The divisive issue of whether judges are empowered to make a common fund order to distribute the costs of a funding commission at the settlement stage of a class action is headed back to the Full Federal Court next week.
A class action accusing Virgin Australia of failing to disclose its true financial position in a 2019 prospectus for a $324 million capital raising is seeking to join a slew of the airline’s insurers to the case.
A judge has approved a $192.5 million settlement in an oil spill class action on behalf of Indonesian seaweed farmers, but the slice for the law firm running the action and its litigation funder remains to be determined amid allegations of negligence by the former lead applicant in the case.
Sixteen law firms and accounting firms have thrown their hat in the ring to administer a $300 million settlement in two class actions against Johnson & Johnson over pelvic mesh devices that injured thousands of women.
A contradictor appointed in two pelvic mesh class actions against Johnson & Johnson has blasted a $300 million settlement, calling it “massively” short of what is owed to group members, after a judge preliminarily found the sum was not fair and reasonable.
GetSwift has been hit with a $15M penalty and several of its directors have been slapped with substantial penalties after the company was found to have misled shareholders in breach of the Corporations Act.
The question of power to make a common fund order at the end of a class action was no longer a hypothetical one and it was time to send the issue to the Full Federal Court. That’s what the 7-Eleven class action judge was told 15 months ago but he failed to heed the advice, resulting in a court deeply divided and funders clamouring for reform.
The law firm running the Montara oil spill class action, which has settled for $192.5 million, is looking for a new lead applicant after the first one defected over concerns group members would lose half the settlement amount to legal costs and a funding commission.
The applicants in a consolidated investor class action against Blue Sky Alternative Investments and auditor EY will be applying for a so-called solicitors common fund order, and will move to transfer the case to the contingency-fee friendly Victoria Supreme Court if the groundbreaking application fails.
Former Liberal staffer Bruce Lehrmann was reasonably identifiable as Brittany Higgins’ alleged rapist in an interview aired on Ten’s The Project and articles published by News Corp Australia, according to court documents in defamation cases against the media companies.