United States Ninth Circuit

The present enforcement action involved many of the same claims, and the same defendant, as a previous class action settlement. Denial of defendant's motion to enjoin plaintiff State of California's entire enforcement action is affirmed, and denial of defendant's motion to enjoin only the State's restitution claims seeking relief for individuals who were bound by a Class Action Fairness Act (CAFA) settlement is reversed, where: 1) a CAFA class action did not act as res judicata against the State in its sovereign capacity, though many of the same claims were included in both the CAFA and present enforcement action; 2) State officials were notified of the terms of the proposed CAFA settlement, but chose not to participate in the settlement approval process; and 3) the State cannot now obtain a duplicate recovery in the form of restitution on behalf of those individual citizens who are bound by the bargained for restitution in the CAFA settlement.

Appellate Information

• Decided 11/07/2014
• Published 11/07/2014

Judges

• Wardlaw

Court

• United States Ninth Circuit

Counsel