The Blogosphere Dissects Faulty CAFA Analysis
Last week a panel of the Eleventh Circuit issued an opinion with results so absurd that it just cries out for reversal. See Cappuccitti v. DirecTV, No. 09-14107 (11th Cir. July 19, 2010). In essence, the court misread the mass action requirement that at least one plaintiff's claim must involve the ordinary jurisdictional minimum for diversity ($75,000) for the complaint to be filed in federal court as applying to class actions. CAFA, of course, clearly distinguishes between mass actions and class actions, and it very explicitly says that for class actions, the class's claims are to be aggregated to reach an aggregated jurisdictional threshold ($5 million).
I won't take the time to dissect the opinion here. My colleagues in the blogosphere -- Andrew Trask, at his truly excellent blog Class Action Countermeasures, and Cory Andrews at the Washington Legal Foundation's The Legal Pulse -- already have done the job for me.
But Cappuccitti is certainly a case to watch. Let's see what the Vegas bookies say about whether it will take a rehearing en banc or an actual certiorari petition to the Supremes to have Cappuccitti reversed and the plain language of CAFA restored.
