Medical devices company Masimo and its CEO Joe Kiani made “materially false and misleading statements” touting “purportedly strong demand” for its products following its $1 billion purchase of consumer audio products company Sound United in April 2022, alleged a verified shareholder derivative class action Wednesday (docket 3:24-cv-00781) in U.S. District Court for Southern California.
Plaintiff Dennis Gromov may file a response by the close of business Friday to defendant Belkin’s April 26 motion to enforce the court’s Feb. 28 order that Gromov turn over to Belkin for testing the Samsung phone he used in generating his fraud allegations, said a clerk’s docket entry Tuesday (docket 1:22-cv-06918) in U.S. District Court for Northern Illinois in Chicago. The court isn't ordering a Belkin reply, it said. The company contends that Gromov is dragging his feet on the testing order in an attempt to avoid discovery. The plaintiff’s class action alleges that Belkin advertised power banks for mobile devices in a deceptive manner, and that the chargers don’t deliver nearly the amount of power promised in those ads (see 2301300008).
Plaintiff Natalie Ebneshahidi voluntarily dismissed her class action against Johns Hopkins University and Johns Hopkins Health System involving the May 2023 MOVEit data breach, said her notice (docket 3083) Monday in U.S. District Court for Massachusetts in Boston. Ebneshahidi’s Sept. 18 class action alleged her personally identifiable and personal health information were compromised due to Johns Hopkins’ inadequate safeguarding of her private information.
Delphinus Engineering, a professional services provider and U.S. military contractor, lost control over current and former employees’ personally identifiable information (PII) in an Oct. 23 data breach, alleged a class action Tuesday (docket 2:24-cv-01810) in U.S. District Court for Eastern Pennsylvania in Philadelphia. The company notified victims 177 days after the breach began, it said.
A February data breach at United Healthcare Group (UHG) resulted in network disruptions that have endangered the health and well-being of millions of Americans, alleged a class action Tuesday (docket 0:24-cv-01559) in U.S. District Court for Minnesota.
Safe Streets USA placed thousands of calls to consumers whose numbers were listed on the national do not call registry, and it did so using “a prohibited artificial or prerecorded voice,” alleged Rose Salaiz’s Telephone Consumer Protection Act class action Monday (docket 3:24-cv-00147) in U.S. District Court for Western Texas in El Paso. Safe Streets, which sells home security systems, didn’t obtain express written consent before placing its unsolicited phone calls, and therefore it’s in violation of the TCPA, said the complaint. By placing unwanted phone calls to people who have registered their phone numbers on the national database, Safe Streets violated “the privacy and statutory rights” of Salaiz and the class, it said. The El Paso, Texas, resident listed her personal cellphone number on the federal DNC registry in May 2021, yet she received at least two unauthorized Safe Streets solicitation calls in January that played a prerecorded voice, it said. Salaiz disconnected the first call on Jan. 2, but she answered the second on Jan. 9, and “engaged in the call for the sole purpose of identifying who was responsible for making illegal robocalls to her personal cell phone,” said the complaint. Salaiz seeks an injunction requiring Safe Streets to stop its “unconsented calling,” plus an award of “actual and statutory fines” to the class members, together with court costs and reasonable attorneys’ fees, it said.
Western Governors University, a private nonprofit online college based in Millcreek, Utah, repeatedly sent text messages after Tiernan Hughes and her putative class members “expressly requested” through their “stop” requests that the messaging should cease, alleged Hughes’ Telephone Consumer Protection Act class action Monday (docket 4:24-cv-00193) in U.S. District Court for Western Oklahoma in Tulsa. The Oklahoma resident alleges that the school sent her at least five telemarketing text messages promoting its online degree programs, and that the contacts continued after multiple attempts to get them to stop. The university’s conduct “violated the privacy rights of Hughes and the putative class members, as they were subjected to annoying and harassing text messages,” said the complaint. The school’s text messages “intruded upon the rights of Hughes and the putative class members to be free from invasion of their interest in seclusion,” it said.
Here are Communications Litigation Today's top stories from last week, in case you missed them. Each can be found by searching on its title or by clicking on the hyperlinked reference number.
Some protesters have gone “well beyond simply engaging in free speech,” said a breach of contract class action (docket 1:24-cv-03232) filed Monday by a second-year Jewish student against Columbia University trustees in U.S. District Court for Southern New York in Manhattan over protests involving the Israel-Hamas war.
Humana and its agents negligently, knowingly and willfully initiated telemarketing calls to residential phone lines using an artificial or prerecorded voice without the prior express consent of the called parties, and did so to numbers listed on the national do not call registry, alleged a class action Friday (docket 3:24-cv-00262) in U.S. District Court for Western Kentucky in Louisville. Carlton Harrison alleges Humana violated the Telephone Consumer Protection Act when it inundated his cellphone with at least seven telemarketing calls to promote its insurance products and services, though Harrison’s cellphone number has been listed on the DNC registry since September 2005, said his complaint. At no point has the Montgomery, Alabama, resident sought out or solicited information about Humana’s insurance products before receiving the telemarketing calls at issue, it said.