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

Mealey's Class Actions

April 16, 2025
Federal Judge Dismisses Securities Suit Against Cybersecurity Company

SAN FRANCISCO — A federal judge in California dismissed investors’ putative class action complaint against a cybersecurity company and its executives for allegedly violating federal securities laws by making materially false or misleading statements about the company’s financials, finding that the investors failed to state a claim.
April 16, 2025
Apple Says Smartwatch PFAS Plaintiffs Fail To State Injury In Fact, Seeks Dismissal

SAN FRANCISCO — Apple Inc. has filed a motion to dismiss a putative class action in California federal court for lack of standing, arguing that the plaintiffs who sued the company claiming that Apple’s smartwatch bands contain per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) do not allege an injury in fact.
April 15, 2025
Harm From Mattress Maker’s Strike-Through Pricing Unclear, Magistrate Judge Says

SACRAMENTO, Calif. — A California federal magistrate judge recommended granting a mattress manufacturer’s motion to dismiss a putative class action lawsuit against it for violating California’s unfair competition law (UCL) and other laws, writing that the plaintiff sufficiently alleged that she was deceived by “strike-through reference pricing” but failed to plead that she suffered damages as a result.
April 15, 2025
7th Circuit Denies Petition Over Refusal To Transfer ERISA Mortality Table Row

CHICAGO — Citing a 1989 U.S. Supreme Court decision, the Seventh Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals denied a mandamus petition concerning denial of a motion to transfer a putative class Employee Retirement Income Security Act case challenging pension calculations that used a mortality table from 1984.
April 15, 2025
Effective Vindication Rule Is Focus Of ERISA Imprudence Appeal In 9th Circuit

SAN FRANCISCO — In separate briefs, a former 401(k) participant and amicus curiae organization Public Justice urge the Ninth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals to affirm that a nonseverable arbitration provision is void because it contains a class, collective and representative action waiver that they say prevents effective vindication of plan participants’ substantive right under the Employee Retirement Income Security Act.
April 14, 2025
Dismissal Bid Fought In Dispute Over Disability Policy ‘Age 65’ Language

PHOENIX — Arguing in part that the defendants’ “desired interpretation runs counter to the well-pleaded facts, the parties’ expectations, any reasonable consumer’s expectations, and decisional law,” a plaintiff on April 11 urged an Arizona federal court to deny dismissal of his putative class complaint over whether certain individual long-term disability (LTD) benefits must be paid through eligible insureds’ 65th birthdays.
April 14, 2025
Federal Judge Rules GoDaddy TCPA Class Settlement Ruling Is Appealable

MOBILE, Ala. — A February order declining enforcement of a Telephone Consumer Protection Act (TCPA) class settlement must be appealable as the decision involved a controlling question of law, “‘substantial’” differences of opinion exist and “‘immediate appeal may materially advance the ultimate termination of the litigation,’” a federal judge in Alabama ruled, quoting from 28 U.S. Code Section 1292(b).
April 14, 2025
University Of Oregon Title IX Class Suit By Female Athletes Survives Nearly Intact

EUGENE, Ore. — An Oregon federal judge has left largely intact a class action alleging that the University of Oregon violated Title IX by depriving members of the school’s women’s beach volleyball and rowing teams of scholarships, support and facilities compared to the men’s football team.
April 11, 2025
Appeals Court Revives 2 BIPA Suits Over Nursing Homes’ Biometric Timeclocks

MT. VERNON, Ill. — In a pair of almost identical unpublished opinions, a Fifth District Appellate Court of Illinois panel reversed a trial court’s dismissal of two putative class actions by former employees alleging violations of the Illinois Biometric Information Privacy Act (BIPA) via nursing facilities’ use of biometric timeclocks.
April 11, 2025
Consolidated Suit Over Medical Device Firm’s Data Breach Partly Dismissed

BOSTON — A Massachusetts federal judge partly granted a medical device manufacturer’s motion to dismiss putative class claims against it stemming from a data breach, disposing of a fiduciary duty claim and several state law consumer protection claims, while largely allowing negligence, unjust enrichment and implied contract claims to proceed.
April 11, 2025
Illinois Genetic Privacy Act Does Not Apply To Life Insurance, Judge Rules

EAST ST. LOUIS, Ill. — The Illinois Genetic Privacy Act (GIPA) “does not apply to the underwriting practices concerning life insurance policies,” an Illinois federal judge found, granting an insurer’s motion to dismiss a putative class claim under GIPA brought against it by a woman who claimed that she was denied a life insurance policy based on information she provided about her family’s medical history.
April 11, 2025
9th Circuit Affirms Dismissal Of Securities Case Against Gaming Company

PASADENA, Calif. — A Ninth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals panel affirmed the dismissal of a pension fund’s suit alleging that a gaming company falsely inflated its share price, finding that the pension fund failed to adequately plead its securities claims.
April 10, 2025
2 TROs, 1 Class Certification Granted In Cases Challenging AEA Immigrant Removals

Two temporary restraining orders and one class certification order were granted April 9 by federal judges in Texas and New York in two cases brought by immigrant detainees being held in those jurisdictions who are challenging their removals from the United Staes under the Alien Enemies Act (AEA); the habeas corpus filings by the immigrants and subsequent orders were all filed within two days after a divided U.S. Supreme Court vacated a temporary restraining order (TRO) and provisional class certification granted to the immigrants by a federal judge in the District of Columbia and ruled that the immigrants’ claims for relief “fall within the ‘core’ of the writ of habeas corpus and thus must be brought in habeas” and that the proper “venue lies in the district of confinement.”
April 10, 2025
Class Suit Against OnlyFans Over ‘Chatter’ Scheme May Proceed Anonymously

SANTA ANA, Calif. — A California federal judge on April 9 declined to dismiss putative class claims brought by California subscribers of adult website OnlyFans for an alleged “chatter scheme” in which they were allegedly deceived into paying to communicate with adult content creators, but instead were connected to “professional chatters,” and said the plaintiffs may proceed anonymously to avoid the risk of embarrassment from revealing private messages discussing their “sexual interests.”
April 10, 2025
University Sued Over Lax Data Security, Delay In Breach Notification

CHATTANOOGA, Tenn. — A university that took more than a year to notify affected individuals that their personally identifiable information (PII) was compromised in a data breach was hit with a putative class complaint in Tennessee federal court, with a prospective student alleging negligence and invasion of privacy.
April 09, 2025
Class Certification Bid Fails In ERISA Early Retirement Equivalence Case

MINNEAPOLIS — Plaintiffs who allege that early retirement benefits provided by their pension plan violate an Employee Retirement Income Security Act actuarial equivalence requirement saw their motion for class certification denied, with a Minnesota federal judge concluding that the proposed class had commonality and typicality problems.
April 09, 2025
U.S. High Court Declines To Hear Appeal Of Detainee Wage Collective, Class Case

WASHINGTON, D.C. — The U.S. Supreme Court denied a petition for a writ of certiorari filed by a Maryland county seeking a ruling on “[w]hether inmates working in furtherance of public works projects for the government charged with their custody and care” are employees under the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA).
April 09, 2025
Federal Judge Approves Lyft Shareholder Derivative Settlement Requiring Reforms

OAKLAND, Calif. — A federal judge in California granted final approval to a settlement in a shareholder derivative class action brought against Lyft Inc., under which the company agrees to implement several safety reforms.
April 09, 2025
Google, Class Plaintiffs Settle 14-Year-Old AdWords Suit For $100M

SAN JOSE, Calif. — A consumer and his company representing two certified classes of advertisers who claim that Google LLC misrepresented the benefits of its AdWords advertising service have moved in California federal court for preliminary approval of a $100 million settlement to claims against Google first filed in 2011 and say their attorneys will seek a 33% attorney fees award.
April 09, 2025
7th Circuit Revives MeTV VPPA Suit, Finds Website Users Are ‘Subscribers’

CHICAGO — Reversing a trial court’s dismissal of a Video Privacy Protection Act (VPPA) putative class claim over the operator of MeTV sharing website users’ online viewing histories with Facebook, a Seventh Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals panel concluded that the plaintiffs qualify as “subscribers” or “consumers” under the act because they provided something of value — their personally identifiable information (PII) — in exchange for a subscription to the website.
April 09, 2025
Federal Judge Grants Final Approval Of $433.5M Securities Fraud Settlement

NEW YORK — A federal judge in New York has granted final approval of a $433.5 million settlement to end a securities fraud class action brought by investors against a Cayman Islands corporation headquartered in Hangzhou, China, and current and former executives for allegedly violating federal securities laws by making misrepresentations regarding the initial public offering of another company in which the defendant company owned a 33% equity interest and not disclosing material facts surrounding an investigation by Chinese regulators into allegedly illegal merchant exclusivity practices.
April 09, 2025
Harriet Carter Website User Had ‘Constructive Notice’ Of Interception, Judge Rules

PITTSBURGH — Even though a consumer opted not to review the privacy statement on Harriet Carter Gifts Inc.’s website, a Pennsylvania federal judge found that she gave her implied consent to a third party’s interception of her communications because the practice was fully disclosed in the statement.
April 08, 2025
Montana City Sues 3M, Others For Making Firefighting Gear With PFAS

BUTTE, Mont. — A municipality in Montana has filed a class action against 3M Co., DuPont de Nemours Inc. and others in Montana federal court seeking compensatory and punitive damages because they made what is called “turnout gear” for firefighters that contained per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS), which the plaintiff says is causing firefighters to develop cancer “at an alarming rate higher than the general population.”
April 08, 2025
Split U.S. High Court Vacates TRO Orders In Immigrant Removal Class Case

WASHINGTON, D.C. — A divided U.S. Supreme Court on April 7 in a per curiam opinion vacated a trial court’s temporary restraining order (TRO) and an order extending the TRO issued in a class case over the removal of immigrants under the Alien Enemies Act (AEA), declining to reach the argument as to whether the immigrants in question fall under the AEA but opining that their claims for relief “fall within the ‘core’ of the writ of habeas corpus and thus must be brought in habeas” and that the proper “venue lies in the district of confinement.”
April 08, 2025
Los Angeles Seeks Review Of Summary Judgment Reversal In Parking Fine Class Suit

WASHINGTON, D.C. — A split Ninth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals panel erred when it reversed summary judgment for Los Angeles in a putative class complaint challenging the city’s parking fee and late payment penalty, the city argues in its petition for a writ of certiorari asking the U.S. Supreme Court to decide a government’s burden of proof when defending itself against an excessive fines claim.