44 results for 'cat:"ERISA" AND cat:"Fiduciary Duty"'.
J. Robinson finds that the district court properly declined to compel arbitration in fiduciary duty claims an employee brought against the company and the trustee of the contribution retirement plan. The arbitration provision was unenforceable under ERISA because the provision limited relief available to an individual's account and barred a plan-wide remedy. Affirmed.
Court: 2nd Circuit, Judge: Robinson, Filed On: May 1, 2024, Case #: 21-2891-cv, Categories: erisa, fiduciary Duty
J. Oliver grants, in part, the insurer's motion to dismiss, ruling the union's fiduciary duty claims fail. The alleged increased rates charged by the insurer were determined by the parties' contractual agreements and involved no discretion on the part of the insurer.
Court: USDC Connecticut, Judge: Oliver, Filed On: April 22, 2024, Case #: 3:22cv1541, NOS: Employee Retirement Income Security Act (ERISA) - Labor, Categories: erisa, fiduciary Duty, Labor / Unions
J. Snyder denies in part an investment consulting group's motion to dismiss a pension fund's allegations of breach of fiduciary duty under ERISA. The pension fund alleges that the investment consulting group recommended a program management company and concealed information regarding the company's lack of experience and its owner's financial difficulties. The pension fund later found that some portfolio companies the management company had invested in were "worthless" and claims the consulting group failed to properly investigate the program management company. The pension fund has ERISA standing and has sufficiently pleaded its breach of fiduciary duty claim under ERISA. The fund is granted leave to amend its remaining claims.
Court: USDC Central District of California, Judge: Snyder, Filed On: April 15, 2024, Case #: 2:23cv7726, NOS: Employee Retirement Income Security Act (ERISA) - Labor, Categories: erisa, fiduciary Duty
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J. Whitney grants a global agricultural products firm’s motion for judgment on the pleadings following allegations of ERISA protections violations brought by an employee after a dispute over benefits involving his ex-wife. The employee argues he was wrongfully denied benefits because some of his ERISA payouts went to furnish his ex-wife as a beneficiary after their divorce. However, an ERISA plan administrator previously denied the employee’s claim for breach of fiduciary duty and his appeal. Here, he alleges wrongful denial of benefits, but the claim is redundant
Court: USDC Western District of North Carolina, Judge: Whitney, Filed On: April 3, 2024, Case #: 3:23cv512, NOS: Employee Retirement Income Security Act (ERISA) - Labor, Categories: erisa, fiduciary Duty
J. Aslan grants, in part, a video game developer and its insurance agency’s motion to dismiss and motion to strike this healthcare insurance coverage dispute brought by a former media artist. The artist alleges the developer and its insurer violated ERISA by denying her COBRA benefits. Her interference and retaliation, COBRA violation and breach of fiduciary duty claims fail to state a claim for relief, and her motion to strike the jury is denied as moot. The artist shall file a stipulation of dismissal for the claims that still remain in action for the third-party benefit administrator after they did not join in on this motion to dismiss.
Court: USDC Maryland, Judge: Aslan, Filed On: March 29, 2024, Case #: 1:23cv1270, NOS: Employee Retirement Income Security Act (ERISA) - Labor, Categories: erisa, Insurance, fiduciary Duty
J. Schiltz partially grants the employer and its benefits committees' motion to dismiss the employees' putative class action alleging mismanagement of a 401(k) plan. A claim for breach of the duty of prudence with respect to managed-account-service fees and a derivative claim for breach of the duty to monitor are dismissed, since the employees have not made sufficient allegations about the plans they seek to compare the employer's plan to. The motion to dismiss is otherwise denied, since the employees have adequately pleaded that the employer and its committees breached the duty of prudence by incurring excessive recordkeeping and administrative fees.
Court: USDC Minnesota, Judge: Schiltz, Filed On: March 21, 2024, Case #: 0:23cv26, NOS: Employee Retirement Income Security Act (ERISA) - Labor, Categories: erisa, fiduciary Duty
J. Rubin grants, in part, the NFL benefit plan and its trustees and commissioner’s motion to dismiss a class of retired NFL players’ lawsuit against the disability and neurocognitive plan, claiming they were wrongly denied benefits. The players allege claims under ERISA for failure to provide notice, denial of right to full and fair review, and breach of fiduciary duty. The trustees and commissioner are dismissed from the failure of notice and denial of right to full and fair review claims. The fiduciary duty claim, as asserted against the benefit plan and its trustees and commissioner, is dismissed because the players did not allege misrepresented the process for obtaining coverage and denied in all other respects.
Court: USDC Maryland, Judge: Rubin, Filed On: March 20, 2024, Case #: 1:23cv358, NOS: Employee Retirement Income Security Act (ERISA) - Labor, Categories: erisa, fiduciary Duty
J. Tunheim largely denies the employer's motion for summary judgment in its employee's suit alleging that it invested employees' 401(k) savings in underperforming funds for over a decade. The employer did not breach any enforceable portion of its Investment Policy Statement, so a count alleging breach of that policy is dismissed, and the employer's Board of Directors are dismissed as defendants because they were not functional fiduciaries and had no duty to monitor the fund. Genuine disputes remain as to the employee's other claims, and they survive "because a reasonable trier of fact could easily find" that the employee caught the employer "with its hand in the cookie jar."
Court: USDC Minnesota, Judge: Tunheim, Filed On: March 12, 2024, Case #: 0:21cv1049, NOS: Employee Retirement Income Security Act (ERISA) - Labor, Categories: erisa, fiduciary Duty, Class Action
J. Cole denies the union's motion for a preliminary injunction, ruling that even if its claims regarding the potential for the two trustees to vote in their own favor and block the union's preferred actions are true, all of the proposed harms could be satisfied with monetary damages and do not require an injunction. Meanwhile, the trustees' motion to dismiss fiduciary duty claims will be granted because the conduct at issue - amending the trust agreement - does not involve action undertaken as a fiduciary.
Court: USDC Southern District of Ohio, Judge: Cole, Filed On: March 8, 2024, Case #: 1:23cv502, NOS: Employee Retirement Income Security Act (ERISA) - Labor, Categories: erisa, fiduciary Duty, Labor / Unions
J. Tostrud partially grants the employees' motion for judicial notice of a number of documents in their proposed class action alleging breaches of fiduciary duty and prohibited transactions in relation to their employer's 401(k) plan, and denies the employer and fiduciaries' motion to dismiss the suit. The employees' claims that the fiduciaries' use of particular preferred stock dividends rather than common stock to satisfy the employer's matching-contribution requirements were prohibited under ERISA are sufficient to plausibly allege claims under ERISA and for breach of fiduciary duty, and they have established that they have suffered an economic injury traceable to the allegedly unlawful conduct for standing purposes. As to the documents, the Plan is embraced by the pleadings and the remaining exhibits would not change the court's analysis.
Court: USDC Minnesota, Judge: Tostrud, Filed On: February 21, 2024, Case #: 0:22cv2354, NOS: Employee Retirement Income Security Act (ERISA) - Labor, Categories: erisa, Securities, fiduciary Duty
J. Dever denies an engineering firm and associated individuals their motion for a partial dismissal of an alleged breach of fiduciary duty brought by the firm’s former president, who claims the owners mismanaged stock and ERISA funds for personal benefit. Although the former president did not hold that position at the time of this filing, he was still a member of the firm’s stock plan, so he has standing to bring the claim.
Court: USDC Eastern District of North Carolina, Judge: Dever, Filed On: February 6, 2024, Case #: 5:23cv324, NOS: Employee Retirement Income Security Act (ERISA) - Labor, Categories: erisa, Trade, fiduciary Duty
J. Conley grants the retirement plan administrators' motion to dismiss the beneficiaries' class action claiming the administrators breached their fiduciary duties by selecting and retaining investments in index funds that perform poorly compared to other available funds. In part because the beneficiaries have failed to prove the disputed investments were made outside the administrators' "reasonable judgment," and because the investments did not always perform poorly during the class period, the beneficiaries have failed to a state a viable claim for breach of fiduciary duty. The beneficiaries' complaint is dismissed without prejudice, and they are given until February 26, 2024, to file an amended complaint, should there be a good-faith reason for it.
Court: USDC Western District of Wisconsin, Judge: Conley, Filed On: January 26, 2024, Case #: 3:22cv449, NOS: Employee Retirement Income Security Act (ERISA) - Labor, Categories: erisa, fiduciary Duty, Class Action
J. Haynes finds the district court properly dismissed the dentists' ERISA claims. The dentists initiated this class action alleging the insurer that served as the issuer and contract record-keeper of their employee retirement plan's assets breached its fiduciary duties and engaged in a prohibited transaction with a party-in-interest. The insurer was not a fiduciary and was also not a party-in-interest when it entered the contract. The collection of the surrender fee was not a separate transaction. Affirmed.
Court: 5th Circuit, Judge: Haynes , Filed On: December 14, 2023, Case #: 22-20540, Categories: erisa, fiduciary Duty, Contract
J. Wright grants the pension benefit plan trustee's motion for judicial notice as to two exhibits, but denies it as to 18 more, and grants its motion to dismiss as to a claim of co-fiduciary liability brought by the employee but denies it otherwise. The exhibits for which notice is denied are largely unrelated to the parties involved in this case, but existence of the news report and website for which notice is granted are adjudicative facts for which notice can be granted. The co-fiduciary duty claim is dismissed along with claims against the employer's principal, which fail because they do not adequately allege a fiduciary role for him. Claims against the trustee for breach of duties of prudence and loyalty survive, as do claims against the employer for co-fiduciary liability and failure to monitor.
Court: USDC Minnesota, Judge: Wright, Filed On: December 12, 2023, Case #: 0:23cv301, NOS: Employee Retirement Income Security Act (ERISA) - Labor, Categories: erisa, fiduciary Duty
J. Brennan grants the ERISA plan administrator's motion to dismiss, ruling its failure to transfer assets from certain passively managed investment funds cannot support a fiduciary duty claim because the comparator evidence from the participants involves actively managed funds. Meanwhile, the participants' failure to cite any similar funds with lower management fees requires dismissal of the claim for excessive fees under ERISA.
Court: USDC Northern District of Ohio, Judge: Brennan, Filed On: December 4, 2023, Case #: 1:21cv256, NOS: Employee Retirement Income Security Act (ERISA) - Labor, Categories: erisa, fiduciary Duty, Class Action
J. Chasanow grants, in part, trustees’ motion to dismiss a construction company’s claim that they violated the Employee Retirement Income Security Act. Several of the claims are barred by ERISA’s preemption of fiduciary duty, negligence and unjust enrichment claims.
Court: USDC Maryland, Judge: Chasanow, Filed On: November 13, 2023, Case #: 8:23cv450, NOS: Employee Retirement Income Security Act (ERISA) - Labor, Categories: erisa, Insurance, fiduciary Duty