stating that the court in Eisen, 479 F.2d at 1017-18, rejected a fluid recovery procedure in an antitrust case where it “avoided constitutionally required notice to each class member, dispensed with individual calculation of damages, and distributed the damages to future traders who were not necessarily members of the class.”
How later courts described this case
- stating that the court in Eisen, 479 F.2d at 1017-18, rejected a fluid recovery procedure in an antitrust case where it “avoided constitutionally required notice to each class member, dispensed with individual calculation of damages, and distributed the damages to future traders who were not necessarily members of the class.”
- finding that a district court’s use of cy pres to distribute unclaimed settlement funds was an abuse of discretion because it did not “adequately target the plaintiff class and fail[ed] to provide ade- quate supervision over distribution”
- stating that the “ ‘manageability’ requirement includes consideration of the potential difficulties in notifying class members of the suit, calculation of individual damages, and distribution of damages”
- affirming award of “in gross” judgment in class action under Farm Labor Contractor Registration Act, distinguishing Eisen and In re Hotel on the basis that statutory, per-violation damages under Act — unlike antitrust or security damages — did not require individual proof of actual damages
Written by the judges who cited it.
The opinion
SNEED, Circuit Judge,
concurring specially:
I concur in the court’s opinion. My purpose in writing a special concurrence is to indicate that the court’s opinion does not endorse a percentage recovery in common fund cases in all instances. Lodestar calculations may be required under circumstances in which a percentage recovery would be either too small or too large in light of the hours devoted to the case. Moreover, trial judges will find it useful, I suggest, to inquire early in the proceedings what mode of recovery of fees the attorneys of the plaintiff class anticipate utilizing. The responses to this inquiry no doubt will facilitate case management by the trial judge as well as the final resolution of the fee calculation issue.