Georgia investigation into judge's use of cy pres

I'm quoted in a newspaper's investigation into a Georgia judge's seemingly self-serving use of cy pres awards. More details at Point of Law.

I'm kind of annoyed at the Los Angeles Daily Journal

CCAF, a non-profit project unaffiliated with and unsupported by any corporate funding, does not lobby. But the LA Daily Journal says that they don't need to run a correction for a sentence beginning with the phrase "Corporate lobbyists and advocacy groups such as CCAF" because, according to them, they're not claiming that CCAF is a lobbyist. It seems to me that the only people who could make that sort of sophistic argument are convicted child molesters and editors such as David Houston of the Los Angeles Daily Journal.

The LA Daily Journal op-ed critical of CCAF was written by a Kabateck Brown Kellner attorney; at no point does it disclose that we've objected to four of Kabateck's settlements (all of which paid substantially more to the attorneys than the class), resulting in one settlement rejection and another ruling reducing their fee request by nearly a million dollars, with two other cases still pending.

(At the risk of killing the joke, I wish to make clear that I have no basis to think that David Houston has been convicted of child molestation or any other sex offense.)

Opening brief filed in appeal of Volkswagen class action settlement approval

We filed our opening brief last Friday. Details at Point of Law.

It's still unclear to me why the Third Circuit waited a year before our briefs were due from our appeal of a class action settlement approval. (Dewey v. Volkswagen is reported at 728 F. Supp. 2d 546.)

Objection in Trombley v. National City Bank

The D.C. Circuit is correct, I think, in holding that an attorneys' fee in a class action should be calculated as a percentage as the common fund. But does that mean that class counsel in a class action that settles immediately upon the filing of a complaint without any contested litigation is entitled to the same 25% that is the benchmark for a fully-litigated case where class counsel is actually facing risk? This month, we argued no at a fairness hearing in a class action over overdraft fees. More details at Point of Law.

On KOGO (San Diego) 1:05 pm today

I will be on the LaDona Live program on KOGO (San Diego), 600 AM at 1:05 PM Pacific, talking about CCAF's objection in the Rice Krispies case.

CCAF objection in Blessing v. Sirius XM Radio

The Center for Class Action Fairness LLC objected today to a valueless class action settlement: the objection, filed in the Southern District of New York on behalf of a class member, underscores that the proposed Sirius XM Radio settlement would provide valueless injunctive relief to the class but $13 million to class attorneys.

"Certainly, parties to a class action can agree to settle a case for $13 million," said Ted Frank, the lead attorney on the objection and the founder of CCAF. "But if they do, it is inherently unfair and unreasonable for the attorneys to extract 100% of the settlement benefit for themselves. Class actions should be prosecuted on behalf of the class members, not self-serving class counsel."

The settlement of the antitrust class action against Sirius XM requires only that the defendant agree to not raise prices for five months. But this is an entirely valueless promise, given that Sirius XM, facing admittedly heavy competition from Internet music services and MP3 players, has been lowering prices and engaging in deep discounting to keep customers. Yet class counsel (including the Milberg law firm) implausibly claims that the settlement is worth $180 million to the class.

The CCAF objection also targets Judge Harold Baer's class certification order. For several years, Judge Baer has controversially required class counsel to meet racial quotas as a condition of appointment. CCAF has requested that Judge Baer vacate that part of his class certification order as unconstitutional.

The case is Blessing v. Sirius XM Radio Inc., No. 09-cv-10035 (S.D.N.Y.).

The Center for Class Action Fairness, founded in 2009, is a not-for-profit program that provides pro bono representation to consumers and shareholders aggrieved by class action attorneys who negotiate settlements that benefit themselves at the expense of their putative clients. It has won millions of dollars for class members over the last two years.

June 20 was a busy day

The growth of the Center for Class Action Fairness LLC can be shown just by the breadth of its activities on Monday, June 20:

• There were twelve objectors at the Cobell v. Salazar fairness hearing, and I was the only attorney representing an objector. Unfortunately, the district court overruled our objections, and approved the $3.4 billion settlement. There was some good news: if one takes the plaintiffs' request for $224 million in a fee and expense award seriously, rather than as a tactical maneuver to give the judge room to award high fees while appearing to cut the request, then the judge's decision to award $99 million in fees (and reject another $11 million in expense requests by the class representatives) means that there will be another $136 million available for class members when and if distribution takes place.
  
• Dan Greenberg was at the fairness hearing in the Central District of California for Stetson v. West Publishing which drew some extra blogosphere attention because it involved BarBri expenses for many many recent law-school graduates. The court, from the bench, rejected the coupon settlement, which entailed over $1.8 million in attorney-fee requests. It's the second win from the bench in a row for Dan; we're still waiting for the official opinion in the coupon settlement rejection in Sobel v. Hertz (D. Nev.).
  
• And Adam Schulman, our local counsel Chris Arfaa, and I helped file Dan's reply brief in the McDonough v. Toys "R" Us (E.D. Pa.) baby products class action settlement, where the attorneys are requesting about $14 million though the class is likely to receive less than $20 million. The fairness hearing will be July 6 in Philadelphia.

The Center for Class Action Fairness represents class members pro bono when they are treated unfairly by class action settlements. Please contact me if you get notice of a class action settlement that you are concerned might be unfair, and I will evaluate it for free.