True Health Chiropractic Inc v. McKesson Corporation
- Haywood Gilliam
- 4:13-cv-02219
- U.S. District Court · Northern District of California
- 6
In True Health Chiropractic v. McKesson, Judge Gilliam decertified the fax class because individualized proof was required to establish liability under the Telephone Consumer Protection Act.
The named plaintiffs, the more than 6,000 purported members of the “Stand-Alone Fax Machine Class,” and the defendants were affected by the court’s order decertifying the class.
What happened
True Health Chiropractic Inc. v. McKesson Corporation involved a class of people who allegedly received unwanted faxes. After an FCC decision, receiving a fax through an online fax service no longer created liability under the Telephone Consumer Protection Act, so how each person received the fax became important.
The plaintiffs submitted more than 100 telephone-carrier declarations and relied on an expert’s opinions about online-fax usage. The court found that this evidence did not provide common proof for the more than 6,000 class members. Instead, deciding whether each person received a fax through a stand-alone machine required individual evidence, so common issues did not outweigh individual ones and a class action was not the best method for resolving the claims.
In True Health Chiropractic Inc. v. McKesson Corporation, Judge Haywood S. Gilliam, Jr. ordered the “Stand-Alone Fax Machine Class” decertified. The opinion did not decide the underlying liability claims for each individual class member.
The detailed version
- True Health Chiropractic Inc v. McKesson Corporation · No. 4:13-cv-02219
- Haywood Gilliam
- Oct. 15, 2021
Background
The court had previously ordered the plaintiffs to explain why the class should not be decertified, meaning removed from class-action treatment. The plaintiffs responded, the defendants replied, and the court heard oral argument.
The dispute concerned claims under the Telephone Consumer Protection Act. After the class was initially certified, an FCC decision changed the legal requirements for liability: a person who received a fax through an online fax service could not establish liability under the statute. The court therefore focused on whether the plaintiffs could prove, with evidence common to the class, that each class member received the relevant faxes through a stand-alone fax machine.
Analysis
The plaintiffs submitted more than 100 telephone-carrier declarations. Carriers serving more than 60% of the class members said they could not determine whether the faxes were received on stand-alone fax machines or through online fax services. The plaintiffs also relied on an expert who discussed general trends in online-fax usage and used those trends to make assertions about individual consumers.
Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 23(b)(3) requires common legal or factual questions to predominate over questions affecting only individual class members. The court found that the plaintiffs’ proposed method was not class-wide proof. The carrier declarations concerned different phone numbers and did not directly establish how each class member received the faxes. The court also rejected the plaintiffs’ reliance on a representative-sample theory discussed in Tyson Foods because, unlike the workers in that case, the class members here had an individual way to establish the relevant fact: each person could testify about how they received the faxes. One class member’s method of receiving a fax did not show how another class member received one.
The court concluded that the individualized question—whether each class member received the faxes on a stand-alone fax machine—was central to liability and predominated over common questions. It also concluded that class treatment was not superior, meaning it was not the fairest and most efficient available method, because of the individual inquiries required.
Disposition
Judge Haywood S. Gilliam, Jr. ordered the “Stand-Alone Fax Machine Class” decertified. The opinion addressed the requirements for maintaining the class action; it did not decide whether each individual class member was ultimately entitled to relief under the Telephone Consumer Protection Act.
Read the full 6-page opinion on CourtListener, the free public archive maintained by the Free Law Project.