In Wal-Mart Stores, Inc. v. Dukes, No. 10-277 (U.S. June 20, 2011), the Supreme Court vacated class certification as to 1.5 million current and former Wal-Mart employees who failed to identify a company-wide policy or practice of gender discrimination. Additionally, the Court held that backpay claims could not be certified as a class action, and rejected the “Trial by Formula” approach because Wal-Mart was entitled to individual proceedings on remedies and to present defenses as to each claim.
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Looks Like Wal-Mart Has The Edge – But By How Much?
By Mark W. Batten on
Although the questions were flying in both directions yesterday, as usual for the Supreme Court, the tone of the Justices’ interaction suggested that Wal-Mart has the edge over the plaintiffs. As others have reported, Justices Kennedy and Scalia were quite skeptical of the plaintiffs’ theory that store-by-store discretion could be characterized as a common policy subject to a class challenge. But the argument went well beyond that.