## Facts

- General Mills owned and operated an industrial facility in the Como neighborhood of Minneapolis from about 1930 to 1977; hazardous substances, including TCE, were allegedly disposed of onsite during that period.
- General Mills later participated for decades in agency-directed groundwater investigation and remediation efforts under a consent framework with Minnesota regulators.
- Subsequent testing raised concerns that TCE vapors could migrate from groundwater into soil gas and potentially into nearby homes.
- General Mills conducted sampling and installed vapor-mitigation systems in some homes, while other homes in the area showed no detectable TCE.
- Residential property owners in a defined area sued for property-related harms (including alleged diminution in value) and sought injunctive relief requiring comprehensive remediation; personal injury claims were excluded from the proposed class.
- The district court certified a class under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 23(b)(2) and 23(b)(3), planning to try classwide liability issues first and address individual damages later.
- General Mills took an interlocutory appeal of the certification order.

## Issues

1. Whether the proposed class satisfied Rule 23(a)(2) commonality where contamination, exposure indicators, and remediation needs varied by property.
2. Whether Rule 23(b)(3) predominance was met when liability, causation, and damages appeared to require property-specific proof.
3. Whether Rule 23(b)(2) certification was proper where the requested injunctive relief depended on differing remediation needs across class members.

## Decision

- The Eighth Circuit reversed the class certification order and remanded for further proceedings.
- Rule 23(a)(2) commonality was not satisfied because resolving the asserted “common” questions would not answer central liability and remedy issues for all class members given property-by-property variation.
- Rule 23(b)(3) predominance was not satisfied because individualized questions as to contamination presence, source, degree, causation of value loss, and appropriate remediation would overwhelm any common questions.
- Rule 23(b)(2) certification was improper because the class was not cohesive; a single injunction would not provide uniform relief where some properties needed different mitigation (or none).

## Legal Principles

- Rule 23(a)(2) requires a common contention whose truth or falsity will resolve an issue central to the validity of each class member’s claims; differing factual circumstances that bear on liability or remedy can defeat commonality.
- Rule 23(b)(3) predominance is not met when individualized questions (including causation and damages) would require substantial member-by-member proof and effectively generate mini-trials.
- Courts must conduct a rigorous analysis at the certification stage and may not defer examination of individual issues on the assumption they can be handled later through phased proceedings.
- Rule 23(b)(2) demands cohesiveness; injunctive or declaratory relief must be appropriate for the class as a whole and not depend on highly individualized determinations of need and scope.

## Conclusion

The Eighth Circuit held that variation among properties in detected contamination, exposure indicators, and remediation needs prevented classwide resolution of key liability and remedy questions, requiring reversal of certification under Rules 23(a)(2), 23(b)(3), and 23(b)(2).


Ebert v. Gen. Mills, Inc., 823 F.3d 472 (8th Cir. 2016)