Two Canadian law firms have filed a $578m class-action
lawsuit against the companies that run Ashley Madison after a hacker group’s data breach exposed
some 39 million memberships in the adultery website earlier this week.
Charney Lawyers and
Sutts, Strosberg, both of Ontario, said Friday that they filed the lawsuit on
behalf of Canadians who subscribed to Ashley Madison and whose personal
information was disclosed to the public. The website, with its slogan “Life is
short. Have an affair,” is marketed to facilitate extramarital relationships.
The lawsuit, filed
on Thursday in the Ontario superior court of justice, targets Avid Dating Life and Avid Life Media, the Toronto-based
companies that run AshleyMadison.com. Its class-action status “still needs to
be certified by the court”, the statement says.
Ashley Madison did
not immediately respond to requests for comment. It has said that the personal
details exposed in the initial data leak can’t be used to prove the infidelity
of their clients.
The
class action lawsuit filed at the Manhattan Supreme Court alleges Dualstar
Entertainment Group for not paying wages of 40 past and present interns at the
company. A representative for the company released a statement defending the
wage theft allegations as "groundless."
Dualstar
Entertainment is the parent company of prestigious labels, The Row and
Elizabeth and James. According to the Olsen Twins Class Action lawsuit,
the interns were demanding payment for the work they provided for the
company. A former intern also alleges the company for their poor working
conditions.
"The
allegations in the complaint filed against Dualstar are groundless, and
Dualstar will vigorously defend itself against plaintiff's claims in court, not
before the media. Dualstar is confident that once the true facts of this case
are revealed, the lawsuit will be dismissed in its entirety," Dualstar
representative Annett Wolf wrote in a statement to USA
TODAY.
The
Class Action lawsuit claims that the interns deserved to be paid since they are
providing the same work done by the regular employees. They also cited
the Olsens' work ethics that subjected the interns to longer working hours and
too much work, Refinery29 reports.
A federal judge’s recent rulings in a driver pay case
involving a class of thousands of drivers who participated in Werner
Enterprise’s Student Driver Program found that the company failed to pay its
drivers for sleeper berth time and short rest breaks.
The findings set the stage for a trial in September to determine damages owed to a class of thousands of Werner drivers who participated in the driver training program for up to three years prior to the initial filing of the class action suit on Sept. 14, 2011.
According to the initial collective class action complaint filed on behalf of plaintiff Philip Petrone and other similarly situated drivers, Werner Enterprises and its subsidiary driver training program, Drivers Management LLC, violated the Fair Labor Standards Act by intentionally failing to compensate the class members for wages earned while in the company’s employment.
Petrone’s suit alleges he was enrolled in Werner’s Student Driver Program, a mandatory six- to eight-week course for new hires. While in the program, the company violated Nebraska labor laws by failing to pay plaintiffs the minimum wage for hours they worked. Specifically, the suit alleges that drivers were cheated out of funds due to them for rest breaks and meals.
The findings set the stage for a trial in September to determine damages owed to a class of thousands of Werner drivers who participated in the driver training program for up to three years prior to the initial filing of the class action suit on Sept. 14, 2011.
According to the initial collective class action complaint filed on behalf of plaintiff Philip Petrone and other similarly situated drivers, Werner Enterprises and its subsidiary driver training program, Drivers Management LLC, violated the Fair Labor Standards Act by intentionally failing to compensate the class members for wages earned while in the company’s employment.
Petrone’s suit alleges he was enrolled in Werner’s Student Driver Program, a mandatory six- to eight-week course for new hires. While in the program, the company violated Nebraska labor laws by failing to pay plaintiffs the minimum wage for hours they worked. Specifically, the suit alleges that drivers were cheated out of funds due to them for rest breaks and meals.
With legal troubles mounting, Barclays PLC (BCS - Analyst Report) is likely to face a class action related to a
lawsuit accusing the bank of inflating its stock price through manipulation of
the London Interbank Offered Rate ("LIBOR"). According to a Reuters
report, on Thursday, a U.S. judge ruled that the shareholders who filed the
lawsuit may move forward with the case as a class action.
A U.S. appeals court on Friday signaled it might reverse a
judge's decision that expanded a class action of bondholders suing Argentina
over debt in default since 2002.
Members
of a three-judge panel of the 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in New York
showed discomfort with a federal judge's decision to expand the class action
over a series of euro-denominated bonds to cover anyone who held them instead
of just continuous holders of the debt.
The
2nd Circuit on Aug. 10 had reversed U.S. District Judge Thomas Griesa's similar
expansion of eight other class actions against Argentina, and the country's
lawyer, Carmine Boccuzzi, argued on Friday that the ninth was similarly too
broad.
Some
judges appeared to accept that argument, questioning how creditors could
receive notice that they could opt out of the class and how the court could
determine who ultimately was covered by the lawsuit, given secondary-market
bond trading.
A SEMINAL class action lawsuit
against the country’s gold mining industry starts on Monday with activist
groups set to argue to be allowed to join the case, as they expect to fully use
the developing class action mechanism in the future.
Lobby group Section27 and two
nonprofit allies intend to help bolster the case for applicants in the planned
class action, which has few precedents. The long-awaited case will see 56 class
representatives, acting on behalf of thousands of former mine workers, take on
the entire gold mining sector in demanding compensation for silicosis and
pulmonary tuberculosis they had contracted after 1965.
Representatives of the health
rights group Treatment Action Campaign (TAC) and gender activist group Sonke
Gender Justice, are seeking to join the suit as amici curiae, or friends of the
court, in the two days of court proceedings.
The groups will argue that they
"have an interest in developing this law (as their) constituency is
marginalised people, which are the kind of people that class action lawsuits
developed to help," Section27 lawyer John Stephens said at a media
briefing on Thursday.
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