Discrimination

Week Adjourned: 11.21.14 – Chrysler, Sephora, Boston Scientific

The top class action lawsuits and settlements for the week. Top stories include Chrysler, Sephora and Boston Scientific Mesh.

Top Class Action Lawsuits

Tipsy TIPMs? Topping the list this week? Another defective automotive class action lawsuit—surprise, surprise. Never would have guessed, right?

This one was filed in federal court against Chrysler Group LLC. The lawsuit seeks to hold the Big Three automobile maker accountable for economic losses suffered by owners and passengers of Chrysler cars and trucks that stalled, caught fire or sustained other potentially life-endangering malfunctions due to a faulty onboard computer.

The Chrysler lawsuit alleges that Chrysler knew about and fraudulently concealed the defectiveness of its Totally Integrated Power Module—TIPM, for short. Chrysler sought as far back as 2005 to hide the magnitude of the TIPM defect from consumers and initiated only limited vehicle recalls, the complaint alleges.

Despite knowing about the defect, Chrysler continued installing faulty TIPMs in vehicles until the 2014 model year, according to the complaint filed in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York.

The TIPM is an integral component of many Chrysler, Dodge and Jeep models on the road today, the device controls and distributes power to all of a vehicle’s electrical functions. Prone to sudden failure, a vehicle’s TIPM poses a serious safety issue, placing the driver and passengers at risk of harm, the complaint indicates.

A failed TIPM causes malfunctioning of airbags, headlights, brakes, horns, wipers, windows, door locks and other components that rely on electrical functions.Worse, a failed TIPM can cause a vehicle’s engine to shut down unexpectedly while driving at high speeds.

“Millions of consumers who have bought into this brand have suffered harm because of Chrysler and its faulty Totally Integrated Power Module,” the complaint alleges.

Owners of defective TIPM-equipped Chrysler vehicles suffer economic losses in part because the device is expensive to replace, costing upward of $1,000. Also, because of the sheer number of vehicles requiring a new TIPM, consumers are forced to make do without their vehicles for many days and even weeks while their vehicles sit in the shop and wait for a replacement TIPM to be shipped. Adding insult to injury, the defect caused many motorists to incur unnecessary costs to replace non-defective parts that malfunctioned because of the faulty TIPM.

Ugly Side of Beauty Biz? Sephora USA Inc. is facing a proposed discrimination class action lawsuit. Filed in New York federal court, the discrimination lawsuit claims the company deactivated thousands of Asian customers’ accounts, allegedly motivated by a racist belief that they were buying discounted beauty products in bulk and reselling them for profit.

Brought by four women of Chinese descent, the discrimination class action claims Sephora shut down Asian users’ accounts after its site crashed on November 6, due to a surge in web traffic resulting from a 20 percent-off sale promotion. According to Sephora, reselling of its products is pervasive. The company said it blocked some North American and international customer accounts for this reason.

According to the plaintiffs, the only accounts that were deactivated were those that used Chinese web domains or had names that Sephora perceived as being of Asian origin. A plaintiffs’ attorney said an investigation revealed that only users who fell into those two categories had their accounts blocked.

According to the lawsuit, the four named plaintiffs live in New York, Philadelphia, and Columbus, Ohio, and were all members of Sephora’s ‘Beauty Insider’ program. The program gives customers who spend certain amounts on the company’s products access to discounts and other promotions. The points the women accumulated by buying Sephora products, and which give access to additional discounts and special gifts, have been lost, according to the plaintiffs’ attorneys. Sephora alleges it only went ahead with the deactivations after it “identified certain entities who take advantage of promotional opportunities to purchase products in large volume on our website and resell them through other channels.”

Attorneys for the plaintiffs said that instead of deactivating accounts, Sephora could have addressed the resale issue by limiting the number of products a single customer could purchase or capping the amount of money they could spend. Sounds sensible.

The named plaintiffs seek to represent a class of Sephora customers who were part of the Beauty Insider program who either are or are perceived as being of Chinese or Asian ethnicity and had their accounts blocked or deactivated following the website crash. The potential class is expected to be in the thousands.

The case is Xiao Xiao et al., v. Sephora USA Inc. et al., case number 14-cv-9181, in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York.

Top Settlements

Boston Scientific Bellwether Results… A jury has awarded $18.5 million against Boston Scientific Corp in settlement of transvaginal mesh litigation brought by four women who alleged the implanted medical device left them with nerve damage, infections and pain during sex.

The trial was heard by a federal jury in West Virginia and is the second verdict against the company over defective vaginal slings. Last week a federal jury in Florida issued a $26.7 million verdict against Boston Scientific for providing insufficient warnings about the risks of its Pinnacle mesh device.

The four women in the West Virginia case sued Boston Scientific over the defective Obtryx transvaginal sling. “In these cases, the jurors clearly understood that Boston Scientific moved too quickly in bringing its product to market, and that it used inappropriate materials while at the same time failing to warn doctors and patients about the risks involved,” said on the of the lawyers representing the plaintiffs. Each of the women will receive $1 million in punitive damages under the terms of the settlement.

The multidistrict litigation being heard in Miami, also involved four women who alleged suffering and injury after having the sling implanted. It was the first federal bellwether trial against Boston Scientific, one of seven manufacturers of pelvic mesh that face about 60,000 lawsuits across the country.

Transvaginal Mesh and Transvaginal Slings are medical devices that are surgically implanted to treat Pelvic Organ Prolapse (POP) and/or Stress Urinary Incontinence(SUI).

Hokee Dokee—Time to adjourn for the week. Have a fab weekend–See you at the bar!

Week Adjourned: 6.14.13 – Class Action against Obama?

Takes a set of you-know-what to sue the President, but… That’s the lead story in this week’s wrap of top class action lawsuits and settlements, for the week ending June 14, 2013.

Top Class Action Lawsuits

If You’re Gonna Sue, Sue Big. In the unlikely event any of us were napping last week—and missed this—it’s among the first of what’s likely to be an onslaught of wiretap class actions resulting from, well, surveillance activities undertaken by the federal government. First up to bat, these plaintiffs are certainly not shy about naming defendants: The wiretap class action names President Obama, US Attorney General Eric Holder, the director of the National Security Agency (NSA), the NSA, the CEO of Verizon, the US Department of Justice, and Judge Roger Vinson of the US Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court as defendants. Judge Vinson is named as a defendant because he signed the secret order directing Verizon to turn over all phone records “on an ongoing daily basis.”

According to the wiretap class action lawsuit, this constituted an “outrageous breach of privacy” and a violation of Verizon users’ “reasonable expectation of privacy, free speech and association, right to be free of unreasonable searches and seizures, and due process rights.” The wiretap lawsuit challenges the legality of the NSA’s “secret and illegal government scheme to intercept and analyze vast quantities of domestic telephone communications.”

The potential class action lawsuit, entitled Klayman, et al. v. Barrack Hussein Obama II, et al., Case No. 13-cv-00851, U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, seeks to represent a class of American citizens in the United States and overseas who are either curren or previous Verizon customers, including, but not limited to customers between April 25, 2013 and July 19, 2013.

The class is seeking a cease-and-desist order to prohibit the collection of Verizon customers’ phone records and more than $3 billion in damages and attorney fees. Plaintiffs are represented by Larry Klayman of Freedom Watch Inc.

Here we go!

Top Settlements

USPS Workers Get Special Delivery? Looks like the US Postal Service was not delivering the goods for all its employees: the agency has agreed to a $17.3 million settlement in the discrimination class action brought by its employees with disabilities.

Some 41,000 past and current postal service employees are involved in the discrimination class action, which details complaints over restricted work hours from 2000 through to 2012. These reduced work hours are allegedly due to employees’ permanent disabilities. The lawsuit alleges the practice violated the 1973 Rehabilitation Act, which bars federal agencies from discriminating against disabled employees.

The USPS class action settlement has received preliminary approval from an Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) administrative judge and is expected to receive final approval from the EEOC in July. If finalized, class members may be eligible to receive up to $300 per employee—but it depends on how many people file claims.

Although the settlement still needs final approval from the EEOC, members of the class are supposed to get formal notification of the agreement next week.

Second-Hand Asbestos Settlement. Good news bad news…as the asbestos debacle continues. On June 5, 2013, an Oakland jury completed its award to plaintiffs Rose-Marie and Martin Grigg of a total of $27,342,500 in damages stemming from Mrs. Grigg’s asbestos mesothelioma (Alameda County Superior Court Case No. RG12629580).

Mrs. Grigg, now 82, was exposed to asbestos in the course of shaking out and washing her husband’s work clothing. Mrs. Grigg’s then husband was an insulator for a company that used Owens-Illinois, Inc. Kaylo brand insulation products from 1950-1958.

Evidence introduced during trial showed that Owens-Illinois, Inc. knew that asbestos exposure could cause death as early as the 1930s and that test results on Kaylo showed that exposure to the asbestos in the product could cause fatal disease.

According to court documents, Owens-Illinois nonetheless advertised Kaylo as “non-toxic” and did not state that the product contained asbestos. Kaylo was packaged in boxes without warning about the health hazards associated with asbestos exposure.

The jury found that Owens-Illinois, Inc. manufactured a defective product, failed to adequately warn Mrs. Grigg, was negligent, and intentionally failed to disclose information about Kaylo-related health hazards to Mrs. Grigg. The jury also found that Owens-Illinois, Inc. acted with malice, oppression or fraud toward Mrs. Grigg. The jury awarded Mrs. Grigg $12,000,000 in damages for her pain and suffering, Mr. Grigg $4,000,000 in damages for his loss of consortium, and $342,500 in economic damages. The jury also levied an $11,000,000 punitive damages verdict against Owens-Illinois, Inc.

Okee dokee—that’s it for this week—happy Father’s Day and safe weekend to you all—see you at the bar!

(Image: northjersey.com)

Week Adjourned: 3.1.13 – Walmart, Budweiser, Apple

The week’s top class action lawsuits and settlements. This week’s highlights include Wal-Mart, Budweiser and Apple.

Top Class Action Lawsuits

If at first you don’t succeed, try, try, try again…Good advice, we hope, for the women who have just filed a regional gender discrimination class action lawsuit against Wal-Mart.

Now, to be clear, Wal-Mart is not unfamiliar with the allegations, as a national gender discrimination and employment class action was filed against the world’s largest retailer only to be dismissed in 2011 by the US Supreme Court. Had that class action gone through, the class of plaintiffs would likely have been in the hundreds of thousands. But it didn’t. So—now, acting on the advice from the Supreme Court, women are filing discrimination class actions by state. The one filed this week is the fifth such regional lawsuit.

Filed in Wisconsin by one current and four former employees, the class action, entitled Ladik et al. v. Wal-Mart Stores Inc., Case No. 13-cv-00123, U.S. District Court for the Western District of Wisconsin, alleges that female employees are discriminated against when it comes to receiving compensation and promotions. The Wisconsin gender discrimination class action lawsuit is seeking to represent female workers employed by Wal-Mart since December 1998.

I’ll show my gender bias and wish them every success!

Hey Bud—this one’s for you! Oh heck yes. This week saw Anheuser Busch, the brewer of the self-proclaimed King of Beers—Budweiser —get hit with several consumer fraud class action lawsuits alleging that it waters down its Budweiser, Michelob and other top-selling beers. Tsk,Tsk. Do not go messing with people’s alcohol content gentlemen.

Filed in Pennsylvania, California and other states, the Budweiser lawsuits allege that consumers have been sold beer that contains less alcohol than advertised on the labels.

Specifically, the complaints allege that Anheuser Busch employs some of the most sophisticated process control technology in the world to precisely monitor the alcohol content at the final stages of production, and then adds additional water to produce beers with significantly lower alcohol content than is represented on the product labels, and depriving consumers of the value they paid for.

The lawsuits are based on information provided by former employees at the company’s 13 US breweries, some in high-level plant positions, according to lead lawyer Josh Boxer (MSN.com). “Our information comes from former employees at Anheuser-Busch, who have informed us that as a matter of corporate practice, all of their products mentioned (in the lawsuit) are watered down,” Boxer told MSN.com “It’s a simple cost-saving measure, and it’s very significant.”

The complaint alleges: “There are no impediments—economic, practical or legal—to AB accurately labeling its products to reflect their true alcohol content. Nevertheless, AB uniformly misrepresents and overstates that content.”

Nina Giampaoli who filed the California-based lawsuit, said “I think it’s wrong for huge corporations to lie to their loyal customers—I really feel cheated. No matter what the product is, people should be able to rely on the information companies put on their labels.”

I’ll drink to that!

Top Settlements

Nothin’ like a kid in an Apple—er, candy—store. This one is for all you parents out there who woke up on morning to find your credit card balance had magically grown—seemingly on its own. But wait—is that the patter of little feet I hear? Could it be the kids buying in-game extras from the Apple mobile apps store that’s the root of the mystery? You betcha!

And this week, Apple magnanimously agreed to pony up some gift cards, no total value given, by the way, in settlement of the consumer fraud class action it’s facing over what could only be described as unfair business practices.

If the Apple apps settlement is approved, parents would receive $5 iTunes gift cards. Wow—pack up the kids, you’re going on vacation!

Ok—here’s the skinny. The lawsuit is brought by parents who allege their children downloaded free games from the Apple mobile app store and then went on to buy in-game extras—effectively charging the cost of the games to their parents—without their parents’ knowledge. In some cases these charges ran into the hundreds of dollars. Yup.

If approved, Apple would build a website for people who wish to make a claim. As well the tech-giant would send e-mail notifications to some 23 million customers. OK, that ain’t chump change.

According to a report by CNN.com parents whose children incurred larger costs and who want more than $5 gift card, must provide proof that a larger amount was spent by their children during any 45-day period. Those who can show more than $30 in purchases may choose a cash refund instead of an Apple credit. Purchases made until the date of the settlement would be eligible for refunds, CNN.com reported.

Bad Apple! What kind of example does that set?

Ok—See you at the bar and Happy Friday!

Week Adjourned: 11.2.12 – OTC Medicine, Bayer Aspirin, Burger King

This week’s wrap of top class action lawsuit news includes OTC Medicine expiration dates, Bayer Aspirin, and Burger King discrimination–the top class actions for the week ending November 2, 2012.

Top Class Action Lawsuits

What’s in an Expiration Date? According to three separate consumer fraud class action lawsuits filed this week, a whole lot of questionable motivation.

Filed against Pfizer (which makes Advil), Bayer (which makes Bayer aspirin) and Johnson & Johnson (which makes Tylenol Cold Multi-Symptom medications), the drug expiration date lawsuits allege the drug makers use “unconscionable, unfair, deceptive, unethical and illegal” means to promote the sales of their products. Specifically, the lawsuits claim that the these means involve the utilization of expiration dates to get consumers to throw away products that have passed their expiration dates, even though the companies know “that if stored properly these medications can and do remain chemically stable, safe and effective long after those dates.”

According to the consumer fraud lawsuits, studies by the Food and Drug Administration, Harvard Medical School, and Johns Hopkins University have found 90% of more than 100 prescription and over-the-counter drugs were fine and could be used for as much as 15 years after their expiration dates: this excludes certain drugs like tetracycline, nitroglycerin, insulin, and liquid antibiotics.

The lawsuit claims that the purpose of the expiration dates is “[T]o increase defendants’ sales and profits because consumers have to purchase replacement medications for those they have thrown out.” The class is seeking actual and punitive damages for consumers that purchased products from Pfizer, Bayer and Johnson & Johnson.

Top Settlements

And Speaking of Drug Marketing… A $15 million settlement has been reached in the consumer fraud class action against Bayer regarding allegations of false advertising around certain combination aspirin products that were sold without FDA approval.

The lawsuit, entitled In re: Bayer Corp. Combination Aspirin Products Marketing & Sales Practices Litigation, alleges Bayer violated state consumer fraud and deceptive business practices acts, express and implied warranty statutes, and unjust enrichment laws in connection with the sale and marketing of Bayer Women’s Low-Dose Aspirin plus Calcium and Bayer Aspirin with Heart Advantage.

If you purchased Bayer® Women’s Low Dose Aspirin + Calcium or Bayer® Aspirin with Heart Advantage, you may be a member of the Bayer Heart Advantage Class or the Bayer Women’s Class (collectively referred to as the “Settlement Classes”) – and thus eligible to receive money from the settlement – depending on (1) which Combination Aspirin Product you purchased, (2) whether you purchased it for personal, family or household uses, and (3) when it was purchased. Each Settlement Class only includes purchases of specific Combination Aspirin Products during specific periods of time.

If you purchased one or more of the Combination Aspirin Products for personal, family or household uses then you are eligible to participate in one or both of the Settlement Classes described in this Notice, provided that your purchase occurred during the time periods specified for each Settlement Class.

Class Members of the Bayer combination aspirin class action settlement include US consumers who purchased one or more of the following combination aspirin products for personal, family or household use during the following time period:

Bayer Aspirin with Heart Advantage Settlement Class: Purchase Date: January 1, 2008 to July 20, 2012

Bayer Women’s Low-Dose Aspirin plus Calcium Settlement Class: Purchase Date: January 1, 2000 to July 20, 2012

To learn more about making a claim and to download forms go to the Bayer Combination Aspirin Class Action Lawsuit Settlement at BayerCombinationAspirinSettlement.com.

Convenience Food not so Convenient… A proposed settlement has been reached in a discrimination class action lawsuit pending against Burger King. The lawsuit, brought by individuals who use wheelchairs and scooters for mobility, allege that they encountered access problems at certain California Burger King leased restaurants.

Specifically, the Burger King class action lawsuit alleges individuals who use wheelchairs and scooters for mobility have been subjected to discrimination at the restaurants that allegedly contain unlawful architectural barriers to access. The Burger King ADA lawsuit sought to remove the alleged barriers, and monetary damages for Class Members denied access to restaurants on or after October 16, 2006.

The proposed settlement terms includes a total of $19 million for monetary relief, which will provide an estimated average recovery per class member of over $8,200, after deductions for attorney’s fees and costs.

Burger King Corporation and the restaurant operators deny they did anything wrong. The parties have reached a settlement of this case. It is now up to the Court approve the proposed settlement.

To find out more and to obtain claim forms for the Burger King wheelchair class action, call 1-888-569-9477.

And on that note—I’ll see you at the bar. Have a great weekend!

Week Adjourned: 7.1.11

Top Class Actions

Best Buy BOLO a NO-GO. Best Buy got hit this week with another potential class action—another discrimination lawsuit—but this time it’s all about you —the customer…

The nation’s largest electronics retailer is facing alleged discrimination in in the form of customer racial and ethnic profiling. Ah, make that widespread racial and ethnic customer profiling in the District of Columbia and Virginia. The lawsuit was brought by an Arab American Muslim manager, Todd Abed, who was fired for protesting the practice, known internally as “BOLO”. Abed accuses Best Buy of terminating his 13-year career with the company because he objected to his district office’s “Be On the Look Out” policy (BOLO).

So, the allegations go that under BOLO, Best Buy employees circulated e-mails among all managers in the region containing images and descriptions of customers suspected of theft, intended to be posted in their respective stores. According to the lawsuit, the images and descriptions circulated under BOLO consistently involved racial and ethnic minorities who had done nothing to merit suspicion, accompanied by racially-tinged descriptions such as “bearded Middle Eastern guy who looked shady” or “black ghetto guy.” Really?

Abed, a supervisor in charge of loss prevention (read ” theft”), claims he refused to post the discriminatory emails. When this refusal became known to the district staff, they twice denied Abed promotions to General Manager—despite his being the most qualified applicant—and directed Abed’s new General Manager to trump up a reason to terminate him, according to the complaint.

The new General Manager, in turn, allegedly told Abed he would create a “paper trail” to have him fired, taunted his religion, sabotaged performance evaluations, placed him under a pretextual disciplinary “Action Plan,” and ultimately terminated him for allegedly poor performance.

The lawsuit seeks $1 million in damages and attorneys’ fees and costs. Most importantly, Abed seeks a court order permanently ending Best Buy’s customer profiling practices, which he believes continue to this day.

Top Settlements

Pond Drowning Case Settled. This is very sad. The family of a small boy who drowned in a pond while trying to save his younger brother who had also fallen in the pond, has been awarded a $30.7M settlement. The family had filed a premises liability lawsuit.

The story is devastating. Apparently, in 2001, Andrew Kennedy, who was just 11 years old at the time, tried to save his 10-year old brother James who had fallen through an ice-covered pond. Andrew drowned and James suffered severe brain damage. Andrew’s twin brother, Christopher Kennedy, claimed emotional and psychological trauma from witnessing the incident. And the parents alleged that the property owner, Lakes of the Four Seasons Property Owners Association Inc., did not have warning signs in place notifying the public of the dangers, nor did they try to restrict access to the pond. The family also claimed that Four Seasons failed to provide safety devices nearby. A cautionary tale…but at what price?

AON Account Specialists Settlement. And for all those ‘misclassified’ AON employees—justice at last. Los Angeles Superior Court judge gave final approval this week to a $10.5 million settlement of the employees overtime class action.

The story here is that California Account Specialists, whose work involves assisting Account Managers in providing insurance brokerage services to Aon’s clients, were misclassified by the defendant as exempt administrative employees. So the California Account Specialists filed a lawsuit—way back in 2007. And wouldn’t you know it, as the case was preparing for trial, the parties were able to reach a settlement. The settlement covers 534 class members, and best guess is they could have their money within 60 days.

OK. That’s it for this week. See you at the Bar.

Week Adjourned: 4.8.11

Top Class Actions

HAMPered Loan Modifications? It seems there’s no end in sight to the mortgage crisis—with new twists and victims appearing regularly. In fact, you could argue that it’s spawned a whole spin-off industry of fraud, and related legal actions. For example, this week, Saxon Mortgage Inc, the mortgage service division of Morgan Stanley, was hit with a potential class action lawsuit over allegations that the company uses the Homeowners Affordable Modification Program (HAMP) to attract customers into making “trial” payments on loans it has no intention of ever permanently modifying.

Filed in Northern California, the suit alleges a pattern of misconduct by Saxon which involves collecting trial payments, delaying the processing of loan modifications, and then denying the application altogether for demonstrably false reasons. Where do you start?

The suit’s lead plaintiff, a small business owner in San Francisco, Marie Gaudin, had, like millions of Americans, fallen on hard times as a result of the recession and approached Saxon for a loan modification on her home. Long story short, she was directed to Saxon’s “Home Preservation Department” and subsequently asked to provide extensive documentation of her financial condition, which she did. She received a written agreement from them that appeared to promise a permanent HAMP loan modification after she made three “trial” payments as proof she could handle the loan repayments. But—Saxon didn’t honor its agreement. Are we surprised?

The suit claims that Saxon delayed the processing of the HAMP loan modification, while Gaudin continued to make trial payments, which were duly noted as received in correspondence from Saxon. Nevertheless, Saxon denied her a permanent HAMP modification. According to the suit Saxon claimed that Gaudin had failed to make payments or comply with document requests. They also allegedly claimed that she did not make payments, while in the same letter actually acknowledged that she was current on all payments (do they not read their own correspondence before it goes out?). Saxon also claimed that the U.S. Treasury Department was involved in reviewing HAMP applications. Who gets paid to think this stuff up?

Not surprisingly, the suit alleges that Saxon’s breach of contract, rescission and restitution, and deceptive debt collection practices violated California’s Rosenthal Fair Debt Collection Practices Act (Rosenthal Act), and fraudulent, unlawful, and unfair business practices under California’s Unfair Competition Law (UCL).

Top Settlements

Goodyear Discrimination Suit Settles. Here’s a good news story—we like those. A jury in Cumberland, NC recently awarded Lashanda Shaw $450,000 as settlement of her wrongful termination suit against Goodyear Tire and Rubber Co.’s Fayetteville plant this week.

Court documents reportedly state that Shaw was fired for making a complaint about racial and sexual discrimination in the workplace. She filed her suit in 2009. When she finally got to court the trial took five weeks with the jury unanimously agreed on the compensatory damages. I’ll bet she’s sleeping better now.

May be Justice—but at What Cost? A 79-year old woman in Scranton, PA was awarded $550K this week as settlement of her medical malpractice case. But here’s the downside—Irene Doherty filed the suit because she suffered a 23-month delay in the diagnosis of her lung cancer. The verdict was returned against radiologist Earl Detrick, who practiced in Scranton and Wilkes-Barre, PA, prior to retiring.

Ms. Doherty’s lawyers argued that Detrick failed to properly report to Doherty or her physician his conclusions regarding a computerized tomography (CT) scan of her chest. That’s helpful. It turns out that that scan revealed a mass in Doherty’s right lung that required medical follow-up—but it wasn’t brought to Ms. Doherty’s attention until nearly two years later when she underwent a subsequent CT scan of her chest. The second scan revealed a much larger cancerous mass. So, in the 23 months between CT scans, the mass had doubled in size, and was inoperable. Worse, the cancer had spread to Doherty’s lymph nodes. Frankly, I find this astonishing—how does this kind of oversight happen?

Needless to say, Doherty’s suffering and physical deterioration due to her lung cancer could have been prevented had the radiologist done his job—which was to report the results of the January 2007 CT scan as soon as he saw them. And that’s exactly what her lawyers argued. If nothing else Doherty’s case emphasizes the importance of being your own advocate when it comes to healthcare. Don’t get me started…

Ok. That’s it for this week. See you at the bar.

Week Adjourned: 3.4.11

Top Class Actions

Glass Ceiling with a $100M Price Tag at CIGNA? Well, this has certainly been a time for discrimination class actions. Filed, that is. Topping the list—Cigna Health Care—based on the number of potential plaintiffs—dollars. This one’s all about gender discrimination—in the form of a hostile work environment and differential treatment of males and females occurs company-wide the suit alleges.

The complaint, filed by Ms. Bretta Karp, a long-time contracting manager with Cigna, claims that Ms. Karp and other female employees were disriminated against by treating them less favorably than male employees in similar positions and by subjecting all females to intentional, deliberate and wilful discriminatory denials of promotions and pay raises, discriminatory evaluations, disparate terms and conditions of work, harassment, hostile work environments, and other forms of discrimination in callous disregard of their rights.

The complaint further details that CIGNA has created a hostile work environment where male supervisors harass and intimidate female employees, where management has made clear that it favors male employees over women, and where company investigations into complaints made by female employees are either nonexistent or superficial and inadequate.

And the amount sought in damages? $100 million baby—along with litigation costs and Continue reading “Week Adjourned: 3.4.11”

Week Adjourned: 8.27.10

Top Class Actions

Care Doesn’t Discriminate? You would think that healthcare might be the one environment in which race would not be the priority. Not so, apparently. One of San Francisco’s biggest hospitals, Sutter Health’s California Pacific Medical Center (CPMC), which also operates St. Luke’s Hospital, is facing a class action over allegations that it is engaged in systematic discrimination against the hiring of Filipino registered nurses. The suit, brought by the California Nurses Association (CNA), alleges contract violations in a systematic policy of discrimination.

The CNA held a press conference over the matter during which former nursing supervisors and nurses of CPMC spoke out about the discrimination they themselves had faced. The CNA have also made public data from a review they conducted which show that in early 2008 there was a major demographic shift among the nurses being hired at St Luke’s. “Before February 2008, 65% of St Luke’s RNs were Filipino. After February 2008, only 10% of RNs hired were Filipino,” the press releases states.

“St. Luke’s and CPMC RNs, many of them Filipino, have been outspoken in defense of their patients, and in opposition to Sutter and CPMC’s plans to reduce services to the largely lower income, minority community depending on St. Luke’s from SOMA to the Excelsior,” said CNA Co-president Zenei Cortez, RN.

“Rather than respond to the concerns of the community, CPMC and Sutter have chosen instead to retaliate by carrying out a punitive, illegal, and immoral campaign of discrimination,” said Continue reading “Week Adjourned: 8.27.10”

Week Adjourned: 5.22.10

Top Class Actions

Seems there’s no end of trouble in sight for the beleaguered auto industry…

“We’re Leading by Example”? What’s that line about not throwing stones if you live in a glass house? Perhaps Ford ought to rethink using that headline as this week the company got hit with a class action lawsuit stemming from consumer complaints about alleged ‘defective’ rear axles on its Windstar model 1999-2003 minivans.

Apparently, the rear axles in question are unsealed hollow cylinders that basically collect water and ‘corrosive agents’ and, you guessed it, over time can corrode and crack, or even split into pieces. Um. That sounds like a quality product…not.

In fact it sounds quiet dangerous—and it is, because the axles are susceptible to failing while the minivan is being operated. Nice.

The law firm that filed the potential class action suspects that “more than 949,000 Windstars were manufactured with a defective axle.” That’s a lot of minivans—and a lot of families…

Top Settlements

The Week the Women Won…5,600 women that is, who filed a gender discrimination class action against their employer, Novartis Pharmaceuticals. Bloomberg reported it as the largest ever employment discrimination verdict—according to their data.

The payoff? $250 million in punitive damages and roughly $3.36 million in compensatory damages for each of the 12 women who are named plaintiffs and who took the stand in the case. Incidentally—the case was filed in 2004—so that’s six years of living the legal wars and all the rest.

Some of the stuff that came out in the courtroom was quite worrying. Here’s a clip from an official press release on the verdict—you be the judge—” On the first day of the trial in the defense’s opening Continue reading “Week Adjourned: 5.22.10”

Week Adjourned: 7.17.09

glasscracked So much for the lazy days of summer—it’s been a busy week!

Top Class Actions

Kindle cracking up? Unfortunately that’s not in a “ha-ha” kind of way. An unhappy customer in Seattle filed a federal class action lawsuit against online bookseller Amazon, this week, over his cracking Kindle.

A Kindle, for those of us technophobes, is an electronic book reader, and has proved tremendously popular for a variety of reasons. Mathew Giese is a convert, he bought a Kindle 2 in February, and a protective cover for it. After 3 months of use his Kindle started to crack in the areas where the cover was attached. The cracks grew worse until one day the screen froze and the Kindle seemingly stopped working.

When Geise contacted Amazon to make warranty claim, he was told by a company representative that Amazon would cover the cost of the frozen screen, but not the cracks, as the warranty apparently doesn’t include damage made by the protective cover. To make a long story short, Mr. Giese was told that the repairs would cost $200. Yes, you read that correctly. And did I mention that you can get a new Kindle 2 for $299? Continue reading “Week Adjourned: 7.17.09”