Corporate & Securities Law

Sixth Circuit Rejects Daubert Challenge and Affirms Class Certification

By Matthew S. Wild

In In re Scrap Metal Antitrust Litig., No. 06-4511, 2008 WL 2050820 (6th Cir. May 15, 2008), the Sixth Circuit affirmed the $20 million jury verdict.  The Sixth Circuit rejected defendants’ Daubert challenge premised on the claim that plaintiffs’ expert relied on unreliable data.  The court characterized this type of attack as one directed to the results and not the methodology and therefore should not be excluded under Daubert.  Rather, “vigorous” cross-examination should be sufficient to reveal to the jury these flaws.  Notably, the defendants’ expert conceded that even use of the flawed data should not affect the results because those data moved in parallel to the defense expert’s data.  This decision illustrates the importance of showing in a  Daubert challenge that any flaws were actually material to the result.  ”Pitfalls to Avoid in Proving Price-Fixing Damages,” Antitrust Litigator (Spring 2006) — linked in the Articles page above — examines strategies to pursue in Daubert challenges.  The Sixth Circuit also affirmed class certification holding that the predominance requirement was satisfied because there was a class-wide method to prove damages

Full post as published by Antitrust Commentary on May 16, 2008 (boomark / email).