We posted last month (here and here) about abuses perpetrated by the concert and sports entertainment industry, which often makes it impossible for consumers to buy tickets at face value. Music-industry celebrities are sometimes part of the problem. The office of New York City councilman Dan Garodnick has followed CL&P's coverage of the issue and alterted […]
Brian's post below mentions the recent New York Times article about automakers' efforts to avail themselves of their dealers' arbitration agreements with customers, as well as the Ninth Circuit's decision in Kramer v. Toyota rejecting one such effort. Anyone interested in these subjects might also want to know that Toyota has filed a petition for a […]
A commenter on my post about the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court's decision in Feeney asked for an explanation in plain English. Here goes. The court decided that Massachusetts courts will not enforce an arbitration clause that bans class actions when a claim really cannot be pursued without a class action. For example, if the claim is […]
by Jeff Sovern The Supreme Court today granted cert in Mount Holly v. Mount Holly Gardens Citizens in Action, which raises the issue of whether courts can use the disparate impact test in federal Fair Housing Act (FHA) cases. Because the language of the FHA is similar to that of the Equal Credit Opportunity Act […]
This article by Christopher Jensen explains that the big automakers are trying to use aribtration clauses in consumers' contracts with auto dealers to escape liability in court in class actions and with respect to individual claims under state "lemon laws." I posted in February about a Ninth Circuit ruling rejecting an effort by Toyota to […]
Consumer advocates have long been outraged by the phenomenon of "pay for delay" in the prescription drug business, whereby brand-name drug companies pay off potential generic competitors to stay out of the market. In return for the payments, the generics drop their challenges to the brand name companies' patents, and the brand name and generic […]
From Dee Pridgen: The Wyoming State Attorney General’s office recently completed its first major in-state enforcement action in recent history against the Sharps Rifle Company. The company was manufacturing a collector's item replica pistol. Sharps took deposits and payments from customers for the pistols, but never delivered the product due to technical difficulties in the […]
Here. The story is about how car makers are using arbitration clauses to defeat consumer protections, including state lemon laws, and keep defects secret.
In a blog post last June, we noted an Alabama Supreme Court ruling that a patient who took a generic version of a drug may sue a brand-name drug manufacturer for failing to warn about a drug’s risks. The court had reasoned that the brand-name manufacturer could have foreseen that a physician prescribing the brand-name […]
by Brian Wolfman We posted in March when a state trial court in New York threw out New York City's ban on the sale of sugary drinks larger than 16 ounces. We have posted many times on the ban, including here, here, here, and here. On Tuesday, New York's appeal was argued in the New […]