The Eighth Circuit affirmed the United States District Court of Minnesota’s denial of class certification in Orduno v. Pietrzak for a proposed class of individuals whose motor vehicle records were accessed impermissibly. The Circuit Court agreed, “the district court correctly observed that class members would ‘need to present evidence of the circumstances under which their particular information was accessed’ to address whether Pietrzak’s purpose in searching the database was impermissible. The circumstances of each obtainment will vary from class member to class member, so the court property concluded that ‘common questions’ would not predominate over individual determinations.”
The Court also affirmed the district court’s holding the City of Dayton was not directly liable for impermissible accesses. The Court further upheld the district court’s evidentiary decisions at trial, excluding evidence of unrelated accesses and the City’s response. Significantly, the Eighth Circuit upheld the district court’s 60% reduction of attorney’s fees, based on overstaffing, excessive billing, and limited success at trial. Susan Tindal and Stephanie Angolkar represented the City of Dayton and Pietrzak.