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Mealey's Class Actions

March 03, 2025
Federal Judge Approves Temple University’s $6.9M Pandemic Closure Settlement

PHILADELPHIA — A federal judge in Pennsylvania issued a final judgment and order granting approval of a $6.9 million settlement that will be paid by Temple University to a class of students who alleged that the school was unjustly enriched and breached its implied contractual duty when it shut its doors in March 2020 due to the COVID-19 pandemic and transitioned learning to online.
March 03, 2025
Preliminary Approval Of $25M Settlement Granted In Rental Management Pact Case

BUTTE, Mont. — A federal judge in Montana granted preliminary approval of a class settlement between condominium owners and the operator of the ski resort where their units are located that will provide $25 million and prospective relief to end a case over rental management agreements (RMAs).
March 03, 2025
$8.2M Class Settlement Proposed In Suit Over Target Date Funds

ALLENTOWN, Pa. — Participants in four defined-contribution pension benefit plans who sued electricity provider PPL Corp. and related defendants under the Employee Retirement Income Security Act over the inclusion of Northern Trust target date funds (TDFs) and other purported mismanagement on Feb. 28 moved in Pennsylvania federal court for preliminary approval of an $8.2 million class settlement.
March 03, 2025
Ukrainians, Others Fleeing Their Countries Bring Immigration Changes Class Suit

BOSTON — A nonprofit and several individuals who fled their home countries due to political instability, persecution and environmental disasters and several citizens of the United States filed a class complaint on Feb. 28 in a federal court in Massachusetts alleging that changes to immigration via President Donald J. Trump’s Jan. 20 executive orders (EOs) and a memorandum issued the same by the acting secretary of Homeland Security have dismantled “legally established and Congressionally authorized pathways to the United States.”
February 28, 2025
9th Circuit Reverses, Remands $800,000 Fee Award For $950,000 Class Settlement

SAN FRANCISCO — A panel of the Ninth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals has reversed a trial court’s approval of $800,000 in attorney fees and costs for a claims-made data breach class settlement that had a redemption value of “at most” about $950,000, but a panel majority approved the underlying settlement with a dissenting judge calling the trial court’s approval “perfunctory.”
February 28, 2025
Class Representative In Oil, Gas Royalty Settlement Opposes Attorney Fee Challenge

DENVER — Parties objecting to the more than $17.3 million in attorney fees awarded as part of a $52 million oil and gas royalty settlement have failed to show that final approval was granted in error, the class representative, Chieftain Royalty Co., argues in an appellee brief filed in the 10th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals.
February 27, 2025
Judge Certifies Class Accusing Loan App Operator Of Concealing Fees

SAN FRANCISCO — A California federal judge certified a class of California residents accusing a consumer loan app operator of concealing certain fees while operating as an unlicensed lender in violation of California’s unfair competition law (UCL) and California finance laws, denied the app operator’s motion to exclude a plaintiffs’ witness and granted in part the defendant’s motion for summary judgment as to claims regarding its performance fees.
February 26, 2025
Attorneys Get A Third Of $7.1M Settlement Of Class Action Over ESOP Deal

EAST ST. LOUIS, Ill. — An Illinois federal judge on Feb. 25 granted final approval to a $7.1 million class settlement resolving a suit over 2012 and 2013 employee stock ownership plan (ESOP) deals, awarding the requested 33% attorney fees that total $2,366,666.67 in the case where the plaintiffs said the lodestar based on their counsel’s “reasonable hourly rate” was more than $6.8 million.
February 26, 2025
Class Certification Denied In Moderator Suit Against TikTok For Lack Of Standing

SAN FRANCISCO — A California federal judge denied a motion for class certification in a putative class action regarding the alleged negligence by TikTok Inc. and its parent company in failing to protect content moderators from harm, finding in part that the plaintiff, a former TikTok moderator, lacks standing for failure to provide evidence showing that “no monitor would remain in the job long enough to pursue a class action.”
February 26, 2025
‘Wholesome’ Claim On High-Sugar Bars Not Puffery, Judge Rules

SAN FRANCISCO — A California federal judge granted in part and denied in part a snack maker’s motion to dismiss a putative class action lawsuit brought against it by a consumer who accuses it of violating California’s unfair competition law (UCL) and other laws by labeling its fig bar products as healthy and “wholesome” when they in fact contain high levels of sugar, finding that “the word ‘wholesome,’” as used on the defendant’s labels “is not puffery.”
February 26, 2025
Data Location Privacy Class Alleges Violations Of Washington My Health My Data Act

SEATTLE — Mobile applications using the software development kit (SDK) from Amazon.com Inc. and Amazon Advertising LLC (together, Amazon) allow for Amazon to harvest location data directly from consumers’ devices without prior notice in violation of consumers’ privacy rights, a Washington woman alleges in a class complaint filed in a federal court in that state and purported to be the first complaint filed under Washington’s My Health My Data Act (MYMD), which was signed into law in 2023.
February 25, 2025
Louisiana High Court Refuses To Review Ruling In Hurricane Ida Coverage Dispute

NEW ORLEANS — The Louisiana Supreme Court on Feb. 25 denied an insured’s application for writ of certiorari seeking review of a First Circuit Louisiana Court of Appeal panel majority’s holding that a lower court properly interpreted the state Legislature's amendment of Louisiana Revised Statutes Section 22:1892(H) by Act 290 to be a procedural change that applied retroactively and, as a result, eliminated any class action for damages, including bad faith penalties, brought against the state’s insurer of last resort.
February 25, 2025
Putative Class Members Seek Intervention, Stay In Deferred Compensation Row

CHARLOTTE, N.C. — Arguing ongoing impairment of their right to arbitration, seven former Merrill Lynch, Pierce, Fenner & Smith Inc. financial advisers moved in North Carolina federal court to intervene and to stay all proceedings in a putative class action in a dispute that the plaintiff argues concerns deferred compensation.
February 25, 2025
Split U.S. High Court: No Attorney Fees For Preliminary Injunctive Relief

WASHINGTON, D.C. — Parties who won preliminary injunctive relief before a case was mooted due to a change in the law are not “‘prevailing part[ies]’” eligible for attorney fees under 42 U.S. Code Section 1988(b) as they have not been “grant[ed] enduring relief on the merits that alters the legal relationship between the parties,” a divided U.S. Supreme Court ruled Feb. 25 in a putative class case over a now-repealed Virginia statute regarding automatic suspension of driver’s licenses for failure to pay certain court fines and fees.
February 25, 2025
Judge Partially Dismisses Claims In UCL Class Suit Over App Cyberbullying

LOS ANGELES — A California federal judge partially dismissed a putative class suit against YOLO, a company that designed an anonymous messaging app that allegedly failed to monitor content, purportedly resulting in cyberbullying and the death of one user, finding that the motion to dismiss for violation of California’s unfair competition law (UCL) is granted due to the plaintiffs’ failure to show that they have an inadequate remedy at law.
February 25, 2025
Nike Workers Who Filed Biased Pay, Promotions Suit File Notice Of Settlement

PORTLAND, Ore. — Four named Nike Inc. workers who brought a class and collective complaint accusing the athletic footwear and apparel company of “devalu[ing]” and “demean[ing]” female employees by paying them less than their male counterparts and passing them over for promotions filed a notice in a federal court in Oregon that they have finalized a settlement agreement as to their individual claims.
February 25, 2025
Judge Denies Motion To Certify Class Of Timeshare Purchasers, Bars Rebuttal Witness

ORLANDO, Fla. — An expert testifying on behalf of a timeshare company can testify that class certification is unnecessary for military members who allege that the timeshare contract violated the law, but the expert retained by those miliary members is barred because his report was untimely, a Florida federal judge ruled, also denying the motion for class certification.
February 24, 2025
7 Suits Over Insurer’s Data Breach Remanded To Wisconsin State Court

MADISON, Wis. — A health insurance company did not establish that federal jurisdiction existed over seven putative class actions that it removed to Wisconsin federal court, a judge held, granting a motion to remand the suits over a 2024 data breach to state court, finding that exceptions to the Class Action Fairness Act (CAFA) defeated federal jurisdiction.
February 24, 2025
U.S. High Court Denies County, Sheriff’s Petition On Standing, Class Service Award

WASHINGTON, D.C. — The U.S. Supreme Court on Feb. 24 denied a petition for a writ of certiorari filed by an Illinois county and sheriff accused by a former detainee of denying him and others sufficient dental care and asking the justices to decide whether the detainee as a putative class representative has standing under Article III of the U.S. Constitution to continue the litigation and seek an incentive award after receiving relief on his individual claims.
February 24, 2025
Netflix Wrongful Death Class Petition Granted; Order Affirming Dismissal Vacated

WASHINGTON, D.C. — The U.S. Supreme Court on Feb. 24 granted a petition for a writ of certiorari presenting jurisdictional questions in a putative class complaint filed by the estate and family members of a minor who died by suicide who accuse streaming service Netflix Inc. of strict liability, wrongful death and negligence in connection with its release of a show depicting a suicide; the high court vacated the judgment and remanded to the Ninth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals for further consideration in light of the ruling in Royal Canin U.S.A., Inc. v. Wullschleger.
February 21, 2025
Imprudence Claim Survives Dismissal In Suit Over ESOP’s Cash-Equivalent Strategy

PITTSBURGH — A Pennsylvania federal judge on Feb. 20 dismissed a prohibited transaction claim but ruled that an imprudence claim asserted under the Employee Retirement Income Security Act survives in a putative class action filed by former and current employee stock ownership plan (ESOP) participants who say that about 20% of the plan’s funds have been kept in cash equivalents — money market funds and short-term certificates of deposit — since at least 2009.
February 21, 2025
Carnegie Mellon’s $4.8M Pandemic Closure Settlement Preliminarily Approved

PITTSBURGH — A federal judge in Pennsylvania granted preliminary approval of a $4.8 million settlement between Carnegie Mellon University (CMU) and students who accuse the school of depriving them of the education and services for which they paid when it halted in-person learning in spring 2020 due to the coronavirus pandemic.
February 21, 2025
4th Circuit Denies Rehearing Sought By Mortgagors After Class, Damages Ruling

RICHMOND, Va. — The Fourth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals denied a petition for rehearing and rehearing en banc filed by borrowers who allege that they were required to pay for “worthless” home appraisals after the appellate panel considered for a second time class certification and damages for the borrowers and the majority ruled that there was no showing of concrete harm.
February 20, 2025
Judge Permits ‘Mass Opt-Out’ From Eavesdropping Class Action Against Google

SAN JOSE, Calif. — A California federal judge stated that she had “little hesitation” denying Google LLC’s motion to reject a “mass exclusion request” by nearly 70,000 Google Assistant (GA) users who seek to opt out of an unfair competition class action over Google’s purported eavesdropping via the digital assistant app and pursue arbitration of their privacy claims against the company instead.
February 20, 2025
5 Federal Workers’ Class Suit Alleges Info Access Is Largest Breach Since Watergate

WASHINGTON, D.C. — Federal officials’ decision to allow individuals from outside the U.S. government to access the “personal sensitive information” (PSI) of millions of federal workers “is the biggest breach of American trust by political actors since Watergate,” five federal employees allege in a class complaint filed in a federal court in the District of Columbia.