sometimes activated incorrectly, particularly at railroad crossings, parking garages, and low overpasses. This was caused by radar misreads, which treated obstacles like cars in adjacent lanes or low-hanging overpasses as direct threats. In response, Nissan released software updates in 2018 and 2019 to address these issues, which improved radar recognition, especially in parking garages. The plaintiffs sought class certification for 10 statewide classes of vehicle owners. The district court granted class certification, agreeing with the plaintiffs that the issues of defective braking systems were common across all the cars involved. On appeal, the defendant argued that the defect was not uniform across all cars due to differences in vehicle models and software versions, which could lead to different experiences among car owners. The defendant also argued that the claims varied significantly by state law and that the plaintiffs’ expert lacked qualifications to identify the cause of the problem. The Sixth Circuit vacated and remanded the district court’s ruling. The Sixth Circuit found that the district court failed to properly assess the commonality of claims across the classes, particularly by not considering how software updates affected the alleged defect. The Sixth Circuit opined that class actions must involve central issues that apply to all members of the class, and that any material differences – such as variations in software versions – must be addressed before certification. The Sixth Circuit ruled that the district court must conduct a detailed, element-by-element analysis of each state law claim in the case and assess whether common answers could resolve the defectiveness, damages, or reliance on deceptive practices for each claim. The Sixth Circuit further held that the district court failed to properly analyze whether the plaintiffs’ expert testimony could be used to support class certification. Accordingly, the Sixth Circuit vacated and remanded the district court’s ruling granting the plaintiffs’ motion for class certification. 3. Other Rulings On Product Liability Class Actions In In Re Zostavax (Zoster Vaccine Live) Products Liability Litigation, 2024 U.S. App. LEXIS 17369 (3d Cir. July 17, 2024), the plaintiffs filed a class action alleging that the defendant’s vaccine Zostavax, designed to prevent shingles, caused them to develop shingles and other injuries. The varicella-zoster virus (VSV) is known to cause chickenpox in childhood and can later reactivate to cause shingles in adults. Zostavax contains a live-attenuated strain of VSV aimed at preventing shingles. The Judicial Panel on Multidistrict Litigation (JPML) previously centralized the claims involving Zostavax into MDL No. 2848 due to their common questions of fact. The district court overseeing the MDL organized the cases into three groups based on the nature of the injuries claimed. From 2018 to 2021, the litigation focused on five bellwether cases within Group A. After extensive fact and expert discovery, the defendant succeeded in excluding the testimony of Dr. Mark Poznansky, a key expert for the plaintiffs. Dr. Poznansky’s failure to convincingly rule out the wild-type virus as a potential cause of the shingles left the court with no reliable evidence linking Zostavax to the plaintiffs’ injuries. As a result, the district court granted summary judgment in favor of the defendant for all five bellwether cases. The plaintiffs in Group A, which included 1,189 cases where plaintiffs claimed that they suffered from shingles or related injuries due to Zostavax, filed an appeal of the district court’s ruling. In January 2022, the defendant sought an order requiring the remaining Group A plaintiffs to produce PCR test reports to determine whether the shingles were caused by Zostavax or the latent wild-type virus. The district court granted the motion, emphasizing that PCR testing was crucial for establishing specific causation. The plaintiffs, however, failed to comply and argued that PCR testing was impractical as the rashes had healed by then and such tests could only be performed on existing rashes. Despite these arguments, the district court maintained that PCR testing was essential and that the plaintiffs had not provided alternative means to prove their claims. The district court subsequently dismissed the actions due to the plaintiffs’ non-compliance with the order and lack of progress on their cases. On appeal, the Third Circuit affirmed the district court’s rulings. The plaintiffs asserted that the district court abused its discretion by issuing the PCR testing order and subsequently dismissing their cases because the order was improperly based on an assumption that PCR testing was the only method to establish causation and that the order demanded evidence that was non-existent or impossible to produce post-factum. The Third Circuit determined that the order was appropriate and aimed at streamlining the litigation by filtering out non-compliant cases. The Third Circuit opined that the plaintiffs had multiple opportunities to present evidence and were duly warned about the consequences of non-compliance. The Third Circuit ruled that the plaintiffs’ failure to produce essential evidence, along with a year-long standstill and lack of progress, justified the dismissal. For these reasons, the Third Circuit affirmed the district court’s ruling dismissing the actions.
The plaintiff in Riddell, et al. v. General Motors LLC , Case No. 20-CV-254 (E.D. Mo. Sept. 6, 2024), filed a class action against the defendant, General Motors LLC (GM), on behalf of himself and a potential class of similarly
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Products Liability & Mass Torts Class Action Review – 2025
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