Super Bowl Class Action

• Jurisdiction: Texas,United States,Federal
• Law Firm: Taft Stettinius & Hollister
• Subject Matter: Litigation, Mediation & Arbitration, Class Actions, Trials & Appeals & Compensation
• Author: Mr Michael J. Zbiegien Jr.
• Published date: 13 February 2023

Did you know that there was a class-action lawsuit after Super Bowl XLV? The game was played at Cowboys Stadium (now known as AT&T Stadium) in Dallas, Texas, between the Pittsburgh Steelers and Green Bay Packers. The litigation arose out of a temporary-seating debacle: the full complement of temporary seats was not installed in time, resulting in some ticketholders being left without seats and others being relocated. There was also another group of ticketholders who complained about a restricted view from their seats even though they did not receive the lower, restricted-view ticket price. On the field, the Packers defeated the Steelers 31-25. In the courtroom, the plaintiffs' bid for class certification suffered the same fate as the Steelers. A look at the Fifth Circuit's opinion in Ibe v. Jones, 836 F.3d 516 (5th Cir. 2016), provides some valuable insights.

The plaintiffs in the suit sought to certify three different classes: (1) the ticketholders who had no seat, called the "Displaced Class"; (2) the ticketholders who were given different seats, called the "Relocated Class"; and (3) the ticketholders who had an obstructed view, called the "Obstructed View Class." Each proposed class failed.

1) The Displaced Class failed based on numerosity. Classes usually do not fail because they don't seek to represent a sufficiently large group of people, but that is what happened to the Displaced Class. Admittedly, the proposed class here was small by class-action standards, just 42-55 people. Courts, however, "must not focus on sheer numbers alone" in determining numerosity; the issue is whether joinder is impracticable. In re TWL Corp., 712 F.3d 886, 894 (5th Cir. 2013). Here, the court pointed to a parallel mass action proceeding in federal court that involved 237 individual ticketholders to conclude that joinder of the much smaller Displaced Class was not impracticable. Ibe, 836 F.3d at 530.

2) The...