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Jeffrey Huberman

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Focusing on complex class actions and commercial litigation, Jeffrey Huberman has handled matters involving a range of issues, including products liability, consumer protection, breach of contract, tort, and statutory claims.

Jeffrey works with clients in the sports, financial services, and pharmaceutical industries, among others, using his substantial experience in all stages of litigation, including:

  • dispositive motions;
  • fact and expert discovery;
  • class certification;
  • summary judgment; and
  • trial

Jeffrey has first-chaired fact and expert witness depositions and has drafted dispositive motions in both federal and state court for clients. In addition, Jeffrey maintains an active pro bono practice focused on veterans’ rights and criminal justice.

Prior to attending law school, Jeffrey worked for the Massachusetts House of Representatives.

Contact: Read more about Jeffrey HubermanEmail

We previously covered the Eleventh Circuit’s decision in Johnson v. NPAS Solutions, LLC, 975 F.3d 1244 (11th Cir. 2020), in which the Eleventh Circuit relied on two Supreme Court decisions from the 1880s to prohibit courts from awarding incentive or service awards to class representatives in class settlements.  Id. at 1255 (citing Trustees v. Greenough, 105 U.S. 527 (1881), and Cent. R.R. & Banking Co. v. Pettus, 113 U.S. 116 (1885).  Although the Eleventh Circuit was the first federal appellate court to bar these awards in all circumstances, a recent Second Circuit decision agreed that these awards are “likely impermissible” under Supreme Court precedent, while observing that it would take the entire Second Circuit to overturn prior precedent upholding incentive awards.  See Fikes Wholesale, Inc. v. HSBC Bank USA, N.A., 62 F.4th 704, 721 (2nd Cir. 2023).  The Department of Justice has likewise implied that it agrees with the Eleventh Circuit’s position, relying on the Johnson decision in an effort to block incentive awards from a class settlement in a District of Columbia court. …

Continue Reading Supreme Court Denies Cert on Incentive Awards

The Eleventh Circuit is poised to reconsider recent standing decisions favorable for defendants seeking to invoke Article III’s standing requirements to defeat class certification.

At issue is the Eleventh Circuit’s July 2022 decision in Drazen v. Pinto, holding that (i) all class members must have Article III standing in order to receive individual damages (whether through a settlement or otherwise), and (ii) the standing determination is decided under Eleventh Circuit law, even where certain class members do not reside within the Eleventh Circuit’s geographic boundaries and may have standing under other circuit precedent.  41 F.4th 1354, 1360–61 (11th Cir. 2022). The dispute in Drazen arose in the context of the Telephone Consumer Protection Act (“TCPA”), and addressed both unwanted phone calls and text messages.  While a settlement in Drazen was pending, the Eleventh Circuit held in Salcedo v. Hanna, 936 F.3d 1162, 1168 (11th Cir. 2019), that, contrary to precedent in other circuits, a single unwanted text message was not sufficient to give rise to Article III standing under the TCPA.  Because the panel was bound by Salcedo, and because the proposed class definition in the Drazen settlement included individuals whose sole harm was an unwanted text message, those individuals did not have standing.  The panel therefore vacated the district court’s approval of the settlement.…

Continue Reading Eleventh Circuit to Reconsider Standing Decisions

Last month, this blog covered the Eleventh Circuit’s denial of a petition to rehear Johnson v. NPAS Solutions, LLC, a decision that held that class action incentive awards are per se unlawful.  See 2022 WL 3083717 (11th Cir. Aug. 3, 2022).  That denial left the Eleventh Circuit as the only circuit where class action incentive awards can never be included in settlements under any circumstances. Now, the Department of Justice has relied on the Eleventh Circuit’s decision in Johnson to try to block class action incentive awards in a class action settlement with the federal government. …

Continue Reading DOJ Seeks to Block Class Action Incentive Awards in Recent Class Action Settlement

In Drazen v. Pinto, the Eleventh Circuit vacated a class settlement and held that in order to receive individual damages (whether through a settlement or otherwise), all class members must have Article III standing under Circuit precedent.  2022 WL 2963470, at *6 (11th Cir. July 27, 2022).  The decision gives defendants another tool to defeat class certification, while at the same time makes it more difficult to include class members that lack standing in classwide settlements. …

Continue Reading Eleventh Circuit Holds that All Class Members Must Have Standing Under Circuit Law to Recover Individual Damages

The en banc Eleventh Circuit recently denied a petition to rehear the case of Johnson v. NPAS Solutions, LLC (Johnson II).  See 2022 WL 3083717 (11th Cir. Aug. 3, 2022).  The initial opinion in Johnson relied on two Supreme Court decisions from the 1880s to hold that district courts can never, under…

The Sixth Circuit recently made it more difficult for plaintiffs to certify a class where individualized inquiries are needed to identify class members. 

In Tarrify Properties LLC v. Cuyahoga County Ohio, 2022 WL 2128816 (6th Cir. June 14, 2022), the Sixth Circuit addressed a claim that Ohio’s tax-foreclosure statute operates as a taking under the federal and Ohio constitutions.  The plaintiff in Tarrify owned delinquent property that was transferred to an authorized land bank, and plaintiff argued that the transfer—which prevented the owner of the delinquent property from recovering the difference between the value of the land and the tax liability—amounted to a taking.  Plaintiff sought certification of a class of owners in which “the total value of [their] property exceeded the amount of the impositions on that property at the time the transfer occurred.”  Id. at *2.  The district court denied plaintiff’s motion for class certification, plaintiff appealed, and the Sixth Circuit affirmed.…

Continue Reading Sixth Circuit Adds Teeth to Rule 23’s Ascertainability Requirement

The Class Action Fairness Act (“CAFA”) includes a “local controversy” exception, requiring federal district courts to decline jurisdiction over classes where, amongst other things, more than “two-thirds of the members of all proposed plaintiff classes in the aggregate are citizens of the State in which the action was originally filed.”  28 U.S.C. § 1332(d)(4)(A)(i)(I).  In Simring v. Greensky, LLC, — F.4th —, 2022 WL 894206 (11th Cir. Mar. 28, 2022), the Eleventh Circuit addressed, where plaintiffs have not submitted actual evidence on the residency of putative class members, whether courts are confined to the class definition in a class action complaint to determine if this exception’s two-thirds citizen requirement is met, or if courts can look at other statements in the complaint. The Eleventh Circuit answered that the review is limited to the class definition itself in the absence of independent evidence of class members’ citizenship.…

Continue Reading Eleventh Circuit Narrowly Construes CAFA’s “Local Controversy” Exception, Ruling that State Residency of Putative Class Members Must Either be Limited by Class Definition or Proven With Evidence