Mealey's Class Actions : Mealey's : Legal News & Analysis

Mealey's Class Actions

August 28, 2025
Majority Reverses Class Certification In Suit Challenging Auto Insurer’s Practices

RICHMOND, Va. — A majority of the Fourth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals concluded that a lower federal court abused its discretion in certifying a class in a lawsuit alleging that an insurer improperly decreased the compensation for totaled vehicles, ruling that common questions do not predominate because the claims are “essentially individualized claims requiring mini trials as to each.”
August 27, 2025
11th Circuit: Lump-Sum Payments Shortchanged Top Hat Plan Participants

ATLANTA — Affirming summary judgment and remedies rulings for a class of nearly 200 executives who participated in so-called “top hat” plans, the 11th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals on Aug. 26 agreed with the lower court that the 2013 lump-sum payments at issue violated the plan terms because they “‘adversely affected’ the ‘accrued benefit’ of at least some participants.”
August 27, 2025
Citing No ‘Exceptional Circumstances,’ Judge Denies Appeal In Online Consent Suit

TACOMA, Wash. — A Washington federal judge denied a motion for interlocutory appeal of the court’s prior order denying a motion to strike class allegations in a putative class action suit over alleged wrongful use of individuals’ names absent consent against ZoomInfo Technologies LLC, a company that provides a database with information about businesses, finding that ZoomInfo failed to establish “exceptional circumstances” that would merit interlocutory review.
August 27, 2025
Anthropic, Authors Reach Agreement On AI Copyright Claims

SAN FRANCISCO — Anthropic PBC and authors told a federal judge in California on Aug. 26 that they reached an agreement in principle resolving claims that the company pirated copyrighted works during the process of obtaining material to train its artificial intelligence.
August 27, 2025
9th Circuit Affirms Motion To Compel Denial In Online Retail Class Arbitration Row

PASADENA, Calif. — The Ninth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals affirmed a lower court’s order denying a motion to compel arbitration by Lands’ End Inc. in a consumer’s putative class suit alleging violations of multiple California consumer protection laws regarding Lands’ End’s purported false advertising about pricing on its website, finding that contrary to Lands’ End’s claims that its website’s terms of use, including an arbitration provision, bar the suit, the District Court did not err in its determination “that the hyperlink to the Terms of Use was broken” at the time of the plaintiff’s purchase.
August 27, 2025
2 Class Settlements Totaling $60 Million Get Final OK In Church Plan Suit

JACKSON, Tenn. — A Tennessee federal judge has granted final approval to class settlements initially grossing $60 million before interest in multidistrict litigation over a religious denomination’s retirement plan, also awarding attorney fees of a third of that amount and a $20,000 service award to each of the 10 named plaintiffs; claims against numerous nonsettling defendants remain.
August 27, 2025
Judge Dismisses Civil Rights Claims In Privacy Suit Over Educational Software

CHICAGO — An Illinois federal judge found no jurisdiction over one defendant, dismissing it from a putative class action alleging improper collection of students’ personal information via an educational software platform, and also dismissed claims brought against other defendants under federal civil rights law.
August 26, 2025
Illinois Panel Reverses Class Certification In Pepperidge Farm BIPA Case

CHICAGO — A trial court must “make explicit findings as to whether any possible conflict of interest” exists as to class counsel in an Illinois Biometric Information Privacy Act (BIPA) case brought against Pepperidge Farm Inc. by an employee, an Illinois appellate panel ruled Aug. 25, reversing class certification after the sole named plaintiff’s daughter’s firm was permitted to remain as class counsel.
August 26, 2025
BIPA Suit Against Coinbase Stayed Pending 7th Circuit Ruling In Parallel Suit

CHICAGO — Granting a motion by Coinbase Inc., an Illinois federal judge stayed a putative class action accusing the cryptocurrency exchange operator of violating the Illinois Biometric Information Privacy Act (BIPA) by using photos in its user authentication process, with the judge concluding that the Seventh Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals’ upcoming ruling in another case pertaining to user authentication using biometric identifiers is likely to affect the issues in the present case.
August 26, 2025
Putative Class Suit Over ‘Alligator Alcatraz’ Partially Dismissed, Transferred

MIAMI — A federal judge in Florida dismissed a Fifth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution due process claim as moot in a putative class suit over access to legal counsel by detainees at “Alligator Alcatraz” and granted a motion by the Florida defendants to transfer the case from the Southern District to the Middle District.
August 25, 2025
J&J, Talc Plaintiffs Debate Attempt To Strike Medical Monitoring Class

TRENTON, N.J. — Plaintiffs representing genital talc users in a New Jersey suit seeking a medical monitoring class and various Johnson & Johnson entities have briefed a motion to strike the claims and whether varying state laws, causation standards and individual situations made handling the claims as a class impossible.
August 25, 2025
Split N.C. High Court Vacates Class Certification In Sales Promotion Suit

RALEIGH, N.C. — A split North Carolina Supreme Court on Aug. 22 vacated class certification in a long-running case by a consumer who alleges that an illegal sales promotion under North Carolina law was used when he purchased his home water treatment system; the majority ruled that while consumers from both North and South Carolina were included in the class, the claims by the residents of South Carolina would arise under that state’s law where inducement is an element, unlike in North Carolina, and inducement creates “individualized fact questions.”
August 25, 2025
Plaintiffs Suing Therapy App For Privacy Violations May Proceed Anonymously

SAN FRANCISCO — The anonymity of putative class plaintiffs accusing online therapy company BetterHelp Inc. of violating privacy laws by selling their personal data to third parties in violation of California’s unfair competition law (UCL) does not require dismissal, a California federal judge ruled in denying the company’s motion to dismiss, citing the nature of the plaintiffs’ privacy protection claims.
August 25, 2025
Federal Judge: Fraud, Breach Of Contract Claims Survive In Suit Over Musk PAC

AUSTIN, Texas — Granting dismissal only as to a claim the plaintiff agreed to drop, a Texas federal judge allowed fraud and breach of contract claims against Elon Musk and political action committee America PAC to proceed under “the lost benefit of the bargain theory of standing” in a putative class action concerning personally identifiable information (PII) provided to sign an online petition in the run-up to the November 2024 election.
August 25, 2025
ERISA Forfeiture Developments Include 2 More Rulings Denying Dismissal

Just over two years after a wave of Employee Retirement Income Security Act suits challenging a common use of forfeited nonvested matching retirement contributions were filed, the case law is developing rapidly; although the majority of dismissal motions have been granted, federal judges in North Carolina and Florida recently denied dismissal in putative class cases filed against Bank of America Corp. (BOA) and NextEra Energy Inc.
August 25, 2025
6th Circuit Vacates Class Certification In Action Against FirstEnergy

CINCINNATI — A Sixth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals panel vacated a lower court’s class certification order in a suit against FirstEnergy Corp. brought by investors regarding a bribery scheme that delivered approximately $2 billion to the company through lobbying the Ohio Legislature to pass House Bill 6, finding that the lower court applied the wrong presumption in certifying the class.
August 22, 2025
Administrative Stay Dissolved, Order Vacated In Immigrant Removal Class Case

WASHINGTON, D.C. — The District of Columbia Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals dissolved its June 10 administrative stay of a June 4 order by a trial court that partially granted a preliminary injunction and class certification to immigrants challenging their removal from the United States under the Alien Enemies Act (AEA) and transfer to a prison in El Salvador; the mandate was filed 11 days after the appellate panel vacated the trial court’s order after the class members were “released from Salvadoran custody and transferred to Venezuela, where they are not likely to remain in custody.”
August 22, 2025
Judge Tosses Online Privacy Class Suits Against ‘People Search’ Providers

CLARKSBURG, W.Va. — A federal judge dismissed with prejudice putative class action suits filed by a retired law enforcement officer alleging violations of West Virginia’s Daniel’s Law, which provides a private right of action for disclosure of home addresses or unpublished phone numbers of current or former judicial officials, finding that a certain provision of the statute “regulates speech based on its content” and “cannot survive strict scrutiny” under the U.S. Constitution “because it is not narrowly tailored.”
August 22, 2025
Breach Of Contract, Bad Faith Claims Will Proceed Against Homeowners Insurers

SAN DIEGO — An insured’s breach of contract and bad faith claims will proceed against homeowners insurers in a putative class action suit filed by a homeowner who claims that her insurer wrongfully refused to renew her homeowners policy because the insured sufficiently alleged facts in support of the claims, a California federal judge said.
August 21, 2025
Deal Reported In Former Twitter Workers’ $500M Lawsuit For Severance

SAN FRANCISCO — In a joint Aug. 20 filing citing an unspecified “imminent class-wide settlement agreement,” the parties in an appeal where former Twitter Inc. employees received support from amicus curiae the U.S. Department of Labor (DOL) in seeking revival of their putative class action for more than $500 million in severance benefits asked the Ninth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals to postpone oral argument that is scheduled for Sept. 17.
August 21, 2025
Federal Circuit Affirms Ruling For Government In MPRA Pension Cuts Dispute

WASHINGTON, D.C. — Affirming summary judgment for the government in a class action, the Federal Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals ruled that retirees’ attempt to get federal compensation for cuts made to their vested pension benefits fails because the Multiemployer Pension Reform Act of 2014 (MPRA) “was not a physical taking and plaintiffs did not prove it was a regulatory taking.”
August 21, 2025
Judge: Pension Trust Must Pay Class Nearly $25M In Early Retirement Row

KANSAS CITY, Kan. — Wrapping up a 6-year-old Employee Retirement Income Security Act case filed by labor union members whose early retirement benefits were stopped or denied because of non-boilermaker work, a Kansas federal judge ordered defendants to pay class members a total of $24,851,056 and to refrain from “acting in a manner that is contrary to” an April 30 summary judgment order.
August 20, 2025
Modified Class Certified In USAID Workers’ Shutdown Suit

GREENBELT, Md. — A federal judge in Maryland certified a modified class of U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) workers who allege that actions by Elon Musk and others in the federal government to shut down the agency violate the U.S. Constitution.
August 20, 2025
YouTube, Minor Users Announce $30 Million Settlement Of Privacy Row

SAN JOSE, Calif. — Seeking to end an almost 6-year-old lawsuit over YouTube LLC’s purported collection of the personally identifiable information (PII) of minor users, a group of plaintiffs who sued YouTube and Google LLC for such alleged privacy violations moved in California federal court for preliminary approval of a $30 million settlement.
August 20, 2025
Addressing Standing, 2nd Circuit Partly Remands ERISA Row Under Cunningham

NEW YORK — Mostly affirming dismissal of an Employee Retirement Income Security Act challenge to retirement plan fees and funds, the Second Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals used a precedential opinion “to clarify our standards applicable to the standing of a defined contribution plan plaintiff individually and on behalf of a putative class” and a simultaneous summary order to vacate judgment on two claims and remand for further consideration under the U.S. Supreme Court’s April 17 Cunningham v. Cornell University ruling.