The Center for Class Action Fairness (CCAF) filed an objection arguing against a cynical settlement in a Facebook class action that provides $3.9 million in fees and expenses to the plaintiffs’ attorneys and only a vague 22-word addition to Facebook’s “Help Center” for the class members.
Yesterday, in a victory for CCAF, the court decided to reduce the attorneys’ grossly disproportionate fee request by 25 percent, from more than $17 million to $13 million.
In an objection filed Monday, class member Anna St. John, an attorney for a class action fairness group, said the deal unfairly enriches the attorneys involved and offers users only a scant, 22-word temporary change to one of Facebook's help pages.
"Cynical." That's the descriptor lawyers at the Competitive Enterprise Institute's Center for Class Action Fairness used to describe a proposed no-cash deal Facebook Inc. reached to settle a privacy class action earlier this year.
If you thought every corporate merger was unique, you’d be wrong. Over 90% of merger deals over $100 million have at least one thing in common: They are challenged in a strike suit—or subject to what essentially amounts to legalized extortion. On June 5, 2017, CCAF argued before the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit to stop one example of such socially wasteful litigation and extend the landmark ruling…
In too many settlements, the same lawyers who rail against deceptive marketing tactics use deceptive settlement provisions to unfairly appropriate the lion’s share of the money for themselves. Kumar v. Salov North America Corp., where the attorneys look to get over 300% of what their clients will, is a good example of this unwelcome phenomenon.
Attorneys general from 13 states filed an amicus brief supporting the Center for Class Action Fairness (CCAF) in its challenge of an unfair class action coupon settlement that involves Provide Commerce, Inc., the parent company of Proflowers.com. The case, In re: Easysaver Rewards Litigation, is on appeal before the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit. In Easysaver, class counsel intentionally inflated the value of the settlement—to the tune of $38 million—in order to…
"Although these class members had their financial data stolen, they are releasing future-damages claims against Target in exchange for nothing," Holyoak said.
This blog post was published when the Center for Class Action Fairness was a project of the Competitive Enterprise Institute. The Center for Class Action Fairness (CCAF) has long opposed abusive “cy pres” settlements that benefit third-party beneficiaries instead of compensating class members; Ted Frank wrote about the issue in 2008 before founding CCAF, and Ted Frank has testified to Congress concerning cy pres settlements. As Reuters reporter Alison Frankel wrote after CCAF’s win in the Eighth…
Academics don’t often have the opportunity to publish an article opining on the correctness of a pending appeal, but our appeal in EasySaver Rewards Litigation, challenging a settlement that pays attorneys nearly $9 million and the class only $225,000 and nearly worthless coupons, is one such case.
