Treehouse Foods, Inc. v. Green Mountain Coffee Roasters, Inc.

Background

The opinion concerns multidistrict antitrust litigation involving direct-purchaser class actions, indirect-purchaser class actions, and individual actions by certain competitors against Keurig Green Mountain, Inc. The indirect-purchaser plaintiffs proposed a $31 million settlement with Keurig. The court had preliminarily approved that settlement before this motion was filed.

The settlement’s Plan of Allocation used a formula based partly on the purchase price in the state where a class member bought the product and the quality of the member’s proof of purchase. It placed states into three groups: states that had repealed the rule from Illinois v. Illinois Brick, states where that rule remained in effect, and Illinois and Florida. Under the plan, purchasers in Illinois and Florida would receive less for the same purchase than purchasers in other states that had repealed the rule.

The Illinois and Florida Attorneys General moved to intervene on behalf of indirect purchasers in those states. They said they were intervening solely to object to the Plan of Allocation. In the alternative, they sought permission to object to that plan. Keurig did not oppose intervention and took no position on the dispute’s substance. The indirect-purchaser plaintiffs also did not oppose intervention, while reserving their right to argue that the Attorneys General should have intervened earlier under the Class Action Fairness Act.

Legal standard

Under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 24(a)(2), intervention as a matter of right requires a timely application, an interest in the action, a showing that the interest may be impaired by the case’s outcome, and a showing that the existing parties do not adequately protect that interest. The court also described permissive intervention under Rule 24(b)(1)(B), which allows intervention when the proposed intervenor has a claim or defense sharing a common legal or factual question with the main action.

Court’s analysis

The court held that the Attorneys General satisfied all four requirements for intervention as a matter of right.

Timeliness. The Attorneys General said they had discussed the allocation plan with class counsel several times before filing their motion. They filed less than two months after being told that the plan would not be amended to place Illinois and Florida in the same category as the other states that had repealed the Illinois Brick rule. The court found the motion timely. It also found little, if any, prejudice to the existing parties because the motion was unopposed, while denying intervention could harm the residents represented by the Attorneys General.

Interest in the action. The court found that the plan would give Illinois and Florida purchasers less value per unit than purchasers in other states that had repealed the rule. It accepted the Attorneys General’s asserted interest in protecting the economic well-being of their residents as a sufficient legal interest in the litigation.

Possible impairment. The court found that, without intervention, the existing parties were highly unlikely to change the allocation plan in the way the Attorneys General requested. The court therefore concluded that the disposition of the case could impair the Attorneys General’s interest.

Adequate representation. The court applied the minimal burden for showing that existing representation may be inadequate. It found adversity of interest because the existing parties had declined to amend the allocation plan even after being given the opportunity to do so. That was enough to satisfy this requirement.

Disposition

Judge Vernon S. Broderick granted the Illinois and Florida Attorneys General’s motion to intervene and directed the Clerk’s Office to terminate the open motion at Document 1247. The opinion did not state that the court approved or rejected the proposed objections to the Plan of Allocation, and it did not alter the settlement or allocation formula.