Welcome to Critical Mass, Law.com's weekly briefing for class action and mass tort attorneys. Here's what's happening this week: The federal judge in the opioid MDL gave plaintiffs' lawyers more time to recast their idea for a “negotiation class.” The State Street judge heard testimony—three days of it— about the plaintiffs' $74.5M fee request. Find out who got appointed to lead these wildfire lawsuits after Quinn Emanuel got disqualified.

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Dan Polster, U.S. district judge of the District Court for the Northern District of Ohio.

Opioid Judge Gives Time to Tackle Class Critics

A federal judge overseeing nearly 2,000 opioid lawsuits gave more time for plaintiffs' attorneys to hammer out a “novel idea” they pitched this month to settle all the cases. At a Tuesday hearing, U.S. District Judge Dan Polster was set to hear whether to certify a “negotiation class,” but plaintiffs' attorneys Elizabeth Cabraser (Lieff Cabraser) and Paul Geller (Robbins Geller) asked for more time after several distributors, pharmacies and state attorneys general raised concerns about the proposal. The judge gave them until July 9 to file an amended motion. A new hearing is Aug. 6.

About the proposal: Lead plaintiffs' attorneys want to create a “negotiation class” that would settle opioid cases brought by 24,500 cities, counties and other smaller governments—but not the states. Here's a few reasons why 26 attorneys general didn't like the idea:

* The proposal “treads on the states' sovereign interests.” * There would be no “global peace.” * The proposal would distribute funds without regard to how they are spent. * The idea's novelty would result in lengthy appeals, delaying the settlement. * The potential for excessive attorney fees would reduce the funds available.

Distributors and pharmacies also cited these reasons:

* Rule 23 does not authorize a “negotiation class.” * The motion for certification comes “untethered to a specific lawsuit.” * The proposal might require a second notice to the class.

State Street Hearing Stretches Three Days

A federal judge in Boston heard testimony this week about whether to grant $74.5 million in attorney fees in securities settlements with State Street Corp. At issue is a $4.1 million payment that Labaton Sucharow paid to a Texas lawyer, and potential overbilling that prompted him to bring in special master Gerald Rosen two years ago to review the fee request.

Labaton had this statement about Monday's hearing, which has stretched into three days:

“Counsel for Special Master Rosen highlighted some of the factors supporting the reasonableness of the court's original award of a 25% fee to class counsel. That included the Special Master's view that the underlying State Street action hinged on a complex and challenging case, with novel legal issues, at substantial risk of success, and the excellent work done by counsel in obtaining a record recovery for the class—against a highly formidable adversary. We hope the court ultimately agrees with the recommendations made by the Special Master that were once again endorsed during today's hearing today.”

Who Got the Work?

Quinn Emanuel is appealing a Los Angeles Superior Court judge's order disqualifying the firm from representing victims of last fall's wildfire in Southern California. Having defended other California utilities in wildfire litigation, Quinn Emanuel had access to Southern California Edison's confidential information before it switched sides, the judge found. He had no shortage of lawyers to appoint as leads in the litigation. On June 20, he appointed 31 lawyers, with Brian Panish (Panish, Shea & Boyle), Lexi Hazam (Lieff Cabraser) and Alexander Robertson (Robertson & Associates) as lead counsel.

Here's what else is going on:

Change Order: Home Depot filed a petition for the U.S. Supreme Court to rehear a case, citing “two fundamental, conceptual legal errors” in its May 28 ruling in Home Depot v. Jackson. The decision found that a third-party counterclaim defendant in a class action could not transfer or remove the case to federal court under the Class Action Fairness Act. The ruling is “inconsistent with the plain language of the applicable removal statutes and Federal Rules of Civil Procedure,” according to Home Depot's June 21 petition.

Breach Backtrack: A federal appeals court reinstated a pair of lawsuits brought over cyberattacks at the U.S. Office of Personnel Management. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit found that the plaintiffs had standing to sue, reversing a district judge's 2017 dismissal of both cases, one of which was a class action.

Yahoo a Yes?: Lawyers are due back in court on Thursday to approve a revised $117.5 million data breach settlement with Yahoo. U.S. District Judge Lucy Koh rejected the original $85 million deal, in part due to the $35 million attorney fee request. On Tuesday, Koh ordered plaintiffs' lawyers to file supplemental information about billing records and incentive awards to class representatives. (Koh, if you recall, had some tough words last year for plaintiffs' lawyers seeking $38 million in fees in the Anthem data breach settlement.) Lead counsel John Yanchunis (Morgan & Morgan) quickly responded to her request in the Yahoo case.

That's all for this week. Thanks for reading Critical Mass!