By Christopher DeGroff, Reema Kapur, and Gerald L. Maatman, Jr. We previously reported that the United States Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) secured a verdict of $240 million in its lawsuit against Hill Country Farms last…

By Rebecca Bjork and Gerald L. Maatman, Jr. Employers who face Title VII discrimination lawsuits in the Second Circuit now have some pretty explicit guidance on how to rebut a plaintiff’s attempt to state a prima facie case of pattern…

By Gerald L. Maatman, Jr. and Jennifer A. Riley On April 18, 2013, Judge George H. Wu of the U.S. District Court for the Central District of California dismissed potentially costly class action claims against the Los Angeles Lakers in Emanuel…

California’s Court of Appeal continues to articulate a measured, well-reasoned class action jurisprudence, most recently by taking a second look at its own order affirming a trial court’s denial of class certification. See…

For some companies, apparently even the famously liberal policy favoring arbitration isn’t enough of an assurance that they can avoid defending a consumer class action in court. Or so the plaintiffs in an antitrust bench trial pending…

In a win for employees seeking to remedy broad, systematic employer violations of workplace protections, California’s intermediate appellate court has reversed a trial court judge’s denial of class certification. Bluford v.…

This trio of cases concerned Pfizer’s off-label marketing of Neurontin and plaintiffs’ efforts to recover for the Neurontin prescriptions they had thereby been fraudulently induced to pay. In Kaiser, Plaintiffs’ primary…

Across industries, corporate counsel reported they spent $2.1 billion annually on class action lawsuits in 2012. This reflects a modest decline from $2.2 billion in 2011. On average, companies managed 5.1 class actions in 2012, representing a…

Carlton Fields is pleased to announce the forthcoming release of its 2013 Carlton Fields Class Action Survey on Best Practices in Reducing Cost and Managing Risk in Class Action Litigation. This second edition of our multi-industry annual…

I’ve had the pleasure of serving on a committee of the Defense Research Institute (DRI) that has put together another blockbuster national class action seminar, being held on July 25, 2013 at the Willard Intercontinental Hotel in…

I’ve covered before on this blog a series of class actions brought against life insurers involving the use of retained asset accounts, in which checkbooks are provided to beneficiaries of life insurance policies, from which any or all…

In August of 2012, I reported on a newly-filed class action in Arkansas federal court alleging that, in estimates on property insurance claims, application of depreciation to labor costs is improper (see my August 7, 2012 blog post).  As…

Congress does not have the reputation lately of working for the people. Stalemates between Republicans and Democrats continue to halt progress in both bodies of Congress. However, amidst their inability to seemingly get anything done, 37…

In the last few months, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit has issued three opinions on the topic of how trial courts should decide motions for class certification when some questions will require individualized proof. Judge…

In the weeks leading up to his State of the Union address tonight, President Obama was surely inundated with reports, requests, and letters from various advocacy groups urging him to not only adopt their platform, but to make it a

The Court of Appeal in Zullo v. Superior Court (Inland Publishing Co.) (6th District, July 12, 2011) has ordered the Santa Clara County Superior Court to vacate an order that had granted an employer's motion to require an employee, Sharon…

California Wage Order 7 regulates mercantile industries. Like other Wage Orders, its overtime protections do not extend to any employee whose earnings exceed one and one-half times the minimum wage if more than half of that employee's…

The California Supreme Court is currently reviewing a spate of Court of Appeal decisions, including Brinker Restaurant v. S.C. (review granted October 22, 2008), that held a California employer must provide, not ensure, an employee receives…