Welcome to Critical Mass, Law.com's weekly digest for class action and mass tort attorneys. This week: What are people saying about the new litigation financing bill? Four 2018 settlements joined ISS Securities Class Action Services' Top 100 List. Lawyers are making a lot of noise over 3M earplugs.

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New Lit Funding Bill: Dead on Arrival?

Republican Senators reintroduced a bill last week that would require plaintiffs' attorneys to disclose litigation financing arrangements in class actions and multidistrict litigation. My colleague Ross Todd wrote this story about the Litigation Funding Transparency Act, introduced by U.S. Sens. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, John Cornyn, R-Texas, Thom Tillis, R-North Carolina, and Ben Sasse, R-Nebraska. It looks a lot like last year's bill, which I wrote about. Here's what people are saying:

>Michael German, Vannin Capital: “The proposed act is another example of special interest groups using their reach in Washington to implement legislation that goes well beyond the issue they purport to address.”

>Travis Lenkner, Keller Lenkner: “This is a carbon copy of the Chamber's unsuccessful bill from the last Congress, which didn't even get a hearing. 'Transparency' is Chamber-speak for a one-sided fishing expedition into a litigant's resources.”

>Anthony Sebok, Benjamin N. Cardozo School of Law at Yeshiva University: “The Democrats are in control of the House of Representatives, so it raises a question of, what is the strategy going forward from the U.S. Chamber of Commerce? Is it that they think they can get allies from people on the Democrats' side? And, if they can, that will be an interesting development and represent an interesting twist in the narrative so far.”

 

 

Top Securities Settlements of 2018

Four securities class action settlements from 2018 joined a Top 100 all-time listcompiled by ISS Securities Class Action Services. The report found there were 126 securities class action settlements, down from 163 in 2017, but they totaled $5.84 billion, up 164%. That's in line with a NERA Economic Consulting report earlier this year that found securities class action settlements swelled in 2018.

The four settlements in 2018 that made the Top 100 were:

No. 5: $3 billion with Brazilian energy firm Petrobras. Lead plaintiffs' counsel was Pomerantz.

No. 31: $480 million over Wells Fargo's fake account scandal. Bernstein Litowitzwas lead counsel.

No. 68: $250 million with Allergan. Bernstein Litowitz and Kessler Topaz were co-lead counsel.

No. 80: $210 million with Wilmington Trust Corp. Bernstein Litowitz and Saxena White were co-lead counsel.

3M Earplugs Targeted by Military Members

Plaintiffs' lawyers are gearing up to file thousands of lawsuits over allegedly defective earplugs issued to U.S. military members in the past decade. So far, more than 200 lawsuits allege 3M's dual-ended Combat Arms Earplugs, used in both training and combat, caused hearing loss and ringing in the ears.

The U.S. Judicial Panel on Multidistrict Litigation plans to hear those cases (pun intended) on March 28 in Washington D.C. On Tuesday: 3M (represented by Kimberly Branscome of Kirkland & Ellis) filed court papers supporting an MDL in Minnesota, where it's headquartered — or, as a “neutral” alternative, the Middle District of Tennessee. It called some of the venues requested by plaintiffs inappropriate “forum shopping” because they were located near military bases or had judges with military experience.

Who Got the Work?

A federal judge in Illinois named Cohen Milstein and Levi Korsinsky to lead the shareholder litigation against MoneyGram International. Back on Nov. 8, MoneyGram agreed to pay $125 million to resolve allegations that it failed to crack down on fraudulent money transfers, as required under a 2009 order with the Federal Trade Commission and a 2012 deferred prosecution agreement with the Justice Department. On Feb. 12, U.S. District Judge Joan Lefkow appointed the competing plaintiffs' firms in the securities class actions that followed those announcements.

Here's more you need to know:

Whole Enchilada: Whole Foods has asked the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit to be the first appellate court to rule on whether Bristol-Myers Squibb v. Superior Court of California applied to class actions – what it called a “novel issue of constitutional due process.” This month, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and the Washington Legal Foundation weighed in as amici on the side of Whole Foods, which argued that a class action over an employee incentive program could be truncated under the 2017 decision by the U.S. Supreme Court. Bristol-Myers limited personal jurisdiction in a mass tort action involving several individual plaintiffs, but didn't address its impact on class actions.

Alsup Addendum: The 9th Circuit has asked U.S. District Judge William Alsup to explain why he refused to allow lawyers to settle a class action over Logitechcomputer speakers. Alsup, who is in San Francisco, has a strict class action standing order that prohibits settlement of classes that aren't certified. Logitech had petitioned to overturn two of Alsup's orders, which the 9th Circuit has stayed.

Rollover Verdict: An Alabama jury awarded $151 million to a 24-year-old man who was paralyzed after the 1998 Ford Explorer he was riding in rolled over. Ford plans to appeal the verdict, which also was against the driver, who had swerved to avoid an animal. Representing the plaintiff, Travaris “Tre” Smith, were: LaBarron Boone, Greg Allen, Kendall Dunson, and Dan Philyaw (Beasley Allen) and Bill Gamble(Gamble Gamble Calame and Jones). Ford's team was Alan Thomas and Jennifer Egbe (Huie Fernambucq & Stewart), and Milton C. Davis.

Thanks for reading, we'll be back next week!