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Op-Ed

Something fishy

April 10, 2023

Do you remember how much tuna you ate between 2011 and 2015? You'll have to if you want to get in on a settlement.

Milt Policzer

By Milt Policzer

Courthouse News columnist; racehorse owner and breeder; one of those guys who always got picked last.

Do you remember what you had for lunch eight years ago?

I don’t, but I assume I had something. Tuna fish may have been featured sometime within a four-year period, but I can’t prove it.

I bring this up because I often wonder whether class action litigation is meant for anyone except lawyers. I wondered this yet again the other day after coming across a press release with this headline: “If you bought canned or pouched tuna between June 1, 2011, and July 1, 2015, your rights may be affected by an ongoing class action litigation.”

Um. OK.

Don’t worry — you weren’t poisoned by the tuna (I don’t think). The litigation, described in a “tuna end purchaser website,”  is over an alleged tuna price-fixing conspiracy. Your can or pouch may have cost a bit too much.

Those of you (i.e. practically all of you) without eidetic memories could have some trouble proving your damages. I’m not sure you need to prove them, but I’m guessing that if enough people find out about this and make claims, there will suddenly be a need for verification.

Raise your hand if you would have known about this lawsuit if I hadn’t mentioned it.

Raise your hand if you knew that Chicken of the Sea already settled and you needed to file a claim by last August to get in on the proceeds.

I don’t see a lot of hands out there. (Yes, I know this is because I’m sitting at my computer and can’t see anyone, but you know what I mean.)

It gets better — for the defendants and lawyers on both sides. The Chicken of the Sea settlement called for a fund of up to $20 million. Of this, up to $5 million was used to “administer notice and claims.” And then there was $4 million-plus used “to cover certain litigation expenses.”

If there’s any unclaimed money left in the fund, it goes back to Chicken of the Sea.

I can’t tell you if there was any money left, but I have my suspicions. If you did hear about this and got a claim in on time, you were entitled to $10.50 — for every 200 cans or pouches of tuna you bought in that four-year period. You needed to be a serious tuna devotee to be rewarded.

If your claim was for less than $5, you got nothing.

I bet you can’t wait to see what happens with the other tuna defendants.

It’s yet another astonishing victory for consumers.

Freedom of not-speech. The fallout from the Stanford Law School disruption of a speech by a conservative federal judge who hurled insults at them gets sillier.

In case you missed it, the judge and a couple of his conservative colleagues announced they will not be hiring Stanford Law grads as clerks.

Umm.

Did the students want to be their clerks? Not being hired by people they hate doesn’t seem all that awful. Not much of a punishment there.

And, of course, it also means judges who say they’re in favor of free speech would rather not listen to any speech near them that they don’t like.

Now imagine being a conservative Stanford law student. Would you have to transfer to another law school? Could you sue the shouting students for ruining your right-wing career? Should you sue the judges you want to work for?

Will liberal judges now hire more Stanford grads?

I’m picturing shouting and insulting in the hallway between chambers.

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