Justia Civil Procedure Opinion Summaries

Plaintiffs were two individuals who purchased Marlboro Light cigarettes in Oregon. Defendant Philip Morris was the company that manufactured, marketed, and sold Marlboro Lights. Plaintiffs brought this action under Oregon’s Unlawful Trade Practices Act (UTPA), alleging that defendant misrepresented that Marlboro Lights would deliver less tar and nicotine than regular Marlboros and that, as a result of that misrepresentation, plaintiffs suffered economic losses. Plaintiffs moved to certify a class consisting of approximately 100,000 individuals who had purchased at least one pack of Marlboro Lights in Oregon over a 30-year period (from 1971 to 2001). The trial court denied plaintiffs’ motion after concluding that individual inquiries so predominated over common ones that a class action was not a superior means to adjudicate the putative class’s UTPA claim. On appeal, a majority of the Court of Appeals disagreed with the trial court’s predominance assessment, concluding that the essential elements of the UTPA claim could be proved through evidence common to the class. The majority remanded to the trial court to reconsider whether, without the trial court’s predominance assessment, a class action was a superior means of litigating the class claims. In granting defendant’s petition for review, the Supreme Court considered whether common issues predominated for purposes of the class action certification decision, and what a private plaintiff in a UTPA case of this nature had to prove. The Supreme Court concluded that the trial court properly denied class certification, and accordingly, it reversed the contrary decision of the Court of Appeals and remanded to the trial court for further proceedings on the individual plaintiffs’ claims. View "Pearson v. Philip Morris, Inc." on Justia Law

Davis Wright Tremaine LLP ("DWT") challenged a trial court order compelling production of certain materials that, in DWT’s view, were protected under the attorney-client privilege. The trial court issued the order in the context of a legal malpractice action against DWT by a former client. The materials that are the subject of the order are communications between DWT’s designated in-house counsel and the lawyers in the firm who had represented the former client, and concern how actual and potential conflicts between the lawyers and the former client should have been handled. The trial court concluded that all but three of the communications with the firm’s in-house counsel ordinarily would have been covered by the attorney-client privilege, but the court recognized a “fiduciary exception” to the attorney-client privilege, which arose out of the fact that the firm was attempting to shield its internal communications from a former client. Upon review, the Supreme Court concluded that the trial court correctly determined that the attorney-client privilege as defined in OEC 503 applied to communications between lawyers in a firm and in-house counsel. However, the trial court erred in recognizing an exception to OEC 503 that the legislature did not adopt in the terms of that rule. Accordingly, the Supreme Court issued a peremptory writ of mandamus ordering the trial court to vacate its order compelling production of materials related to those communications that it determined were otherwise subject to the attorney-client privilege. View "Crimson Trace Corp. v. Davis Wright Tremaine LLP" on Justia Law

The issue in this mandamus proceeding was whether the trial court correctly denied defendants' motion to change venue. Plaintiffs, a husband and wife, initiated a medical malpractice action against defendants in Multnomah County. Defendants argued that venue was in Clackamas County, because that was where the clinic was located, where the doctor who provided the husband's medical services resided, and where the husband received treatment. Plaintiffs argued that venue is proper in Multnomah County, because defendants solicited patients who lived in that county, referred patients to imaging facilities in that county, used medical education programs in that county, and "identified" the clinic's location in its website as the "Portland area." The trial court denied defendants' motion, explaining that defendants, by soliciting patients in Multnomah County, "purposely availed themselves of the court's jurisdiction" in that county. The Supreme Court concluded that the trial court mistakenly conflated personal jurisdiction considerations with the statutory requirements for venue and erred in denying defendants' motion. The Court therefore granted defendants relief and granted the writ. View "Kohring v. Ballard" on Justia Law

In this product liability action, plaintiff appealed a judgment for defendants after a jury trial. The Court of Appeals affirmed without considering the merits of nine of plaintiff's ten assignments of instructional and evidentiary error. Plaintiff contended on appeal that, in so holding, the Court of Appeals misconstrued the standard for reversal in ORS 19.415(2) as it applied to claims of instructional and evidentiary error like those that the court declined to consider. Upon review, the Supreme Court found that the appellate court erred in its reasoning for not considering all of plaintiff's arguments. Accordingly, the Court reversed and remanded this case to the Court of Appeals to address plaintiff's assignments of error. View "Purdy v. Deere & Company" on Justia Law