Justia Class Action Opinion Summaries

Acticon is the lead plaintiff in a consolidated putative class action suit against China North East Petroleum Holdings Limited (NEP) brought under the Securities Exchange Act of 1934, 15 U.S.C. 78j(b) & 78t(a), and under SEC Rule 10b-5. Acticon alleges that NEP misled investors about its reported earnings, oil reserves, and internal controls. It further alleges that NEP revealed this information through a series of corrective disclosures and that in the trading days after each disclosure was made, NEP’s stock price dropped. NEP argues that these allegations are not sufficient to allege economic loss because its share price rebounded on certain days after the final disclosure to the point that Acticon could have sold its holdings and avoided a loss. The district court held that because Acticon had foregone multiple opportunities to sell its shares at a profit, it had not suffered an economic loss and dismissed. The Second Circuit vacated. Price recovery does not defeat an inference of economic loss. View "Rosado AG v. China North East Petroleum Holdings, Ltd." on Justia Law

In this putative class action, Plaintiffs were doctors of chiropractic who alleged they had been victimized by the discriminatory practices of Iowa's largest health insurer, Wellmark, Inc. The district court (1) granted Wellmark's motion to dismiss claims brought under Iowa's insurance regulatory statutes because no private cause of action was provided therein; (2) granted Wellmark's motion for summary judgment on Plaintiffs' antitrust claims based on the "state action" exemption found in Iowa Code 553.6(4); (3) granted summary judgment on claims alleging Wellmark breached its obligations under a judicially approved national class action settlement in Love v. Blue Cross Blue Shield Ass'n; and (4) granted summary judgment on several specific antitrust claims. The Supreme Court (1) reversed in part, holding that the district court erred in granting summary judgment on Plaintiffs' antitrust claims based on the state action exemption, as the record failed to establish the challenged conduct fell within the exemption; and (2) otherwise affirmed. Remanded. View "Mueller v. Wellmark, Inc." on Justia Law

In a suit alleging engine defects in Volkswagen and Audi vehicles, the district court awarded $30 million in attorneys' fees to several groups of plaintiffs' attorneys who achieved a class action settlement agreement. The award was based in federal law. The First Circuit vacated the fee award and remanded for calculation using Massachusetts law. In a diversity suit, where the settlement agreement expressly states that the parties have not agreed on the source of law to apply to the fee award and there is an agreement that the defendants will pay reasonable fees, state law governs the fee award. View "Volkswagen Grp of Am. v. McNulty Law Firm" on Justia Law

Travelers sought a declaratory judgment that they had no duty to defend their insured, Rogan Shoes, in an Illinois state court class action for violations of the federal Fair and Accurate Credit Transactions Act, 15 U.S.C. 1681c(g), which prohibits businesses from including on sales receipts the expiration date or more than the last five digits of the purchaser’s credit or debit card and authorizes damages of up to $1,000 per unlawful receipt. The suit sought statutory damages of $387 million. Rogan settled for $16 million; the settlement specified that the judgment would be satisfied only through proceeds from Travelers’ policies, with the exception of $50,000 to cover legal costs. Rogan assigned its claims and rights to payments under the policies. The state court approved the settlement. A state court citation to discover assets was served on Travelers’ agent. The district court dismissed the declaratory judgment action on the ground that parallel state proceedings were pending. The Seventh Circuit affirmed, finding that the case did not satisfy the amount-in-controversy requirement for diversity jurisdiction, 28 U.S.C. 1332(a), because Rogan had assigned its interests in its policies to class members, none of whom individually claim a share of more than $75,000. View "Travelers Prop. Cas. & Travelers Indem. Co. v. Good" on Justia Law

The district court presided over four class action cases. Two insurance companies (collectively, Defendants) were the defendants in the two underlying cases. Allianz Life Insurance Company (Allianz) was a defendant in the other cases. Defendants filed motions for summary judgment. Plaintiffs opposed and attached a declaration by Dr. Craig McCann to support their theories. When Defendants moved to exclude the opinion, the court appointed an expert witness, Dr. Zvi Bodie, to evaluate Dr. McCann's opinion. The district court ordered Dr. Bodie's report sealed until it determined whether the report was admissible. In its case, Allianz filed a motion for summary judgment and a Daubert motion to exclude Dr. McCann. Defendants settled with the plaintiffs before the district court ruled on the Daubert or summary judgment motions. Allianz subsequently intervened in the underlying cases and requested the unsealing of Dr. Bodie's report. The district court denied its motion, ruling that the presumption in favor of public access to judicial records did not apply to the records at issue because they were attached to a non-dispositive Daubert motion. The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals reversed and remanded with directions to grant the motion, because the records at issue were filed in connection with pending summary judgment motions. View "Midland Nat'l Life Ins. Co. v. Allianz Life Ins. Co. of N.A." on Justia Law

Plaintiffs David McCorkle and William Pender appealed a district court order dismissing two of their class action claims against Bank of America Corporation for alleged violations of certain provisions of the Employment Retirement Income Security Act of 1974 (ERISA). Their claims centered on the Bank's use of a normal retirement age (NRA) that allegedly violated ERISA in calculating lump sum distributions and further ran afoul of ERISA's prohibition of "backloading" the calculation of benefit accrual. Upon review, the Fourth Circuit agreed with the district court's conclusion that Plaintiffs failed to state a claim upon which relief could be granted, and it affirmed the district court's judgment to dismiss those claims. View "Pender v. Bank of America Corp." on Justia Law

Plaintiffs sought to recover on behalf of themselves and similarly-situated employees and retirees of the City of Cincinnati the current value of the 870,021 shares of Anthem stock that the City received from Anthem’s demutualization. Plaintiffs asserted eight claims for breach of contract and four tort claims against Anthem and three breach of contract claims and four tort claims against the City. The district court certified the class: 2,536 people named as insureds, or former members of a group of insured persons, covered under a health care group policy from June 18 through November 2, 2001. The class included “Class A” members, who had an insurance policy with Anthem prior to its merger with Community in 1995 and “Class B” members who received a health insurance group policy after the merger. The court later dismissed. The Sixth Circuit, exercising jurisdiction under the Class Action Fairness Act of 2005, 28 U.S.C. 1332(d), affirmed. Plaintiffs cannot recover any demutualization compensation; the City was the policyholder before the merger and maintained its policyholder rights post-merger through a grandfather clause, including any rights to demutualization proceeds. The 2001 demutualization process did not disrupt the City’s membership interests or confer any equity rights to Plaintiffs. View "Mell v. Anthem, Inc." on Justia Law

The issue before the Eleventh Circuit concerned a private securities fraud class action suit brought against a bank holding company and its management. State-Boston Retirement System, a shareholder and lead plaintiff, sought to prove that the holding company had misrepresented the level of risk associated with commercial real estate loans held by its subsidiary. After the trial, the District Court submitted the case to the jury on a verdict form seeking general verdicts and answers to special interrogatories. When the jury returned a verdict partially in favor of State-Boston, the holding company moved for judgment as a matter of law. Perceiving an inconsistency between two of the jury's interrogatory answers, the District Court discarded one of them and granted the motion on the basis of the remaining findings. The Eleventh Circuit concluded that was error: "[w]hen a court considers a motion for judgment as a matter of law -even after the jury has rendered a verdict- only the sufficiency of the evidence matters. . . .The jury’s findings are irrelevant." Despite the District Court’s error, the Eleventh Circuit concluded that the evidence was insufficient to support a finding of loss causation, an element required to make out a securities fraud claim. The Court therefore affirmed. View "State-Boston Retirement System v. BankAtlantic Bancorp, Inc." on Justia Law

In a class action under ERISA, the district court partially decertified the class, 3000 to 3500 members (57 to 71 percent). Plaintiffs appealed under Rule 23(f), which authorizes a court of appeals to “permit an appeal from an order granting or denying class-action certification.” After holding that an order materially altering a previous order granting or denying class certification is within the scope of Rule 23(f), the Seventh Circuit denied the appeal for failure to satisfy the criteria for a Rule 23(f) appeal. View "Matz v. Household Int'l Tax Reduction Inv. Plan" on Justia Law

Appellant, a former pilot for Vision Airlines, sued Vision on behalf of a Class of other pilots and flight crew employees to recover hazard pay, which Appellant and the Class alleged Vision had accepted on their behalf and never paid to them. After nearly two years of discovery disputes between Vision and the Class, the district court sanctioned Vision by striking its answer, entered default judgment against Vision, and held a jury trial to determine damages. On appeal, the Ninth Circuit Court rejected Vision's arguments that (1) the district court abused its discretion by striking Vision's answer, (2) the claims in the complaint were legally insufficient to support the default judgment, and (3) the district court abused its discretion by certifying the Class. The Court then reversed the order dismissing the Class's claim for punitive damages, holding that the district court erred in dismissing the Class's claim for punitive damages. View "Hester v. Vision Airlines, Inc." on Justia Law