23(b). In their complaint, Employees alleged claims of breach of contract and unjust enrichment based on Employer’s failure to compensate Employees for earned but unused vacation time. The circuit court granted Employees’ motion for class certification. Appellants filed this interlocutory appeal arguing that Employees failed to demonstrate commonality, predominance, and superiority as to their breach of contract claim. The Supreme Court remanded the case, holding that the circuit court’s bare conclusion that “Plaintiffs have satisfied all elements of Rule 23 of the Arkansas Rules of Civil Procedure and class certification is appropriate in this case” was clearly insufficient for the Supreme Court to conduct a meaningful review. View "Industrial Welding Supplies of Hattiesburg, LLC v. Pinson" on Justia Law