Wolf v Life Ins. Co. of N. America, No. 3:20-cv-05684-BHS, __ F. Supp. __ (W.D. Wash. May 25, 2021) (Judge Benjamin Settle).

This week’s notable decision is a victory for the plaintiff, represented by Kantor & Kantor, in the Western District of Washington. The plaintiff was the father and life insurance beneficiary of 26-year-old Scott Wolf, who had recently died in a car accident. While speeding the wrong way on a one-way access road along a highway, he hit a speed bump, which flipped his car into an adjacent bay, where he drowned. Mr. Wolf had alcohol in his system at the time of his death. He was wearing a seatbelt and had his hazard lights on at the time of the accident. Continue Reading Court Awards Accidental Death Benefits in Auto Accident Case, Finding Death Was Not “Substantially Certain” to Occur

Becker v. Wells Fargo & Co., et al., No. 20-2016 (DWF/BRT), 2021 WL 1909632 (D. Minn. May 12, 2021) (Judge Donovan W. Frank). 

The Notable Decision this week exemplifies a recent trend in the courts to allow 401(k) participants in litigation challenging the appropriateness of certain investments to move forward on their class action complaints even where the named plaintiff is not invested in all of the funds being challenged.

In this case against Wells Fargo, Yvonne Becker, a single named plaintiff, brought this putative class action alleging breach of fiduciary duty and prohibited transactions for selecting and retaining 17 Wells Fargo proprietary funds for its own 401(k) plan. She alleges that these funds not only underperformed their benchmarks, but that the fees are higher than similar non-proprietary funds. In addition, she alleges that Wells Fargo added newly launched proprietary funds that had no historical performance to evaluate whether they were appropriate investment options for the plan. Becker claims the higher fees on the proprietary funds increases the salaries for executives who serve as the plan’s fiduciaries and were used as seed money for the newly launched funds. Becker invested her 401(k) savings in Wells Fargo/State Street Target Date Collective Trusts, one of several investment options being challenged. Continue Reading District Court Denies Wells Fargo’s Motion to Dismiss Proprietary Funds Case

Howard Jarvis Taxpayers Ass’n v. California Secure Choice Ret. Sav. Program, No. 20-15591, 2021 WL 1805758, __ F.3d __ (9th Cir. May 6, 2021) (Before Circuit Judges Hurwitz and Bress and District Judge Clifton L. Corker (E.D. Tenn.)).

According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, more than 30 percent of private industry workers do not have access to an employer-provided retirement plan, amounting to almost 40 million employees. To combat this problem, many states (and the City of Seattle) have adopted government-run auto-enrollment retirement programs. Continue Reading Ninth Circuit Determines CalSavers is Saved from ERISA Preemption