Spivak v. Petro-Lewis Corp.

120 F.R.D. 693, 1987 WL 47743
CourtDistrict Court, D. Colorado
DecidedDecember 28, 1987
DocketCiv. A. Nos. 86-C-2215, 86-C-1605
StatusPublished
Cited by7 cases

This text of 120 F.R.D. 693 (Spivak v. Petro-Lewis Corp.) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering District Court, D. Colorado primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Spivak v. Petro-Lewis Corp., 120 F.R.D. 693, 1987 WL 47743 (D. Colo. 1987).

Opinion

ORDER

CARRIGAN, District Judge.

Plaintiffs Kenin M. Spivak and Byron Goldman, former shareholders of defendant Petro-Lewis Company (“PLC”) claim that they were forced to surrender their shares for inadequate consideration after the defendants effected a merger of PLC into defendant FPCO, Inc. (“FPCO”). FPCO, a subsidiary of defendant Freeport [694]*694McMoran, was formed to acquire PLC and American Royalty Trust (“ART”). Plaintiffs filed this action on their behalf and as a class action pursuant to Fed.R.Civ.P. 23 on behalf of all holders of common shares of PLC who were allegedly deprived of their equity interests in PLC by an investor group that included members of PLC’s senior management.

Plaintiffs have filed a motion for class certification requesting that they be allowed to represent a class consisting of all shareholders of PLC common stock who purchased or otherwise held their shares on or after July 24, 1986. Defendants Free-port and FPCO have filed a memorandum in opposition to class certification arguing that the plaintiffs should not be permitted to represent the proposed class because: (1) the plaintiffs’ claims are atypical of the class; and (2) the class would not be adequately represented by the plaintiffs. The issues have been fully briefed and oral argument on the plaintiffs’ motion was heard on September 25, 1987.

PLC is an independent oil and gas producer and manager of petroleum investments for public and private partners, including ART. From October 1970 until February 1984, PLC’s principal business was to acquire domestic oil and gas producing properties primarily to market them to public investors.

Apparently, at a time when oil prices were poised to increase, PLC announced that it had signed a Letter of Intent to be acquired (along with ART) by an investor group led by Freeport, members of PLC management, and Kidder, Peabody & Company. The transaction, whereby common shareholders would receive only 73 cents a share, was contingent upon: (1) tender of at least two-thirds of the units not owned by PLC; and (2) tender of at least ninety percent of the aggregate amount of each series of PLC’s outstanding notes. Shortly after disclosure of the Letter of Intent, several lawsuits challenging the proposed transaction were commenced in this court.

In July, 1986, PLC, Freeport and FPCO entered into an agreement embodying the terms of th,e Letter of Intent. Plaintiffs label the transaction “an egregious mutation of a management-led leveraged buyout” and contend that the defendants are liable for their preconceived, unified transaction to cash out PLC common stockholders at an unfair and coerced price. According to the plaintiffs, the defendants’ buying up and “freezing out” of the members of the proposed class deprived them of the opportunity to share in the future growth and profit of PLC and ART.

Plaintiffs’ Supplemental and Consolidated Class Action Complaint alleges that the defendants violated: (1) §§ 10(b), 14(a), and 14(e) of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934 (“Act”); (2) Colo.Rev.Stat. §§ 11-51-123 and 11-51-125; (3) common law duties of due care; and (4) common law fiduciary duties. Essentially, the plaintiffs claim that tender and proxy solicitations by FPCO regarding the acquisition of PLC suffered from material misrepresentations or omissions.

The primary distinction between the plaintiffs and the members of the proposed class is that whereas the former did not tender their shares pursuant to the tender offer made by FPCO, the majority of the proposed class members did. In fact, it appears undisputed that the plaintiffs Spivak and Goldman were not misled by the alleged misrepresentations in the tender offer materials. Rather, they claim that: (1) the alleged misstatements induced certain shareholders to tender their stock; and (2) the tendering of stock by those shareholders enabled the defendants to buy out the plaintiffs at an unfair price.

Class Certification Requirements.

Whether a class may be certified is left to the discretion of the court. Anderson v. City of Albuquerque, 690 F.2d 796 (10th Cir.1982). However, in making a determination of whether a cause of action is suitable for resolution on a class-wide basis, a court must adhere to the provisions of Fed. R.Civ.P. 23. See McCarthy v. Kleindienst, 741 F.2d 1406, 1412 n. 6 (D.C.Cir.1984). In making the certification decision, a court should remember that certification is conditional and may be altered, expanded, subdi[695]*695vided, or vacated as the case progresses toward resolution on the merits. See Fed. R.Civ.P. 23(c)(1), 23(c)(4)(B); Walsh v. Ford Motor Co., 106 F.R.D. 378, 387 (D.D.C.1985). Because class certification is subject to later modification, a court should err in favor of, and not against, the maintenance of the class action. Esplin v. Hirschi, 402 F.2d 94, 99 (10th Cir.1968), cert. denied, 394 U.S. 928, 89 S.Ct. 1194, 22 L.Ed.2d 459 (1969).

The party seeking to invoke Rule 23 carries the burden of demonstrating that all of the prerequisites to utilizing the class action procedure have been satisfied. 7A C. Wright & A. Miller & M.K. Kane, Federal Practice and Procedure § 1759, at 578 (2d ed. 1986); Albertson’s, Inc. v. Amalgamated Sugar Co., 503 F.2d 459 (10th Cir.1974). More specifically, in order for an action to be maintained as a class action, it must first be established that the four requirements of Rule 23 are satisfied. Those requirements are:

(1) the class is so numerous that joinder of all members is impracticable, (2) there are questions of law or fact common to the class, (3) the claims or defenses of the representative parties are typical of the claims or defenses of the class, and (4) the representative parties will fairly and adequately protect the interests of the class.

These requirements are referred to as numerosity, commonality, typicality, and adequacy of representation.

Defendants concede that the requirements of numerosity and commonality have been met. However, they assert that the plaintiffs cannot satisfy the requirements of typicality and adequacy because the plaintiffs, unlike the majority of members of the proposed class, did not tender their shares, and therefore the plaintiffs’ claims are different from those of the class members. See East Texas Motor Freight v. Rodriguez, 431 U.S. 395, 403, 97 S.Ct. 1891, 1896, 52 L.Ed.2d 453 (1977) (“a class representative must be part of the class and ‘possess the same interest and suffer the same injury’ as the class members”) (citations omitted).

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120 F.R.D. 693, 1987 WL 47743, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/spivak-v-petro-lewis-corp-cod-1987.