LeGrand v. Abbott Laboratories

Background

Condalisa LeGrand brought a proposed class action against Abbott Laboratories, alleging that statements on the labels of Abbott’s Ensure nutrition drinks are false and misleading. The court set a deadline for filing a class-certification motion, later extended that deadline to January 23, 2025. LeGrand filed a class-certification motion by the extended deadline, but the court denied it on August 4, 2025.

The earlier class-certification order found that the requirements for class certification were met except for one part of the manageability requirement under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 23(b)(3). The court concluded that LeGrand had not presented a method for proving damages at a class trial. The court had excluded LeGrand’s damages experts under the evidence rule known as Daubert, and it found that neither of her damages methodologies satisfied the applicable requirements.

On September 11, 2025, LeGrand filed a renewed class-certification motion, but the deadline for such motions had passed. She then asked for permission to file the renewed motion. LeGrand said she had supplemented the record by obtaining additional testimony from her damages experts about their conjoint analysis and by providing evidence that the health message was the reason consumers purchased Ensure.

Legal standard

Because LeGrand sought to modify the scheduling order after the deadline, the court applied Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 16(b)(4), which requires good cause and the judge’s consent to modify a schedule. The main consideration under that standard is the diligence of the party seeking the change.

The court also considered Rule 23, which gives district courts broad discretion to decide whether to certify a class and to revisit class-certification decisions before final judgment. The court explained that a class-certification order is tentative before final judgment and that courts may allow a renewed motion.

Abbott argued that LeGrand also had to satisfy the standard for reconsideration. The court rejected that argument, explaining that no binding authority required the court to apply the reconsideration standard to a request for leave to file a renewed class-certification motion.

Court’s reasoning

The court found good cause to modify the schedule. LeGrand filed her request five weeks after the court denied the original class-certification motion, and that denial occurred after the deadline for filing the original motion. The court treated this timing as consistent with diligence.

The court also found that the renewed motion could address the specific deficiency identified in the earlier order. According to the court, LeGrand was not proposing an entirely new damages model that she had failed to present earlier. Instead, she was offering supplemental testimony and evidence to clarify and support the same model. The court distinguished a case in which the plaintiff had offered no workable class-wide damages model at all.

Disposition

The court granted LeGrand’s motion for leave to file a renewed motion for class certification. It directed her to file the renewed motion in substantially the same form as the proposed motion attached to her request and to properly notice a hearing under the court’s local rules. The court expressly granted leave without addressing the merits of the renewed class-certification motion.