Justia Class Action Opinion Summaries

Plaintiff, Oklahoma Firefighters Pension and Retirement System (“Oklahoma Firefighters”) is a purchaser of Six Flags Entertainment Corporation common stock and brought suit against the company and two of its executive officers. Plaintiffs alleged that Six Flags executives made material misrepresentations and omissions regarding the development of several Six Flags theme parks in China, thereby violating federal securities laws. The district court dismissed the claims with prejudice for failure to state a claim. Plaintiff sought a reversal of the district court’s two primary rulings: the dismissal of the complaint and the refusal to allow post-judgment amendments to the complaint. As to the dismissal, Plaintiff argued it sufficiently pled (1) actionable misstatements, (2) scienter, and (3) control person liability. As to the failure to allow an amendment, Plaintiff alleged it timely and sufficiently corrected the claimed deficiencies in the complaint.   The Fifth Circuit reversed and remanded the district court’s ruling. The court held that the complaint adequately alleges that Six Flags improperly recognized revenue on the China parks in its Class Period financial statements due to Defendants’ misleading statements regarding the parks’ construction progress and the admission of $15 million in overstated revenue in 2018. However, the court remanded to consider whether the complaint adequately alleges a Section 20(a) claim. View "OK Firefighters Pension v. Six Flags Entmt" on Justia Law

Plaintiff, a home-delivery subscriber to the St. Louis Post-Dispatch daily newspaper (the “Post-Dispatch”), filed a putative class action for damages against the owner and publisher of the Post-Dispatch in state court alleging that Defendants “double-billed” him for “overlapping days.” Defendants removed the case to federal court under the Class Action Fairness Act, alleging that Plaintiff is seeking aggregate class-wide damages for the applicable five-year statute of limitations period that exceed $5,000,000. Plaintiff filed a First Amended Class Action Complaint alleging six claims for relief under Missouri law. The district court granted summary judgment dismissing all claims.   On appeal, Plaintiff argued the district court erred in granting summary judgment dismissing his breach of contract and MMPA claims because there are genuine issues of material fact “whether overlaps cost subscribers money” and whether Defendants’ billing practices violate the MMPA because “overlaps are incorrect and wrong.”   The Eighth Circuit affirmed. The court explained that it might be evidence that Defendants made minor billing errors in Plaintiff’s individual subscriber account, but that claim was not pleaded. The district court did not err in granting Defendants summary judgment dismissing the claims Plaintiff asserted despite his belated raising of this unpleaded contract claim. Further, the court explained that Plaintiff failed to controvert Defendants’ evidence showing that DISCUS properly deducts from a subscriber’s payment-in-advance the applicable rate charged as each newspaper is delivered. Thus, because Plaintiff cannot establish the ascertainable loss element of an MMPA claim, the court held that it need not address his additional argument that the Post-Dispatch’s billing practices are unfair or unethical. View "Steven Goldsmith v. Lee Enterprises" on Justia Law

Plaintiff purchased a set of tires from Walmart.com, which included a Terms of Use with an arbitration provision. Plaintiff had the tires shipped to and installed at a Walmart Auto Center, and while waiting for the tires to be installed, he purchased the lifetime balancing and rotation Service Agreement. Plaintiff received tire services once in 2019 but was later denied service on several occasions in 2020 at multiple Walmart Auto Centers. Plaintiff brought a putative class action alleging breach of contract and breach of the duty of good faith and fair dealing. Walmart sought to compel individual arbitration of its dispute with Plaintiff pursuant to the arbitration provisions of the Terms of Use. The district court found that the plain meaning of the Terms of Use precluded the applicability of the arbitration provision to in-store purchases.   The Ninth Circuit affirmed the district court’s denial of Walmart Inc.’s motion to compel arbitration and agreed with the district court that Plaintiff contested the existence, not the scope, of an arbitration agreement that would encompass this dispute. As the party seeking to compel arbitration, Walmart bore the burden of proving the existence of an agreement to arbitrate by a preponderance of the evidence. The panel held that substantial evidence supported that the two contracts between Plaintiff and Walmart were separate, independent agreements. The two contracts—though they involved the same parties and the same tires—were separate and not interrelated. Therefore, the arbitration agreement in the first did not encompass disputes arising from the second. View "KEVIN JOHNSON V. WALMART INC." on Justia Law

Plaintiff bought a laptop with a manufacturer’s warranty from Target. He filed a class action on behalf of “all citizens of Arkansas who purchased one or more products from Target that cost over $15 and that were subject to a written warranty.” His theory was that Target violated the Magnuson-Moss Warranty Act’s Pre-Sale Availability Rule by refusing to make the written warranties reasonably available, either by posting them in “close proximity to” products or placing signs nearby informing customers that they could access them upon request. Target filed a notice of removal based on the jurisdictional thresholds in the Class Action Fairness Act of 2005. The district court the class action against Target Corporation to Arkansas state court.   The Eighth Circuit vacated the remand order and return the case to the district court for further consideration. The court explained that the district court applied the wrong legal standard. The district court refused to acknowledge the possibility that Target’s sales figures for laptops, televisions and other accessories might have been enough to “plausibly allege” that the case is worth more than $5 million. The district court then compounded its error by focusing exclusively on the two declarations that accompanied Target’s notice of removal. The court wrote that the district court’s failure to consider Target’s lead compliance consultant’s declaration, Target’s central piece of evidence in opposing remand, “effectively denied” the company “the opportunity . . . to establish [its] claim of federal jurisdiction.” View "Robert Leflar v. Target Corporation" on Justia Law

Plaintiff appealed the district court’s dismissal of her putative class action against the West Virginia Parkways Authority, in which she alleges that the Parkways Authority improperly collected fees. And the Parkways Authority appeals the district court’s holding that it was not entitled to sovereign immunity under the United States or West Virginia Constitutions.   Plaintiff relied on the Class Action Fairness Act for jurisdiction. The Fourth Circuit vacated the district court’s judgment and remanded the case remanded to the district court with directions to dismiss without prejudice. The court concluded that here, Section 1332(d)(5)(A) bars jurisdiction under Section 1332(d)(2) of the Class Action Fairness Act. The court explained that the Parkways Authority is the only, and thus “primary,” defendant. And it is a “governmental entity.” The Parkways Authority’s sovereign-immunity claim is strong enough to conclude that the district court “may be foreclosed from ordering relief” against it. So Section 1332(d)(2)’s jurisdictional grant “shall not apply.” Since that is the only provision that Plaintiff relies on to establish jurisdiction over her putative class action, the district court lacked jurisdiction to hear it. View "Blazine Monaco v. WV Parkways Authority" on Justia Law

Fourteen women (“Plaintiffs”) from seven states brought the present putative class action against Ashley Black and her companies (“Defendants”), alleging false and deceptive marketing practices. They take issue with various representations in Defendants’ ads about a product called the FasciaBlaster, a two-foot stick with hard prongs that is registered with the Food and Drug Administration as a massager. The district court dismissed Plaintiffs’ claims in their entirety.  Plaintiffs appealed the order striking the class allegations and the dismissal of individual claims.   The Fifth Circuit found that the district court correctly struck Plaintiffs’ class allegations and properly dismissed all but two of their claims. Accordingly, the court affirmed in part, reversed in part, and remanded the case to the district court. The court explained that it agreed with the district court that Plaintiffs’ allegations suffer from a combination of defects, including a failure to plead adequately what representations were actually made when those representations were made, who made the representations, and where those representations occurred.   However, the court reversed the dismissal of Plaintiffs’ breach of express warranty under, respectively, California Consumer Code Sections 2313 & 10210, and Florida Statutes Sections 672.313 & 680.21. The court wrote that the district court did not apply the law of a specific jurisdiction when conducting its analysis. Plaintiffs on appeal cite various Fifth Circuit cases in addition to Texas and California state law precedents. Defendants proffer Fifth Circuit, California, and Florida precedents. Neither party, however, briefed what law should be applied to each claim. View "Elson v. Black" on Justia Law

The Court of Chancery denied Defendants' motion to dismiss this action asserting that the management team (or sponsor) and directors of a special acquisition company (SPAC) breached their fiduciary obligations, holding that it was reasonably conceivable that Defendants breached their fiduciary duties.For a SPAC organized as a Delaware corporation, stockholders are assured that the SPAC's fiduciaries will abide by certain standards of conduct. Plaintiff, a stockholder, filed a putative class action alleging that Defendants undertook a value destructive deal that generated returns for the sponsor while impairing stockholders' ability to decide whether to redeem or to invest in the post-merger company. Defendants filed a motion to dismiss. The Court of Chancery denied the motion, holding that the complaint stated reasonably conceivable claims against Defendants in counts one, two, and three. View "Delman v. GigAquisitions3, LLC" on Justia Law

Plaintiff, who represents both a Washington and a national class, was incarcerated three times in the Kitsap County Jail. In each instance, the jail confiscated his cash at booking and returned it to him in the form of a prepaid debit card issued and serviced, respectively, by defendants Cache Valley Bank and Rapid Investments, Inc. (collectively, “Rapid”). Plaintiff was not provided an option to receive his money in any other form. Plaintiff claimed that Rapid’s debit cards carried fees that violated the EFTA and Washington state law. Rapid sought arbitration pursuant to an arbitration provision in a cardholder agreement.   The Ninth Circuit affirmed the district court’s order denying Defendants’ motion to compel arbitration. The panel wrote that Plaintiff’s retention of the release card, prior to use, cannot constitute assent to the agreement. The panel next considered whether Plaintiff’s subsequent use of the card to withdraw funds, while remaining silent, constituted assent. The panel held that because the money Plaintiff withdrew was his own, because the card he was issued came pre-activated and there was no other way to obtain immediate use of his own funds, and because Rapid structured its fees to begin deducting after three days regardless of use, Plaintiff’s decision to withdraw his own money cannot reasonably be understood to manifest assent to the contract. View "JEFFREY REICHERT, ET AL V. RAPID INVESTMENTS, INC., ET AL" on Justia Law

The Supreme Court held that the payment of a civil fine for a traffic violation under a city's automated traffic enforcement program without a dispute of liability for the violation precludes those improperly ticketed under the program from raising an unjust enrichment claim against the city in a separate action.Appellees - Plaintiffs in a class action - were vehicle lessees who received tickets under the city of the city of Cleveland's automated traffic enforcement program. Plaintiffs did not appeal their cases, and most paid the civil fine. The trial court granted Appellees' motion for class certification. The City appealed, arguing that res judicata precluded class relief. After the court of appeals affirmed the class certification order the trial court ruled in favor of the class. The Supreme Court reversed, holding that by paying their civil fines and not disputing their liability, Appellees admitted their liability for their traffic violations, and res judicata prevented a subsequent lawsuit. View "Lycan v. City of Cleveland" on Justia Law

Plaintiffs, a class of children, appearing through their guardians ad litem, filed a lawsuit against Google LLC and others, alleging that Google used persistent identifiers to collect data and track their online behavior surreptitiously and without their consent in violation of the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act (“COPPA”). They pled only state law claims arising under the constitutional, statutory, and common law of California, Colorado, Indiana, Massachusetts, New Jersey, and Tennessee, but also allege Google’s activities violate COPPA. The district court held that the “core allegations” in the third amended complaint were squarely covered, and preempted, by COPPA.   The Ninth Circuit reversed the district court’s dismissal on preemption grounds. The panel considered the question of whether COPPA preempts state law claims based on underlying conduct that also violates COPPA’s regulations. The Supreme Court has identified three different types of preemption—express, conflict, and field. First, express preemption is a question of statutory construction. The panel concluded that COPPA’s preemption clause does not bar state-law causes of action that are parallel to, or proscribe, the same conduct forbidden by, COPPA. Accordingly, express preemption does not apply to the plaintiff class’s claims. Second, even if express preemption is not applicable, preemptive intent may be inferred through conflict preemption principles. The panel held that although express and conflict preemption are analytically distinct inquiries, they effectively collapse into one when the preemption clause uses the term “inconsistent.” For the same reasons that the panel concluded there was no express preemption, the panel concluded that conflict preemption did not bar Plaintiffs’ claims. View "CARA JONES, ET AL V. GOOGLE LLC, ET AL" on Justia Law