Justia Consumer Law Opinion Summaries

Plaintiffs had a Home Depot credit card issued by Citibank. In 2005, Krahenbuhl, who also had a Citibank-Home Depot credit card, contracted with plaintiffs to build a log cabin for speculative resale. A log cabin package was purchased over the phone from Home Depot for $9,761.64 and charged to Krahenbuhl’s account. The materials were approved by, delivered to, and signed for by plaintiffs, who eventually built and sold the log cabin. The relationship between Krahenbuhl and plaintiffs deteriorated, and Krahenbuhl disputed the charge. Citibank transferred the charge from Krahenbuhl’s credit card to plaintiffs’ card. Krahenbuhl and plaintiffs reached a settlement through mediation, which plaintiffs thought included payment of the credit card charge. About one year later, they claim, they became aware that the $9,761.64 charge had been transferred to their account. Neither Citibank nor Home Depot would remove the charge; accrued interest has resulted in a total sum of approximately $21,000. Plaintiffs sued under the Wisconsin Consumer Act, Wis. Stat. 427.104(1)(j). Citibank was dismissed and the district court granted Home Depot summary judgment, finding that Home Depot had not acted either directly or indirectly in an attempt to collect a debt. The Seventh Circuit affirmed. View "Parent v. Home Depot U.S.A., Inc." on Justia Law

Defendant, a crematory operator, hid hundreds of uncremated bodies on his property rather than perform cremations he was paid to do. When Plaintiffs, who had received what they thought to be their deceased son's cremains from Defendant's crematory, learned about the problems at the crematory, they discovered the body of their son was mishandled and not properly cremated. Plaintiffs sued Defendant for the alleged mishandling of their deceased son's body. Following a jury verdict for Plaintiffs, the trial court entered judgment against Defendant based on the intentional infliction of emotional distress claim but granted his motion for a judgment notwithstanding the verdict on Plaintiffs' Tennessee Consumer Protection Act (TCPA) and bailment claims. The court of appeals affirmed. The Supreme Court affirmed, holding that the trial court did not err in (1) holding Defendant liable for intentional infliction of emotional distress in the amount of the jury verdict; (2) instructing the jury that they were permitted to draw a negative inference resulting from Defendant's invocation of his Fifth Amendment privilege during questioning; and (3) dismissing the TCPA and bailment claims. View "Akers v. Prime Succession of Tenn., Inc." on Justia Law

Plaintiffs filed a putative class action against Facebook and others complaining that Facebook's program, Beacon, was causing publication of otherwise private information about their outside web activities to their personal profiles without their knowledge or approval. Beacon operated by updating a member's personal profile to reflect certain actions the member had taken on websites belonging to companies that had contracted with Facebook to participate in the Beacon program. At issue on appeal was whether the district court abused its discretion in approving the parties' $9.5 million settlement agreement as "fair, reasonable, and adequate," either because a Facebook employee sat on the board of the organization distributing cy pres funds (DTF) or because the settlement amount was too low. The court concluded that objectors' contention that the settling parties were prohibited from creating DTF to disburse cy pres funds was without merit, and the district court did not abuse its discretion in so concluding. The court also concluded that the settlement was fundamentally fair; the notice in this case adequately apprised class members of all material elements of the settlement agreement and therefore complied with the requirements of Rule 23(e); and the district court properly limited its substantive review of the agreement as necessary to determine that it was "fair, adequate, and free from collusion." View "Lane, et al v. Facebook, Inc., et al" on Justia Law

Lesley and Fogg presented the Benistar 419 Plan to the Ouwingas, their accountant, and their attorney, providing a legal opinion that contributions were tax-deductible and that the Ouwingas could take money out tax-free. The Ouwingas made substantial contributions, which were used to purchase John Hancock life insurance policies. In 2003, Lesley and Fogg told the Ouwingas that the IRS had changed the rules; that the Ouwingas would need to contribute additional money; and that, while this might signal closing of the “loophole,” there was no concern about tax benefits already claimed. In 2006, the Ouwingas decided to transfer out of the Plans. John Hancock again advised that there would be no taxable consequences and that the Plan met IRS requirements for tax deductible treatment. The Ouwingas signed a purported liability release. In 2008, the IRS notified the Ouwingas that it was disallowing deductions, deeming the Plan an “abusive tax shelter.” The Ouwingas filed a class action against Benistar Defendants, John Hancock entities, lawyers, Lesley, and Fogg, alleging conspiracy to defraud (RICO, 18 U.S.C. 1962(c), (d)), negligent misrepresentation, fraudulent misrepresentation, unjust enrichment, breach of fiduciary duty, breach of contract, and violations of consumer protection laws. The district court dismissed. The Sixth Circuit reversed, View "Ouwinga v. Benistar 419 Plan Servs., Inc." on Justia Law

ORS 742.061 authorizes an award of attorney fees to an insured who prevails in "an action * * * in any court of this state upon any policy of insurance of any kind or nature * * *." A later enacted statute, ORS 742.001, provides that ORS chapter 742 "appl[ies] to all insurance policies delivered or issued for delivery in this state * * *." The question in this case was whether ORS 742.001 precluded awarding attorney fees to an insured who prevailed in an action in an Oregon court on an insurance policy that was issued for delivery and delivered in the State of Washington. The trial court concluded that it did and entered a supplemental judgment to that effect. The Court of Appeals affirmed. Considering the text, context, and legislative history of Chapter 742, the Supreme Court concluded that the legislature did not intend that ORS 742.001 would limit the scope of ORS 742.061. "For us to hold otherwise, we would have to turn an expansion of the state's authority to impose substantive regulations on insurers transacting business in Oregon into a limitation on the remedial and procedural rules that affect insurers appearing in its courts. * * * we would have to read a limitation into the text of that section that the legislature did not include. We may not do that." The Court reversed the appellate court and remanded the case for further proceedings. View "Morgan v. Amex Assurance Company" on Justia Law

Plaintiffs brought a class action suit under section 4 of the Clayton Act, 15 U.S.C. 15, against the largest United States casket manufacturer, Batesville; and against the three largest United States funeral home chains and distributors of Batesville caskets. Plaintiffs alleged that defendants conspired to foreclose competition from independent casket discounters (ICDs) who sold caskets directly to consumers at discount prices and maintained artificially high consumer casket prices in violation of sections 1 and 2 of the Sherman Act, 15 U.S.C. 1, 2, by engaging in a group boycott to prevent ICDs from selling Batesville caskets and dissuading consumers from purchasing caskets from ICDs. Plaintiffs also alleged that defendants used concerted efforts to restrict casket price competition, including coordinating prices, limiting the advertisement of pricing, and engaging in sham discounting. The court reversed and remanded the district court's dismissal for lack of subject matter jurisdiction of the claim for attorneys' fees and costs; affirmed the district court's dismissal of Consumer Appellants' and FCA's injunctive relief claims for lack of subject matter jurisdiction; and affirmed the district court's denial of class certification. View "Funeral Consumers Alliance Inc, et al v. Service Corp. Intl, et al" on Justia Law

Plaintiff, a resident of Massachusetts, challenged the district court's grant of summary judgment dismissing claims she brought in November 2009 against the Cadle Company and its corporate sibling CadleRock Joint Venture II for unlawful debt collection under Massachusetts law. In November 2005 Plaintiff entered into a settlement with Defendants and furnished a release. Because the release was valid, at issue was whether, given the release of past claims, anything that occurred in or after November 2005 restored or gave rise to a claim by Plaintiff. The First Circuit Court of Appeals affirmed, concluding that because Plaintiff was essentially attacking Defendants' pre-release conduct in the present lawsuit, Plaintiff's claims, which ultimately depended on the wrongfulness of the original debt collection efforts, were without merit. View "Pilalas v. The Cadle Co." on Justia Law

Plaintiff, a religious order of the Roman Catholic Church that undertook charitable work internationally, filed suit against defendant, a charitable organization with an expressly ecumenical association, asserting infringement and false advertising claims under the Lanham Act, 15 U.S.C. 1051 et seq., as well as state law claims for unfair competition and violation of the Florida Deceptive and Unfair Trade Practices Act (FDUTPA), Fla. Stat. 501.201 et seq. The infringement claims were based on defendant's alleged use of marks that were confusingly similar to those for which plaintiff had obtained federal registrations. In the false advertising claim, plaintiff charged that defendant falsely claimed a historic affiliation with plaintiff going back to the eleventh century. The state law claims derived from these same litigations. Defendant counterclaimed, alleging that plaintiff committed fraud on the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (PTO) in applying for its service marks due to plaintiff's failure to disclose its knowledge of the domestic presence of other organizations that used similar marks in commerce. The court concluded that the district court clearly erred in evaluating the claim that plaintiff committed fraud on the PTO and reversed the cancellation of the four word marks. Because the court was not presented with sufficient findings to review the Lanham Act infringement claims, the court vacated the district court's ruling on that issue and remanded. The court vacated the district court's ruling on the state law claims and affirmed the district court's finding on the Lanham Act false advertising claim in favor of defendant. View "Sovereign Military Hospitaller v. Knights Hospitallers" on Justia Law

Shawn Adel, a former employee of Westgate Resorts, a timeshare company, formed Consumer Protection Group (CPG) to right perceived wrongs stemming from Westgate's offer of certificates to consumers that were virtually irredemable. CPG solicited people who had received certificates to assign their claims to CPG. Westgate sued Adel, claiming intentional interference with existing and potential economic relations, conversion, breach of contract, and violation of the Utah Uniform Trade Secrets Act. Adel and CPG counterclaimed on behalf of 500 claimants, alleging breach of contract, fraudulent inducement, and violation of the Utah Consumer Protection Act. The jury awarded actual economic damages of between $5 and $550 for each claimant and awarded each claimant punitive damages of $66,666. The Supreme Court vacated the jury's punitive damages award, holding that the award violated Westgate's procedural due process rights under Philip Morris USA v. Williams because the statements made by CPG's counsel during closing argument created a risk that the jury would improperly consider harm allegedly caused by Westgate to nonparties when it fixed its punitive damages award. Remanded for a new evaluation of the punitive damages award only. View "WestGate Resorts, Ltd. v. Adel" on Justia Law

Plaintiffs brought suit against defendants on behalf of themselves and similarly situated plaintiffs, alleging, inter alia, that defendants engaged in unlawful, unfair, and deceptive practices through unauthorized enrollment practices known as "post transaction marketing" and "data pass." At issue was whether plaintiffs were bound to arbitrate their dispute with defendants as a consequence of an arbitration provision that defendants asserted was part of a contract between the parties. The court concluded that despite some limited availability of the arbitration provision to plaintiffs, they were not bound to arbitrate this dispute. In regards to the email at issue, under the contract law of Connecticut or California - either of which could apply to this dispute - the email did not provide sufficient notice to plaintiffs of the arbitration provision, and plaintiffs therefore could not have assented to it solely as a result of their failure to cancel their enrollment in defendants' service. In regards to the hyperlink at issue, the court concluded that defendants forfeited the argument that plaintiffs were on notice of the arbitration provision through the hyperlink by failing to raise it in the district court. View "Schnabel et al. v. Trilegiant Corp. et al." on Justia Law