It’s been about one month since the U.S. Judicial Panel on Multidistrict Litigation transferred to U.S. District Judge Ada Brown a group of proposed class action lawsuits brought by dozens of lawyers over the AT&T data breach, and the jockeying for a leadership position in the sprawling litigation has commenced.
It started on June 12, seven days after a dozen proposed class action lawsuits were transferred to Judge Brown, when former federal judge Joe Kendall of Kendall Law Group filed a “majority plaintiffs’ status report” with the court.
“The majority of plaintiffs have self-organized and will submit a proposed leadership structure within seven days,” he explained in the four-page filing where lawyers from Hausfeld, Susman Godfrey, Milberg Coleman Bryson Phillips Grossman and Markovits, Stock & DeMarco also signed on. “Plaintiffs further propose that deadlines for filing a consolidated class action complaint and defendant’s response thereto be set after the court appoints lead counsel.”
The next day, Mark Lanier chimed in, writing in his own four-page status report that he and cocounsel Chris Seeger of Seeger Weiss had also been “meeting and speaking with counsel in an attempt to organize a leadership structure well suited to aggressively litigate this case.”
“We were not contacted by Judge Kendall or the Hausfeld firm and did not know in advance of the filing submitted to Your Honor on June 12,” Lanier wrote. “We are more than happy to coordinate with Judge Kendall, but to date they have not reached out to us. In the interest of trying to reach consensus, we will immediately reach out to Judge Kendall. If for any reason the two groups cannot reach consensus, we are happy to submit a competing proposal to the court.”
Lawyers from Carella Byrne Cecchi Brody & Agnello also signed on to Lanier’s status report to Judge Brown.
Then, on June 14, from the law firms of George Feldman McDonald and Foster Yarborough filed a response asking Judge Brown to wait until other similar lawsuits against AT&T are consolidated in her court before making any decisions on leadership structure.
“Accordingly, for the proposed class to be represented by an appropriate leadership team — representing a variety of capabilities, expertise, and backgrounds — the court should set a schedule of deadlines for all leadership applications and responses thereto, according to a procedure that ensures all may be considered and heard on an equal basis,” read the response, which was signed on by the Mathias Raphael firm and The Hoda Law Firm.
Kendall filed a supplemental status report on June 20, informing Judge Brown that he and the other lawyers representing the “majority plaintiffs” “welcome an opportunity to confer in good faith” with the Lanier group, the George Feldman McDonald-Yarborough group “and any other counsel of record, to reach a consensus or near-consensus well suited to litigate this complex data breach litigation.”
“Accordingly, the majority plaintiffs respectfully request until July 11, 2024 … or any date as set by the court to confer with the Lanier Group (and all other counsel) in the interest of reaching a proposed leadership structure,” the supplemental report reads. “By July 11, the plaintiffs will submit a status report on whether they were able to reach a consensus (or near-consensus).”
Lawyer Maureen M. Brady of McShane & Brady in Kansas City, Missouri, also filed a response with the court on June 21 asking Judge Brown to hold off on making any leadership structure decisions.
“Undersigned counsel is unaware of any orders being entered by this court establishing a schedule for leadership applications for this newly formed MDL,” she wrote. “As cases are still being filed and consolidated into this MDL proceeding, any proposed leadership filing at this stage would a) be premature, b) be unfair to the counsel who are awaiting the transfer of their case, and c) not conserve judicial resources.”
In the initial order transferring the first dozen proposed class actions to Judge Brown, the MDL panel noted that at least 18 other proposed class actions pending in seven districts that could be tag-along cases.
All parties unanimously agreed on centralizing the lawsuits, but the location was contested.
Plaintiffs in five cases within the sprawling litigation — filed in courts in California, Georgia, Illinois, Missouri and Texas — requested the cases be transferred to the Northern District of Georgia; plaintiffs in two cases requested the Western District of Oklahoma; two other plaintiffs requested the Eastern District of Texas and one plaintiff requested the Northern District of Illinois.
But the defendants, AT&T Inc. and AT&T Mobility, along with plaintiffs in 18 of the lawsuits, requested the cases be centralized in the Northern District of Texas. The MDL panel agreed with the majority.
“Defendant AT&T Inc. has its headquarters in Dallas, Texas, where common witnesses and other evidence likely will be found. Most of the related actions are pending there, and defendants and many plaintiffs support this district as their first or second choice for the transferee venue,” the order reads. “We assign this litigation to the Honorable Ada E. Brown, a skilled jurist with the willingness and ability to manage this litigation, who has not yet had the opportunity to preside over an MDL. We are confident she will steer this matter on a prudent course.”
More than 18 additional cases have since been transferred to Judge Brown.
The MDL case number is 3:24-md-03114; the lead case number is 3:24-cv-00757.