## Facts

- Numerous plaintiffs filed California state product-liability actions alleging injury or death from propoxyphene-containing pain medications.
- The Corber matters were two multi-plaintiff actions, each with fewer than 100 plaintiffs, among many related propoxyphene cases pending across multiple California counties.
- Plaintiffs petitioned for coordination under California Code of Civil Procedure § 404, requesting coordination “for all purposes” in a single court and emphasizing efficiency, consistent rulings, and avoidance of inconsistent judgments.
- Defendants removed the Corber actions to federal court under the Class Action Fairness Act (CAFA) “mass action” provision, asserting that the coordination petitions proposed a joint trial of claims of 100 or more persons.

## Issues

1. Whether petitions seeking state-court coordination under California Code of Civil Procedure § 404 constituted a “proposal” that “monetary relief claims of 100 or more persons” be “tried jointly” under CAFA, 28 U.S.C. § 1332(d)(11)(B)(i).
2. Whether CAFA requires an express request for a joint trial, or permits an implicit proposal inferred from the substance and practical effect of plaintiffs’ filings.

## Decision

- The en banc Ninth Circuit reversed the district court’s remand orders and held that federal jurisdiction existed under CAFA’s mass-action provision.
- The court held that a proposal for claims to be “tried jointly” may be implicit and need not be stated in formal or explicit terms.
- Examining the petitions’ substance and practical effect, the court concluded that requesting coordination “for all purposes,” coupled with stated goals of efficiency and avoiding inconsistent judgments, amounted to proposing joint trial-type proceedings.
- The court found the 100-person threshold satisfied because the coordination request encompassed numerous related actions collectively involving well over 100 plaintiffs, even though each individual complaint named fewer than 100 plaintiffs.

## Legal Principles

- Under CAFA, a “proposal” that claims be “tried jointly” can be implicit; courts may look beyond labels to the substance and practical effect of plaintiffs’ filings.
- A state-court coordination request “for all purposes,” without limiting language excluding trial, can reasonably be treated as encompassing trial and thus as proposing joint trial-type proceedings.
- CAFA’s mass-action numerosity inquiry focuses on whether claims of 100 or more persons are proposed to be tried jointly in the relevant proceeding, not on the number of plaintiffs in any single complaint.

## Conclusion

The en banc Ninth Circuit held that plaintiffs’ petitions to coordinate numerous propoxyphene cases “for all purposes” implicitly proposed joint adjudication of 100+ plaintiffs’ claims, making the matters removable as a CAFA “mass action” and requiring reversal of the remand to state court.


Corber v. Xanodyne Pharms., Inc., 771 F.3d 1218 (9th Cir. 2014) (en banc)