Sept 19 (Askume) – A group of Republican state attorneys general urged a U.S. appeals court on Wednesday to throw out a $62 million consumer privacy settlement with Google (GOOGL.O), which would keep funds available for plaintiffs’ lawyers and advocacy groups but not include them.
Twenty state attorneys general, led by Iowa and including Florida, Ohio, Georgia and Virginia, told the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals that the deal gives “more access to controversial political organizations than the group’s members.”
The amicus brief from the states supporting challenges to the agreement said it would be inappropriate to divert settlement funds to third-party groups whose focus areas include “controversial positions on environmental justice, abortion, and sex and sexuality.” The states said their work is “completely unrelated to the class’s data privacy statement.”
Google said in a statement that the organizations selected by both sides in the case “have a strong commitment to advancing online privacy.” The company said the states had an opportunity to object to the terms of the settlement but failed to do so.
Lawyers for the plaintiffs, who will receive $18 million in fees from the deal, did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Iowa Attorney General Brenna Byrd said in a statement that the Google settlement “mistakenly prioritizes a left-wing political agenda over the people this lawsuit hopes to help.”
In the case , Google was accused of illegally tracking and storing location data of 247.7 million US mobile users who had disabled “Location History” on their phones. Google has denied any wrongdoing in agreeing to the settlement.
The judge who approved the deal in May found that payouts to class members were too small and impractical.
The dispute provides the San Francisco-based appeals court with the latest opportunity to review the appropriateness of “Cypress-only” settlements, in which money is earmarked for independent groups to pursue interests related to the claims in the case.
Twenty-one recipients of the $42.6 million settlement include the ACLU’s Speech, Privacy and Technology Project; and Yale Law School’s Information Society Project. The organizations did not immediately respond to requests for comment on Thursday.
A group of class members appealed the settlement’s approval to the Ninth Circuit. The challengers are led by Theodore Frank, director of the Hamilton Lincoln Law Institute and the Center for Class Action Fairness.
In a filing last week , Frank criticized “the enormous size of the Sipes fund without any attempt to distribute it across the entire class.”
Iowa and other states argue that many recipients of settlement funds have no “substantial connection” to the interests of class members.
The states are asking the appeals court to at least order reconsideration of third-party groups that “do more than advance the social justice goals of defendants and class counsel.”
The case is Napoleon Patacil et al v. Google, U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, No. 24-3387.
Plaintiffs: Michael Sobol of Lief Cabraser Heiman & Bernstein and Tina Wolfson of Ahdoot & Wolfson;
Opponent: Theodore Frank of the Center for Class Action Fairness
For the states: Eric Wesson, Iowa Attorney General’s Office
Read more:
Google privacy deal gets lawyers $18 million, but consumers get no money
