Class Action Procedure

This blog previously covered the Eleventh Circuit’s July 2022 decision in Drazen v. Pinto, which held that all class members must have Article III standing in order to receive individual damages in a class settlement.  41 F.4th 1354 (11th Cir. 2022).  Because the law in the Eleventh Circuit at the time held that a

On July 26, 2023, the UK Supreme Court decided in R (on the application of PACCAR Inc and others) (Appellants) v Competition Appeal Tribunal and others (Respondents) [2023] UKSC 28 that litigation funding agreements (“LFAs”) — where third party funders agree to finance the legal costs of litigation in return for a percentage of any damages recovered — constitute damages-based agreements (“DBAs”) under UK law. Consequently, LFAs will be unenforceable unless they satisfy the statutory requirements for DBAs. In practice, this decision is likely to render many LFAs that are currently in place unenforceable, and will affect the type of funding arrangements available to claimants in collective proceedings moving forward.Continue Reading UK Supreme Court Hands Down Judgment on Litigation Funding Agreements

Rule 23(c)(4) states that, “[w]hen appropriate, an action may be brought or maintained as a class action with respect to particular issues.”  But do classes under Rule 23(c)(4), otherwise known as “issue classes,” also need to satisfy the requirements of Rule 23(a) and (b)?  In Harris v. Medical Transportation Management, Inc., 2023 WL 4567258 (D.C. Cir. July 18, 2023), the D.C. Circuit confirmed that the answer is “yes.” Continue Reading D.C. Circuit Confirms That Issue Classes Must Satisfy the Requirements of Rule 23(a) and (b)

An Illinois federal district court recently concluded that, under the Class Action Fairness Act (CAFA), the “citizenship” of a limited liability company is determined by reference to its principal place of business and state of organization. See Calchi v. TopCo Associates, LLC, 2023 WL 3863355 (N.D.Ill. June 7, 2023).

The court originally dismissed plaintiff’s

Pennsylvania law requires foreign corporations to register to do business in the Commonwealth and provides that all registrants are subject to suit on “any cause” in the Commonwealth’s courts, regardless of a connection to the jurisdiction. In a split decision, the Supreme Court reversed a Pennsylvania Supreme Court decision finding that this general jurisdiction provision violated the Due Process Clause. Mallory v. Norfolk So. Railway Co., 600 U.S. __ (2023) (slip op. available here).Continue Reading Split Supreme Court Weighs in on Corporate Consent to Personal Jurisdiction

The Supreme Court, in a 5–4 ruling, has resolved a circuit split on the issue of litigation stays pending appeal of denials of motions to compel arbitration.  In the underlying putative class action, Bielski et al v. Coinbase, Inc., 3:21-cv-07478 (N.D. Cal.), Coinbase moved to compel arbitration of the plaintiffs’ claims, but the motion was denied by the district court.  The Ninth Circuit—in a split from several other Circuits—declined to stay the district court proceedings while the appeal was pending.  The Supreme Court now has ruled that a district court must stay proceedings while an interlocutory appeal on the question of arbitrability is ongoing.  The decision means that defendants should be able to minimize ongoing litigation costs while an appeal of an adverse arbitration decision is pending.Continue Reading Supreme Court Resolves Circuit Split to Require Stays Pending Appeal of Refusals to Compel Arbitration

A Northern District of California court recently dismissed a putative California class action against The J.M. Smucker Company (“J.M. Smucker”) for lack of personal jurisdiction because it did not purposefully target California in operating its marketing website for the Folgers coffee brand.  See Carroll v. J.M. Smucker Co., No. 3:22-cv-08952 (N.D. Cal. June 15, 2023).Continue Reading J.M. Smucker Defeats Putative VPPA Class Action on Jurisdictional Grounds

The Sixth Circuit recently vacated a class certification order in a decision that may make it easier for defendants to defeat putative class actions where a named plaintiff asserts standing based on the injuries of absent class members.  Under the “juridical link doctrine,” a named plaintiff may bring a class action against defendants who did not injure them so long as the absent members of the proposed class would have standing to sue those defendants.  In vacating a district court order that certified a class based on this doctrine, the Sixth Circuit joined the Second Circuit in rejecting the doctrine and holding that named plaintiffs in a putative class action must have standing to sue every defendant at the time of filing.Continue Reading Sixth Circuit Rejects Juridical Link Exception to Standing in Class Actions

The Third Circuit recently affirmed the denial of class certification to end-payor health plans that alleged that the defendant’s “pay-for-delay” settlement of patent infringement litigation inflated prices on a prescription drug.  In doing so, the court reaffirmed that named plaintiffs must present an administratively feasible mechanism to ascertain whether putative class members fall within the proposed class definition and thus took sides in a growing circuit split on that issue.  See In re Niaspan Antitrust Litig., — F.4th –, 2023 WL 3243532 (3d Cir. 2023).Continue Reading Third Circuit Defends Ascertainability Requirement in Affirming Denial of Class Certification

The Tenth Circuit recently affirmed an order denying class certification, in an unpublished decision holding that district courts may rely on out-of-circuit precedent in deciding whether a proposed class is ascertainable.Continue Reading Tenth Circuit Permits District Courts to Rely on Third and Seventh Circuit Ascertainability Precedent