Plaintiffs Can’t Evade Removal Under Class Action Fairness Act By Suing For Only Declaratory Relief

Over the years, the plaintiffs' bar has used a wide variety of stratagems to try to prevent defendants from removing class actions to federal court. We've previously blogged about several of them. A recent Eleventh Circuit decision addresses yet another page from the plaintiffs' playbook.

Defendants often can remove significant class actions under the Class Action Fairness Act (CAFA) when there is at least minimal diversity of parties and the amount in controversy exceeds $5 million. In South Florida Wellness, Inc. v. Allstate Insurance Co. (pdf), the plaintiffs tried to prevent the defendant from satisfying CAFA's $5 million amount-in-controversy requirement by suing for only a classwide declaratory judgment. The plaintiffs' theory of liability apparently would have put roughly $68 million at stake—the difference between the formula for reimbursement that the defendant insurance company had used and the formula the plaintiffs alleged should have been