Duane Morris Class Action Review - 2023 - Report - Page 121
C.
Rulings On Motions To Strike Class Claims
Sometimes defendants opt to defeat putative classes before they grow larger by moving
to strike class allegations contained in the pleadings pursuant to Rule 23(c), which
provides “at an early practicable time after a person sues or is sued as a class
representative, the court must determine by order whether to certify the action as a
class action.” That is precisely what Samsung Electronics did in Lee, et al. v. Samsumg
Electronics America, Inc., 2022 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 168986 (S.D. Tex. Sept. 21, 2022).
The plaintiff filed an action on behalf of a nationwide class of consumers, delineated into
four state sub-classes, who all purchased Samsung’s black stainless steel kitchen
appliances. The plaintiff alleged the appliances were not, in fact, black stainless steel;
instead, they were regular stainless steel coated with a thin plastic finish that peeled,
chipped, flaked, discolored, and disintegrated.
The defendant moved to strike the plaintiff’s class allegations, even before discovery
was underway, because it argued the complaint itself demonstrated the plaintiff could
not meet Rule 23’s requirements. Id. at *2. The plaintiff argued Rule 12(f) applied and
pursuant to that standard, Samsung’s motion to strike should be denied. Id.
The court agreed with Samsung that federal courts, including the Southern District of
Texas, had stricken class allegations in pleadings by analyzing Rule 23’s requirements
for commonality and predominance. The court, though, also acknowledged that some
federal courts have lent support to the plaintiff’s Rule 12(f) position because those
courts had held motions to strike were premature where discovery had not commenced
nor a motion for class certification been filed. Id. at *3. The court declined to follow that
line of case law, though, because it found those cases presented “a more limited class
definition making class certification less unlikely on the pleadings” than the plaintiff’s
class definition here. Id.
Analyzing the defendant’s motion to strike under Rule 23, the court found the class
alleged a defect theory - the black plastic coating was present on every appliance that
putative class members thought was stainless steel and purchased accordingly sufficiently common to satisfy Rule 23(a)(2)’s requirement. Id. at *4.
However, the court found the plaintiff’s common law fraud and consumer fraud claims
were not appropriate for class treatment because the reliance element of fraud claims
necessarily requires individualized proof that precluded predominance. Id. at *4-5.
Contrary to the plaintiff’s argument that reliance could be inferred where it already
established Samsung made misrepresentations about its appliances, the court found
federal and state law still required a showing of individual reliance on those
misrepresentations. Id. The plaintiff’s class allegations failed to eliminate variations
between misrepresentations made to each individual class member. Id.
Samsung also argued that the putative class could not be certified because state law
varied as to the plaintiff’s fraudulent concealment and unjust enrichment claims. Id. The
plaintiff alleged a nationwide class in addition to four sub-classes defining membership
by state lines. Id. at *1. In response, the plaintiff argued Samsung’s conflict of law
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Duane Morris Class Action Review – 2023
