On January 24, 2025, the United States Supreme Court agreed to answer a question that has divided the circuits: Can a federal court certify a class containing members who lack any Article III injury? In Davis v. Laboratory Corporation of America Holdings, a trial court in California certified a damages and injunctive relief class comprised of blind patients who—unliked sighted individuals—could not use LabCorp’s kiosks to access testing services. It did not matter to the trial court or to the Ninth Circuit that the class members had the option to bypass LabCorp’s kiosks, which had been introduced as an option in 2017, and instead secure services through the front desk, which had been the sole option previously offered by LabCorp. Estimating the class size at hundreds of thousands of individuals, plaintiffs pegged their damages (available at a minimum statutory pop of $4,000 per plaintiff) at half a billion dollars a year. Many of the class members, LabCorp asserted, were not injured at all—they simply chose to check in at the front desk rather than use a kiosk. As LabCorp phrased it, the proposed classes were defined as individuals who had “been merely exposed to these allegedly unlawful kiosks.”
No one disputes that a federal court lacks Article III jurisdiction to provide a remedy to an individual who has suffered no injury. And the Supreme Court held in TransUnion LLC v. Ramirez, that “every class member must have Article III standing in order to recover damages.” But that decision addressed a final judgment awarding damages, not a class-certification order. The Court left open “the distinct question whether every class member must demonstrate standing before a court certifies a class.” As we noted in this space back in 2015, the Supreme Court was expected to decide the issue in Tyson Foods, Inc. v. Bouaphakeo, but did not do so.
In the years since, the circuits have taken different approaches, with some circuits refusing to certify classes with members who lacked Article III standing and others only allowing certification when the number of uninjured members is de minimis. Still others—including the Ninth Circuit, as here—hold that a class can be certified as long as the named plaintiff has standing and the presence of uninjured class members does not prevent the plaintiff from showing that common issues predominate under Rule 23.
Class counsel in Davis v. LabCorp, sees no Article III issue here. In a class certification order, they point out, a court does not finally adjudicate the question of damages or injury. If a particular individual turns out not to have been injured, that individual can be excluded from eventual relief. And, with an injunctive relief class, it shouldn’t matter—they argue—that some individuals have not been injured. Injunctive relief often provides incidental benefits to persons who haven’t yet experienced harm. And class counsel comes at the injury question differently as well: they argue that if a kiosk violates the ADA and is inaccessible to a blind person, that individual has suffered an injury because he is unable to take advantage of a tool that a sighted person can choose to use.
Part of the answer here depends on how one assesses the impact of a class certification decision. Class counsel contends that questions of injury can be postponed to a later stage of the case. But that is hardly a cost-free exercise. As LabCorp observes in its cert petition, “With class actions, certification is often the ballgame. Once a class has been certified, the typical step is settlement, not trial.” And so-called “no injury” class actions can pack a punch in California, where anyone, injured or not, can recover a minimum of $4,000 in statutory damages. Including uninjured persons in a class, LabCorp argues, can dramatically and unfairly drive up the settlement value of a case. Failure to recognize those realities, LabCorp suggests, ignores the real world.
The merits briefs in this case should be filed in March and April. Stay tuned.
The post Supreme Court To Decide Whether a Class Can Contain Individuals Who Lack Any Article III Injury appeared first on Class Actions Brief.
