RAQUEL AGUILAR, ET AL V. WALGREEN CO., No. 21-16563 (9th Cir. 2022)
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The appeal was brought in the name of purported clients of the law firms of Gallo LLP and Wynne Law Firm (“Gallo/Wynne”). Gallo/Wynne originally sought to represent a putative class of Walgreen’s store managers in the San Francisco Superior Court in a wage and hour action (the Morales action). A different group of attorneys from the firms of Miller Shah LLP and Edgar Law Firm LLC (“Miller/Edgar”) filed a substantially similar wage and hour action on behalf of Walgreen’s store managers in the Eastern District of California (the Caves action). Gallo/Wynne sought to encourage putative class members in the Caves action to instead join a separate “mass action” to be filed by Gallo/Wynne as Gallo/Wynne clients.
The district court issued an order granting Miller/Edgar’s ex parte application for Corrective Notice to the allegedly misleading Letter and invalidated all Gallo/Wynne procured opt-outs from the Caves action. The district court issued a second order granting Walgreen’s motion to modify the scope of the Corrective Notice to be sent to all Gallo/Wynne procured Caves opt-outs. Appellants are purported clients of Gallo/Wynne, and they appealed these two orders.
The Ninth Circuit dismissed the appeal for lack of jurisdiction and denied Appellants’ request for mandamus relief. The panel held that the two orders were amenable to review after final judgment, and this placed them outside of the third collateral order requirement: effective unreviewability. The panel held that the dispositive third factor–that the district court order is clearly erroneous as a matter of law– was not met here.
Court Description: Jurisdiction / Collateral Order Doctrine. The panel dismissed the appeal for lack of jurisdiction and denied appellants’ request for mandamus relief in an action challenging two district court orders in a class action by a group of Walgreens “store managers” against Walgreens Co. The appeal was brought in the name of purported clients of the law firms of Gallo LLP and Wynne Law Firm (“Gallo/Wynne”). Gallo/Wynne originally sought to represent a putative class of Walgreen’s store managers in the San Francisco Superior Court in a wage and hour action (the Morales action). A different group of attorneys from the firms of Miller Shah LLP and Edgar Law Firm LLC (“Miller/Edgar”) filed a substantially similar wage and hour action on behalf of Walgreen’s store managers in the Eastern District of California (the Caves action). The San Francisco court in the Morales action granted a stay in favor of the Caves action. Gallo/Wynne sought to encourage putative class members in the Caves action to instead join a separate “mass action” to be filed by Gallo/Wynne as Gallo/Wynne clients. After a class settlement in the Caves action was preliminarily approved, but before the opt-out deadline, Gallo/Wynne sent a Letter to certain putative Caves class members urging them to opt out of the proposed Caves settlement. The district court issued an order granting Miller/Edgar’s ex parte application for Corrective Notice to the allegedly misleading Letter, and invalidated all AGUILAR V. WALGREEN 3 Gallo/Wynne procured opt-outs from the Caves action. The district court issued a second order granting Walgreen’s motion to modify the scope of the Corrective Notice to be sent to all Gallo/Wynne procured Caves opt-outs. Appellants are purported clients of Gallo/Wynne, and they appeal these two orders. This court has “jurisdiction of appeals from all final decisions of the district courts of the United States.” 28 U.S.C. § 1291. Under the Supreme Court’s collateral order doctrine, a final decision in § 1291 also includes a narrow class of decisions that do not terminate the litigation where an order meets the three conditions of conclusiveness, separateness, and effective unreviewability. Mohawk Indus., Inc. v. Carpenter, 558 U.S. 100, 108 (2009). The panel held that the two orders were amenable to review after final judgment, and this placed them outside of the third collateral order requirement: effective unreviewability. As to the first order, appellants cited no caselaw establishing that opt-out invalidation orders were not amenable to review after final judgment. Likewise, Appellants identified no credible interests that would be lost through application of a final judgment requirement, and the Corrective Notice did not eviscerate the Appellants’ right to counsel. The challenged orders did not place any restrictions on Gallo/Wynne’s ability to communicate with the individuals subject to the district court’s opt-out invalidation order or Corrective Notice, there was no irreparable injury at stake in this case, and appellants can fully remedy any injury they suffered by way of the district court’s orders after a final judgment is reached. In the alternative, Appellants asserted that if there was no jurisdiction under the collateral order doctrine, the panel 4 AGUILAR V. WALGREEN should issue a writ of mandamus. Under the five factors prescribed by Bauman v. United States District Court, 557 F.2d 650, 654-55 (9th Cir. 1977), for mandamus analysis, the panel held that the dispositive third factor–that the district court order is clearly erroneous as a matter of law– was not met here. The panel, therefore, declined to grant mandamus relief to appellants.
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