Devlin v. Equitable Financial Life Insurance Company

Background

Laura Devlin brought a proposed nationwide class action against Equitable Financial Life Insurance Company. The opinion states that Devlin is an Illinois resident and schoolteacher, and that Equitable is a New York company headquartered in New York City. Devlin alleged that Equitable violated federal securities laws by charging certain fees for its EQUI-VEST variable annuity without properly disclosing them. She alleged that account statements did not tell investors the actual fees charged to their accounts.

Devlin sought to represent investors who held EQUI-VEST between July 15, 2019, and July 18, 2022, with minor exceptions. Equitable moved under 28 U.S.C. § 1404(a) to transfer the case from the Northern District of Illinois to the Southern District of New York.

Transfer standard

Under Section 1404(a), a court may transfer a civil case to another federal district where it could have been brought when transfer would serve the convenience of the parties and witnesses and the interest of justice. The moving party must show that the proposed new forum is clearly more convenient. The parties agreed that venue was proper in both the Northern District of Illinois and the Southern District of New York.

Convenience factors

The court gave Devlin’s choice of Illinois little weight because she proposed a nationwide class and the case centered on statements created and issued from New York. The court found that the material events—Equitable’s creation and distribution of statements and its work concerning the EQUI-VEST fee structure—occurred mostly in New York. Equitable’s relevant personnel and operations were based almost exclusively in New York, either at its New York City headquarters or in Syracuse.

The court treated access to documents as neutral because relevant records could be moved easily. It found that witness convenience favored transfer, although not decisively: Equitable employees likely would be important witnesses and generally lived and worked in New York, while Devlin’s possible witnesses from her school district and financial advisory relationship were of uncertain importance. Party convenience was neutral because New York was more convenient for Equitable and Illinois was more convenient for Devlin.

Overall, the court concluded that the convenience factors favored transfer. Devlin’s choice of forum received only minimal weight against it.

Interest of justice

The court found court workload neutral. Although the Southern District of New York had a faster median time from filing to trial, the two courts had almost identical median times from filing to disposition, and complex class actions rarely reach trial. The parties also agreed that both courts were sufficiently familiar with the relevant law.

The remaining interest-of-justice factors favored New York. Devlin lived, bought the annuity, and allegedly suffered harm in Illinois, but the proposed class included people in many states. According to Equitable, New York contained the largest share of proposed class members. Equitable’s New York headquarters and the operations central to the allegations also gave New York a stronger relationship to the dispute and a greater interest in resolving it.

Disposition

The court granted Equitable’s motion to transfer. It transferred the case to the Southern District of New York immediately and terminated the civil case in the Northern District of Illinois. The court also terminated Devlin’s motion for appointment as lead plaintiff without prejudice as moot and denied Devlin’s request for a status conference as moot. The opinion addressed the proper forum; it did not decide whether Devlin’s securities-law allegations were ultimately valid.