Patricia Hood v. Gilster-Mary Lee Corporation
2015 U.S. App. LEXIS 7241
| 8th Cir. | 2015Background
- Former and current employees sued Gilster-Mary Lee in state court alleging lung injury from diacetyl exposure at its Jasper, Missouri popcorn plant and sought class-wide relief including medical monitoring.
- Defendants removed under the Class Action Fairness Act (CAFA); plaintiffs later dismissed all defendants but Gilster.
- District court remanded under CAFA’s local-controversy exception, finding >2/3 of proposed class were Missouri citizens based largely on last-known addresses and responsive affidavits.
- Plaintiffs identified 372 potential class members: 40 current (37 clearly Missouri citizens), 246 former (95 confirmed Missouri residents), 61 temp-staff (13 confirmed), and 25 prior litigants (9 confirmed). District court found ~154 of 372 clearly Missouri citizens (≈41%) but concluded >2/3 based on extrapolation from responses.
- This appeal challenged the district court’s reliance on last-known addresses and its extrapolation/sampling approach to meet the plaintiffs’ burden under CAFA.
Issues
| Issue | Plaintiff's Argument | Defendant's Argument | Held |
|---|---|---|---|
| Applicability of CAFA local-controversy exception (greater than two-thirds local citizens) | Plaintiffs argued >2/3 of class were Missouri citizens based on last-known addresses plus affidavits and extrapolation | Defendants argued plaintiffs failed to prove >2/3 were Missouri citizens; last-known addresses are insufficient | Reversed district court: plaintiffs did not meet burden; local-controversy exception not established |
| Burden of proof on remand motion | Plaintiffs bore burden to prove exception and urged doubt be resolved in their favor | Defendants urged court to require reliable proof and resolve doubts against remand-seekers | Court reiterated that party seeking remand bears burden and doubts resolve against them; district court erred by resolving doubt for plaintiffs |
| Use of last-known addresses as proof of citizenship | Plaintiffs relied on last-known addresses and returned affidavits to infer citizenship of nonrespondents | Defendants contended addresses and phone numbers cannot reliably establish citizenship at removal date | Court held last-known addresses are insufficient alone; cannot assume residency equals citizenship without reliable methodology |
| Validity of sampling/extrapolation from respondents | Plaintiffs and district court extrapolated citizenship from respondents to nonrespondents without rigorous sampling | Defendants argued the extrapolation was biased and unreliable (nonresponse bias) | Court rejected the extrapolation absent a documented, statistically valid sampling method or comprehensive affidavits; plaintiffs failed to show >2/3 |
Key Cases Cited
- Westerfeld v. Independent Processing, LLC, 621 F.3d 819 (8th Cir. 2010) (party seeking remand under CAFA bears burden; doubts resolved against remand-seeker)
- In re Sprint Nextel Corp., 593 F.3d 669 (7th Cir. 2010) (courts may not infer class-member citizenship from phone numbers or addresses; suggests affidavits or statistically valid sampling)
- Mondragon v. Capital One Auto Fin., 736 F.3d 880 (9th Cir. 2013) (residence/address does not conclusively establish citizenship for CAFA purposes)
- Myrick v. WellPoint, Inc., 764 F.3d 662 (7th Cir. 2014) (approves use of statistically valid sampling to establish class citizenship percentages)