Hanrahan v. Britt

174 F.R.D. 356, 1997 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 1541, 1997 WL 67765
CourtDistrict Court, E.D. Pennsylvania
DecidedFebruary 11, 1997
DocketCivil Action No. 94-4615
StatusPublished
Cited by21 cases

This text of 174 F.R.D. 356 (Hanrahan v. Britt) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering District Court, E.D. Pennsylvania primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Hanrahan v. Britt, 174 F.R.D. 356, 1997 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 1541, 1997 WL 67765 (E.D. Pa. 1997).

Opinion

MEMORANDUM

DuBOIS, District Judge.

This class action was brought by plaintiffs against defendants, William Britt, Individually and t/a, d/b/a American Multimedia, Inc., Britt Motivation, Inc., Britt Leasing, Inc., Britt Management, Inc., Britt Resources, Inc., Executives Unlimited, Inc., Executive Planners, Inc., and Dexter Yager, Individually and t/a, d/b/a Yager Enterprises, Dexter R. Yager, Sr. & Family Enterprises, Inc., D & B Yager Enterprises, Inc., Dexter Yager Securities, Inc., Dexter Yager Motivation, Inc., Internet Services Corporation, Internet Services, Inc., International Communication Corporation of America, Yager Resort Properties, Inc., Dreambuilders Review, and Amway Corporation, Inc. (“Amway”), for alleged violations of the Sherman Act, 15 U.S.C. § 1, [359]*359and the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act, 18 U.S.C. § 1961 et seq. (“RICO”). Plaintiffs also alleged pendent state law claims for common law fraud and negligent misrepresentation.

Three issues relating to a proposed class action settlement are presently before the Court. Plaintiffs’ Motion for Final Approval of the Class Action Settlement requires the Court to determine whether the class is certifiable and, if so, whether the settlement is fair, adequate and reasonable. If the Court grants that Motion it must then consider whether the application of plaintiffs’ counsel for attorneys’ fees and other costs should be approved. The Court held a hearing on all three issues on December 16, 1996. For the reasons set forth below, the Court will grant Plaintiffs’ Motion for Final Approval of the Class Action Settlement and approve the Application of Plaintiffs’ Counsel for Award of Attorneys’ Fees, Reimbursement of Cost Disbursements, and for Incentive Payments to the Class Representatives.

I. Background1

Defendant Amway is a corporation engaged in the manufacture, distribution and sale of home care products, health and beauty products, “home tech” products, and commercial products with sales in excess of $5 billion. Amway also markets services and provides catalogs through which consumers can purchase many other “name brand” items. Amway sells its products and services exclusively through hundreds of thousands of independent distributors. Each Amway distributor may sponsor other independent Amway distributors; all distributors who can trace their sponsorship directly or indirectly to a particular distributor are said to be in that distributor’s “downline.”

Distributors earn income by selling Amway products and services to the public at retail prices and through monthly performance bonuses based on the total volume of products purchased by the distributor in that month. Because each newly sponsored distributor normally purchases products from the distributor who personally sponsored him, the volume of products sold by a distributor will depend, in part, upon the number of distributors in his downline.

Defendants William Britt and Dexter Yager are Amway distributors doing business through a number of related companies. Britt and Yager each occupies a position at the top of his own Amway distributorship pyramid. The distributorship networks that Britt and Yager run are vast: tens of thousands of distributors are in the downlines of each. Britt and Yager, and their businesses, benefit financially from the large number of distributorships in their downlines; in turn, Amway benefits from the success of Britt and Yager.

Plaintiffs John and Stacy Hanrahan and Mark Mensack are the named class representatives.2 The Hanrahans are former Amway distributors in the downline of defendant Britt; they were distributors of Amway products from January 1992 until August 1992, when they abandoned the distributorship. Plaintiff Mensack is a former Amway distributor in the downline of defendant Yager; he was a distributor of products marketed by Amway from April 1991 until August 1992, at which time he terminated his distributorship.

Plaintiffs allege that defendants Britt and Yager intentionally misrepresented and failed to disclose to them material facts regarding (1) the amount of profits Amway distributors could realistically expect to earn; (2) the expense required to operate a successful Amway distributorship; (3) the existence of profitable business relationships between Amway and numerous major corporations; and (4) the necessity of purchasing motivational materials sold by their affiliated companies and attending motivational rallies [360]*360organized and promoted by defendants. Plaintiffs also allege that defendants Britt and Yager allocated customers and fixed prices for the sale of their motivational materials and that Amway was aware of and encouraged all of the foregoing.

Plaintiffs filed this class action on July 29, 1994, charging defendants Britt, Yager and Amway with violations of the Sherman Antitrust Act (Count I),3 defendants Britt and Yager with violations of § 1962(c) of RICO (Count II), defendants Britt and Yager with violations of § 1962(d) of RICO (Count III), defendant Amway with aiding and abetting violations of RICO (Count IV), defendants Britt and Yager with fraud (Count V), and defendants Britt and Yager with negligent misrepresentation (Count VI). In addition to damages, plaintiffs claim injunctive and/or declaratory relief (Count VII).

Plaintiffs filed a Motion for Class Certification on November 30, 1994.4 That motion defined the proposed class as “[a]ll persons in the United States who, since January of 1990, have been or are Amway distributors and have been or are in the sales organizations or downlines of defendants William Britt and/or Dexter Yager;” the proposed class excluded the defendants, any entity in which the defendants have a controlling interest, and the officers and directors, affiliates, legal representatives, heirs, successors, or assignees of the defendants or their officers and directors. The Settlement Agreement defines the proposed class in a similar manner, delineating the proposed class as “[a]ll persons, who at any time during the period from January 1, 1990 to August 1, 1996, have been or are Amway distributors in the Amway lines of sponsorship ‘downline’ from the Amway distributorships of either William Britt or Dexter Yager or who purchased motivational materials published, produced, distributed or sold” by defendants; the Settlement Agreement proposed class definition includes the same exceptions as provided in the November 30, 1994 Motion. Plaintiffs seek to be certified as a class under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 23(b)(3).

In addition, plaintiffs are petitioning this Court for final approval of the settlement contained in the Settlement Agreement dated August 12,1996, pursuant to Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 23(e).

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174 F.R.D. 356, 1997 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 1541, 1997 WL 67765, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/hanrahan-v-britt-paed-1997.