Heartland Security Breach Class Action: Victims $1925, Lawyers $600,000

Fluffeh writes "Back in 2007, Heartland had a security breach that resulted in a 130 million credit card details being lifted. A class action suit followed and many thought it would send a direct message to business to ensure proper security measures protecting their clients and customers. With the Heartland case now over and settlements paid out and divided up, the final breakdown is as follows: Class members: $1925 (11 cases out of 290 filed were 'valid'). Lawyers for the plaintiff class action: $606,192. Non-Profits: around $1,000,000 (The Court ruled a minimum of $1 million in payouts). Heartland also paid its own lawyers around $2 million. Eric Goldman (Law Professor) has additional commentary on his Law Blog: 'The opinion indicates Heartland spent $1.5M to advertise the settlement. Thus, it appears they spent over $130,000 to generate each legitimate claim. Surprisingly, the court blithely treats the $1.5M expenditure as a cost of doing business, but I can't wrap my head around it. What an obscene waste of money! Add in the $270k spent on claims administration, and it appears that the parties spent $160k per legitimate claimant. The court isn't bothered by the $270k expenses either, even though that cost about $1k per tendered claim (remember, there were 290 total claims).'"

Comments

This woman took Honda to small claims court.

[trout007]

This lady opted out of a class action and took Honda to small claims court and won.
http://www.insurancejournal.com/news/west/2012/02/03/234115.htm

When will Americans demand change?

[MikeRT]

The time has come for the legal profession to become fully accountable to the public like the rest of the white collar professions. Lawyers should not sit on the Bar associations; businessmen, doctors, engineers, etc. should be the ones judging the professional conduct of lawyers. Lawyers have little to no education in these matters but deem themselves fit to judge every facet of how we do our work. Why is it then so outrageous to think that similarly intelligent and educated people from different fields should be the ones judging their ethics, billing practices, etc.?

Lincoln's advice to lawyers

[coldsalmon]

"Discourage litigation. Persuade your neighbors to compromise whenever you can. Point out to them how the nominal winner is often a real loser -- in fees, expenses, and waste of time. As a peacemaker the lawyer has a superior opportunity of being a good man. There will still be business enough."

--Abraham Lincoln