Earlier this month, the Supreme Court declined to hear an appeal from the Ninth Circuit’s decision in Lytle v. Nutramax Laboratories, Inc. affirming the certification of a class of owners of elderly dogs, alleging that the...more
February 11, 2025 Types : Alerts Meta Platforms, Inc. recently defeated certification of a class of consumers who claim the company lied about its user privacy safeguards and violated antitrust laws. ...more
U.S. Eleventh Circuit Court of Appeals - Isaac Indus v. PDVSA - personal jurisdiction, foreign sovereign immunity, breach of contract - USA v. Schwarzbaum - foreign bank accounts, IRS form FBAR, penalties, Excessive...more
From medical devices to OTC drugs, preemption to expert preclusion, New York state and federal courts issued decisions in 2024 which further shaped the landscape in the medical and life sciences legal world. To prepare the...more
Takeaway: The Sixth Circuit recently emphasized how demanding Rule 23’s commonality requirement can be. In In re Nissan North America, Inc. Litigation, --- F.4th ----, No. 23-5950, 2024 WL 4864339 (6th Cir. Nov. 22, 2024),...more
Class certification decisions under Rule 23 of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure mark a critical stage in any putative class action lawsuit. Rule 23(a) requires plaintiffs to prove, among other things, that “there are...more
In Cody v. City of St. Louis, 103 F.4th 523 (8th Cir. 2024), the Eight Circuit maintained its position that admissibility standards do not apply strictly at the class certification stage, thereby solidifying a circuit split...more
Predominance and Classwide Damage Models. The Ninth Circuit held that class action plaintiffs may rely on a reliable though not-yet-executed damages model (in this case a proposed but not done conjoint analysis) to...more
A recent decision by Senior District Judge Robert Payne on a Daubert motion in class action litigation against a pension fund offers some helpful lessons on challenging expert witnesses in the EDVA. Trauernicht v. Genworth...more
The Roundup covers notable class action decisions each month from federal appellate courts, as well as notable Supreme Court class action cert petitions....more
One notable opportunity associated with antitrust class action practice is the expert “hot tub,” which generally speaking is an in-court, on-the-record “debate” between dueling economists, with the court, parties, and experts...more
Class certification is the feature fight of any putative class action lawsuit. If granted, it can multiply the stakes of a case several hundred- or thousand-fold. If denied, it can signal the end of the litigation. Because of...more
Just a decade ago, it was still an open question whether parties could challenge the admissibility of expert testimony in class certification proceedings. The United States Supreme Court recognized the issue in Wal-Mart...more
On April 8, 2022, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, sitting en banc, re-certified three classes of packaged tuna buyers, rejecting a Ninth Circuit panel-majority’s per se rule regarding a de minimis number of...more
Key Points - The en banc 9th Circuit clarified numerous rules applicable to class actions brought under Rule 23(b)(3) of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure. The court’s watershed decision in Olean Wholesale Grocery v....more
In recent years, conjoint analysis has proliferated as a methodology for calculating class-wide damages in consumer class actions. While conjoint analysis first emerged as a marketing tool for measuring consumers’ relative...more
At Class Certification Stage, Non-Expert Evidence Must Be Reliable, but Not Necessarily Admissible: As the Supreme Court explained 40 years ago in General Telephone Co. of Southwest v. Falcon, 457 U.S. 147, 161 (1982),...more
Seyfarth Synopsis: For nearly a decade, the aftershocks of the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision in Wal-Mart Stores, Inc. v. Dukes have curtailed the success of plaintiffs attempting to certify class discrimination claims in...more
Certifying an antitrust class under Rule 23 has become a battle. In the last 20 years, courts have been changing the game around Rule 23 interpretation, and rigorous analysis at class certification has made briefing...more
To prove damages in a consumer class action, the named plaintiff must show—among other things—how many units of the defendant’s product were purchased by consumers in the relevant state (or states). This is easier said than...more
It is fitting that the day after Halloween the Ninth Circuit issued its denial of rehearing en banc in Sali v. Corona Regional Medical Center, Case No. 15-56460, because the issue it raises, like Michael Myers in the...more
D.C. District Court Follows Dukes Admonition - Nearly seven years ago, in Wal-Mart Stores, Inc. v. Dukes, 564 U.S. 338 (2011), the Supreme Court addressed, at least in significant respect, the question of whether experts must...more
In a 28-page opinion, a panel of the Ninth Circuit overturned a district court’s denial of class certification, in part, because the lower court required supporting evidence to be admissible. This decision certainly...more
The last ten years have seen a proliferation of high-profile class actions alleging breach of ERISA fiduciary duties of prudence and loyalty against plan fiduciaries. The claims are usually based upon alleged excessive...more
Noodle this: Two significant orders on class certification in antitrust matters issued last week. Both were heavily influenced by the threshold determination of Daubert challenges to the plaintiffs’ expert evidence. In one...more