Oral Argument on the Preclusive Effect of the Engle Case

In Engle v. Liggett Group, 945 So.2d 1246, the Florida Supreme Court decertified a smoker class action, but held that factual findings in a class action of cigarette smokers could be preclusive in subsequent actions by individual plaintiffs.  Now the 11th Circuit is charged with deciding whether this violates due process and what exactly the preclusive effect of the factual findings in the original class action will be in Brown v. R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Co., 08-16158.

The case was argued by NYU law professor Sam Issacharoff on behalf of the plaintiffs and Andrew Frey of Mayer Brown for the defendant tobacco company. A description of the argument can be found on Law.com.

Thanks to Richard Nagareda (Vanderbilt) for alerting me to these developments. 

ADL