Class Action Fairness Act (CAFA) Articles

The latest CAFA developments and trends, including news, key cases, and strategies.

Lawyers Sanctioned for Seeking to Settle Federal Court Class Action in State Court

Lawyers seeking to settle class actions pending in federal court by dismissing and refiling in state court beware! In two recent orders, a federal judge in the Western District of Arkansas ruled that the attorneys representing a class and defendants alike violated Rule 11 and abused the judicial process by this practice. The court sanctioned the lawyers for the class in the form of a reprimand. It retreated from a formal sanction of the defendants’ lawyers because it was ... Keep Reading »

Illinois District Court Holds CAFA and Diversity Both Provide Federal Jurisdiction Over Class Actions

by Jaret J. Fuente

The Southern District of Illinois recently confirmed that traditional diversity jurisdiction and jurisdiction under the Class Act Fairness Act (CAFA) provide two separate means of obtaining federal jurisdiction over class action lawsuits—though, in this case, defendants failed to satisfy either. Two plaintiffs brought a putative class action lawsuit in state court alleging that their employer failed to pay overtime wages. The defendant, an Indiana citizen, removed the ... Keep Reading »

The Amount-in-Controversy Requirement Presents an “Obstacle” to CAFA Removal

by David L. Luck and D. Matthew Allen

In Pazol v. Tough Mudder Inc., No. 15-1640, --- F.3d ----, 2016 WL 1638045 (1st Cir. Apr. 26, 2016), the First Circuit analyzed the “reasonable probability” standard that a defendant must satisfy to support CAFA’s $5 million amount-in-controversy removal requirement. See 28 U.S.C. § 1332(d)(2). The putative class action began in Massachusetts state court and stemmed from a decision by the defendant, a promoter of a series of nationwide “obstacle course” races, to move ... Keep Reading »

Court Holds Notice of Removal Filed 128 Days After Service of Complaint Was Timely Under CAFA

by Carlton Fields

The U.S. District Court for the District of New Jersey denied plaintiffs’ motion to remand, holding that defendants’ notice of removal, filed 128 days after service of the complaint, was timely because neither the complaint nor plaintiffs’ briefing on defendant’s motion to dismiss triggered the 30-day time period for removal under the Class Action Fairness Act (CAFA). In doing so, the court concluded that, where plaintiffs’ complaint and other litigation documents did ... Keep Reading »

2016 Carlton Fields Class Action Survey Reveals Important Trends in Class Action Management

by Chris S. Coutroulis and Julianna Thomas McCabe

The fifth annual edition of the Carlton Fields Class Action Survey has just been released, and in this year’s survey corporate counsel report that class action spending has increased after four consecutive years of decline. Spending is also projected to increase in 2016. This marks a key turning point. The Numbers Across industries, the companies surveyed report that they spent $2.1 billion on class action lawsuits in 2015. The number of companies facing at least one ... Keep Reading »

CAFA Settlement Trap: States As Absent Class Members

by Oleg Rivkin

Will a Class Action Fairness Act (CAFA) notice of settlement bind a state as an absent class member? A Pennsylvania federal district court recently offered guidance on this issue. The case involved allegations that the defendant pharmaceutical company illegally delayed the introduction of a cheaper, generic version of its nasal inflammation drug Flonase by filing a sham citizen petition with the Food and Drug Administration. In June 2013, the court approved a ... Keep Reading »

Eleventh Circuit Denies Petition For Rehearing In Lisk v. Lumber One

by Jaret J. Fuente

The Eleventh Circuit Court of Appeals denied a petition for rehearing en banc in the Lisk v. Lumber One Wood Preserving, LLC matter, where last month it held that the Alabama Deceptive Trade Practices Act’s restriction on private class actions does not apply in federal court; rather, federal rule 23 controls. See our prior post about that opinion. Lisk v. Lumber One Wood Preserving, LLC., No. 14-11714 (11th Cir. September 15, 2015). ... Keep Reading »

CAFA Jurisdiction: Cases Consolidated in California Cannot be Split by the Local Controversy Exception

by Jacob R. Hathorn

Assuming its other requirements are satisfied, the local controversy exception to CAFA jurisdiction requires a district court to remand a class action if, during the three-year period preceding the filing of that action, another class action was filed asserting the same or similar factual allegations against any of the defendants on behalf of the same or other persons. But what happens when the class action, prior to its removal, was actually consolidated with the ... Keep Reading »

California District Court Finds CAFA’s Amount-in-Controversy Requirement Satisfied and No Local Controversy Alleged; Denies Motion to Remand

by David L. Luck

The Southern District of California denied a plaintiff’s motion to remand a putative class action removed pursuant to the Class Action Fairness Act (CAFA), where the plaintiff had alleged that the primary defendant’s product, Chobani yogurt, had become “the best-selling brand of Greek yogurt in the United States”; had annual revenues estimated at $1 billion in 2012; and had “collected tens of millions of dollars” in California alone (as the result of allegedly deceptive ... Keep Reading »

Western District of Missouri Declines to Deliver Certification in Class Action Based on Alleged Newspaper Subscription Overcharges