Summary
This document is Conditional Transfer Order CTO-48 issued by the United States Judicial Panel on Multidistrict Litigation in MDL No. 2406, In re: Blue Cross Blue Shield Antitrust Litigation. It conditionally transfers a tag-along action to the United States District Court for the Northern District of Alabama for coordinated or consolidated pretrial proceedings under 28 U.S.C. § 1407 and assigns it to Judge R. David Proctor. The attached schedule identifies a California federal action involving Memorial Hospital for Cancer and Allied Diseases and Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Illinois.
Topics
Practice areas
Questions Presented
- Whether the scheduled tag-along action should be conditionally transferred under 28 U.S.C. § 1407 to the Northern District of Alabama for coordinated or consolidated pretrial proceedings with MDL No. 2406.
Holdings
- The scheduled action is conditionally transferred to the United States District Court for the Northern District of Alabama for coordinated or consolidated pretrial proceedings in MDL No. 2406 because it involves questions of fact common to actions previously transferred to that district.
Factual background
The underlying tag-along action concerns antitrust litigation involving Blue Cross Blue Shield entities. The Panel found that the action presented questions of fact common to actions already transferred to the Northern District of Alabama for coordinated or consolidated pretrial proceedings. The scheduled action was identified as Memorial Hospital for Cancer and Allied Diseases et al. v. Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Illinois et al.
Procedural history
The Panel transferred two civil actions to the Northern District of Alabama on December 12, 2012, under 28 U.S.C. § 1407, and later transferred 84 additional actions to that district. With the district court's consent, all actions were assigned to Judge R. David Proctor. The Panel determined that the action listed on the CTO-48 schedule involved common questions of fact and conditionally transferred it to the same MDL proceedings, subject to a seven-day opposition period and filing with the Northern District of Alabama clerk.