Snitzer v. The Board of Trustees of the American Federation of Musicians and…

Background

The court had scheduled a fairness hearing for August 26, 2020, to be conducted by Skype and telephone. The court had asked individual objectors who had previously expressed interest in attending whether they wanted to be heard by video. Anne Bryant, Frank Hosticka, and Martin Stoner requested to speak. Daniel Walfish, an attorney representing a group of objectors, also was scheduled to be heard by video.

The order noted that Walfish and Stoner had submitted additional objection papers after the objection deadline. The attached materials included arguments that the proposed class settlement was unfair or inadequate, including objections concerning the settlement's releases and proposed governance provisions. Those arguments appear in the attached submissions; the order itself does not decide them.

Court’s Orders

Judge Valerie Caproni ordered that Bryant, Hosticka, and Stoner, who were appearing without lawyers, would each have five minutes to address the court. The court stated that chambers had emailed video-appearance instructions to those three objectors and to all counsel.

The court further ordered that Walfish’s and Stoner’s additional submissions be filed on the electronic docket to maintain an accurate record. Because the submissions were filed after the objection deadline, class counsel did not have to respond to them in writing. Because Walfish and Stoner would appear at the hearing, they could raise relevant issues orally, and class counsel had to be prepared to address those issues.

Finally, the court ordered class counsel to make the order available on the settlement website no later than the close of business on August 24, 2020. The order did not rule on whether the proposed settlement should be approved or rejected.