Week Adjourned: 9.10.10

Hopefully Good News for Vets with PTSDTop Class Actions

Veterans PTSD. An announcement was issued this week, about an extension of time for veterans to join or opt in to a class action lawsuit over Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD). Given that tens of thousands of troops deployed to Iraq are ending their tours, the timing of this couldn’t be better.

The lawsuit that was brought on behalf of veterans who served on active duty in the U.S. Army, Navy, Marine Corps, or Air Force and were found by a Physical Evaluation Board (“PEB”) to be unfit for continued service due, at least in part, to the individual’s PTSD, were assigned a disability rating for PTSD of less than 50%, and, as a result, were released, separated, retired, or discharged from active duty on or after December 17, 2002 and before October 14, 2008 (regardless whether such release, separation, retirement, or discharge resulted in the individual’s placement on the Temporary Disability Retirement List), has been extended to November 10, 2010, according to an Order entered by federal Judge George W. Miller.   

Under the Rules of the United States Court of Federal Claims, the Court has reportedly allowed the class action lawsuit to be a class action on behalf of the following individuals who choose to opt in:

All individuals who (a) served on active duty in the U.S. Army, Navy,Marine Corps, or Air Force, (b) were found by a Physical Evaluation Board to be unfit for continued service due, Continue reading “Week Adjourned: 9.10.10”

Week Adjourned: 6.26.09

Top Class Actions

Quiet Company…loud ex-employees? Seems some former Northwestern Mutual (NML) employees missed the “Shhhh!” memo when they worked there. The Milwaukee-based life insurance giant has been slapped with a $200 million class action lawsuit by former employees who allege NML violated the federal Fair Labor Standards Act and California’s overtime and minimum wage laws. Their complaint also states that NML “intentionally and repeatedly” misclassified sales employees as independent contractors: independent contractors are exempt from federal and state wage and hour laws, while full-time employees are not.

Any of this sound familiar? It should. NML was sued on similar allegations in Pennsylvania in 2008. That time around NML won the lawsuit, which resulted in their being able to maintain their financial representatives as ‘independent contractors.’ According to media reports, NML has about 7,000 “financial representatives nationwide.” Be interesting to see if history does repeat itself here.

Fill ‘er kinda up? If you’ve been running out of gas sooner than expected—and I’m referring to propane here, check your cylinder. If it’s from Blue Rhino and AmeriGas, you might be interested to know that they are facing a class action lawsuit over allegations that they reduced the amount of propane provided in tanks sold as ‘full’ without telling their customers. Continue reading “Week Adjourned: 6.26.09”