We have extensive experience representing a wide variety of plaintiffs in a broad array of cases involving fraudulent or dishonest practices by private businesses and the government. Over the past two decades, we have played important roles in some of the most important consumer protection cases, including the landmark case against Camel Cigarettes for advertising to children.
Our firm played an important role in the California Tobacco Cases which finally ended the "Joe Camel" campaign, Camel Cigarette's advertising campaign targeting teens and children. As a key player in the first class action case challenging the "Joe Camel" campaign as a violation of California's unfair competition/consumer protection law, we helped secure over $12 billion in settlement funds to cities and counties in California.
As a result of this litigation, R.J Reynolds Tobacco Company's' "youth targeting" documents - perhaps the most significant set of tobacco documents ever to be made public - were released. R.J. Reynolds admitted that the Mangini case was "an early, significant and unique driver" that led to the phase out of the Joe Camel campaign. The settlement funds were given to anti-smoking efforts for youth Congressman Henry Waxman described the members of the legal team, including Jonathan W. Cuneo, as "real American heroes."
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Mr. LaDuca served as class counsel in the Guidant Heart Defibrillator litigation which settled for over $205 million in 2008. On behalf of a nationwide class of patients implanted with the Guidant Ventak Prizm defibrillator, our suit alleged that Guidant Corporation misrepresented the safety of its defibrillators, which are subject to short circuiting and malfunctioning.
The plaintiff and the class sought and received a declaratory judgment that Guidant is liable for all medical care and corrective surgery caused by Guidant's alleged misconduct, as well as the significant award for damages.
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We are a national leader in challenging advertisements that inaccurately label merchandise In 2001, we achieved trial judgment in the nation's first private suit challenging company's improper use of "Made in the USA" logo.
In Benson v. Kwikset Corp, we led a legal team that won significant injunctive relief for false advertising as "Made in USA" in violation of California "Made in USA" requirements and unfair competition/consumer protection law. Kwikset Corp. moved its manufacturing from Anaheim, California to a facility in Mexico yet continued to market their products as "Made in USA" and "All American Made." The court of appeal upheld the trial court's judgment. However, while the case was still pending, the voters of California passed Proposition 64, changing the requirements for consumer actions under the Unfair Competition Law. As a result, the case has been remanded to the trial court for further proceedings to allow the Plaintiff to amend the complaint to meet the new requirements of Proposition 64.
In Colgan v Leatherman Tool Group, the firm was co-lead counsel in a case that charged the Leatherman Tool Group with inaccurately labeling many of its tools as "Made in USA" when many components were actually made outside the United States. After a hard-fought trial in early 2004, the Superior Court entered a significant corrective advertising program and awarded over $12 million in restitution. Unfortunately, the California Court of Appeals reversed the restitution award in 2006 and remanded the case for modification of the injunctive order. The Superior Court modified the injunction and the case then settled.
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We served as co-lead counsel in the trail-blazing consumer privacy case Dennis v. Metromail Corp. The complaint charged that Metromail, acting through subcontractors, processed personal information from shopping questionnaires by contracting to have high security Texas prisoners "key" the information.
As a result, the lead plaintiff received an extremely offensive, sexually explicit letter from a convicted sexual offender. The firm's investigation found that the personal information of almost two million Americans was processed using maximum security prisoners. The landmark settlement secured $15 million and significant non-monetary relief.
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Our firm acted in the role as claimants representative as part of the massive settlement involving sales practices of life insurance policies sold by Prudential Insurance Company. Under the terms of the over $4 billion settlement, individual policyholders were accorded the right to have an individual determination of their remedies according to terms that were defined by the settlement.
Our firm and one other were appointed as claimant representatives. We handled over 55,000 arbitration-like proceedings in an eighteen-month period and recovered hundreds of millions of dollars on behalf of policyholders.
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