When Class Members Oppose A Class Settlement: B.C. Court Approves Settlement Despite Objections Of Certain Class Members

In Jones v. Zimmer GMBH, 2016 BCSC 1847, Justice Bowden of the B.C. Supreme Court recently approved settlement of a class action despite the objections of a number of class members to the settlement agreement that had been reached between the representative plaintiff, class counsel and the defendant. This decision is instructive for class action defendants negotiating and arranging settlements with class counsel.

Events Leading To The Settlement Of The B.C. Class Action

This past July, we wrote about the decision of Justice Perell of the Ontario Superior Court in Crider v. Nguyen, 2016 ONSC 4400, where he ordered that an Ontario plaintiff could pursue an individual action against a manufacturer of a hip implant device, Zimmer, while claims relating to that same device were already being advanced against Zimmer as part of two class actions: one certified in British Columbia (Jones v. Zimmer), and the other certified in Ontario (McSherry v. Zimmer).