Plaintiffs' Consumer Class v. Hyundai Motor Company

• Court: Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit
• Decided: January 8, 2026
• Docket: 24-7080
• Status: Unpublished

Opinion

NOT FOR PUBLICATION FILED UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS JAN 8 2026 MOLLY C. DWYER, CLERK U.S. COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE NINTH CIRCUIT

PLAINTIFFS’ CONSUMER CLASS, No. 24-7080 D.C. No. Plaintiff - Appellee, 8:22-ml-03052-JVS-KES DONALD K. BIRNER, MEMORANDUM* Objector - Appellant,

v.

HYUNDAI MOTOR COMPANY; KIA CORPORATION,

Defendants - Appellees.

Appeal from the United States District Court for the Central District of California James V. Selna, District Judge, Presiding

Argued and Submitted November 19, 2025 Pasadena, California

Before: WARDLAW, BERZON, and MILLER, Circuit Judges.

Objector-appellant Donald Birner appeals from the district court’s order

granting final approval of a class action settlement concerning allegations that

* This disposition is not appropriate for publication and is not precedent except as provided by Ninth Circuit Rule 36-3. certain Hyundai and Kia vehicles were defectively designed and thus vulnerable to

theft. We have jurisdiction under 28 U.S.C. § 1291, and we affirm.

A class action settlement must be fair, reasonable, and adequate. Fed. R.

Civ. P. 23(e)(2). We review the district court’s approval of a pre-certification

settlement for clear abuse of discretion. Roes, 1-2 v. SFBSC Mgmt., LLC, 944 F.3d

1035, 1043 (9th Cir. 2019). “[T]he district court must show it has explored

comprehensively all [Rule 23(e)(2)] factors, and must give a reasoned response to

all non-frivolous objections.” Allen v. Bedolla, 787 F.3d 1218, 1223–24 (9th Cir.

2015) (quoting Dennis v. Kellogg Co., 697 F.3d 858, 864 (9th Cir. 2012)).

1. Birner argues that the district court abused its discretion by approving the

settlement. The theme of his arguments is that the settlement amount is too low

given the strength, in his estimation, of the class plaintiffs’ case against Kia and

Hyundai. We examine “the settlement taken as a whole, rather than the individual

component parts,” for overall fairness. Hanlon v. Chrysler Corp., 150 F.3d 1011,

1026 (9th Cir. 1998), overruled on other grounds by Wal-Mart Stores, Inc. v.

Dukes, 564 U.S. 338 (2011). Because “the very essence of a settlement is

compromise,” it is “not to be judged against a hypothetical or speculative measure

of what might have been achieved by the negotiators.” Linney v. Cellular Alaska

P’ship, 151 F.3d 1234, 1242 (9th Cir. 1998) (quoting Officers for Justice v. Civil

Serv. Comm’n, 688 F.2d 615, 624, 625 (9th Cir. 1982)) (alteration in original).

2 24-7080 The district court considered each of the required Rule 23(e)(2) factors and

specifically addressed Birner’s objections. The court correctly concluded that

Birner’s arguments were largely unsupported by the record. See In re Hyundai &

Kia Fuel Econ. Litig., 926 F.3d 539, 568 (9th Cir. 2019) (en banc) (rejecting

settlement objection for which objectors “cite no evidence”). The district court also

correctly recognized that novel and untested aspects of plaintiffs’ theory justified

the litigation discount and the caps placed on class members’ relief. Thus, the

district court did not abuse its discretion by concluding the settlement was fair,

reasonable, and adequate.

2. Birner’s remaining objections fail either because he did not raise them in

the proceedings below or because he lacks standing. For example, Birner argues

that plaintiffs unknowingly overpaid for defective vehicles and defendants were

thereby unjustly enriched. But Birner forfeited this argument, and others, by not

raising them in his objection before the district court.

For a class action objector to have standing to make an argument, he “must

seek relief for an injury that affects him in a ‘personal and individual way.’”

Hollingsworth v. Perry, 570 U.S. 693, 705 (2013) (quoting Lujan v. Defenders of

Wildlife, 504 U.S. 555, 560 n.1 (1992)); see also In re First Cap. Holdings Corp.

Fin. Prods. Sec. Litig., 33 F.3d 29, 30 (9th Cir. 1994). Because Birner does not

claim to have incurred a covered loss that was reimbursed by his insurer, he lacks

3 24-7080 standing to challenge the settlement on the ground that it fails to compensate class

members whose losses have already been compensated by insurers.

AFFIRMED.

4 24-7080