A San Francisco federal judge has crushed, for now, a class action lawsuit accusing the makers of Handi-Foil and Jiffy-Foil disposable aluminum pans of misleading consumers by claiming their products are "Made in the USA" when they may obtain the raw aluminum from foreign mines.
On Aug. 29, U.S. District Judge Richard Seeborg, of the Northern District of California, dismissed the lawsuit brought by named plaintiff Brigette Hood against the disposable pan makers.
The lawsuit was filed in April 2024 in the federal court by attorneys John R. Parker Jr., of the Almedia Law Group LLC, of Sacramento ; and attorneys Brandon M. Wise and Domenica M. Russo, of the firm of Peiffer Wolf Carr Kane Conway & Wise LLP, of St. Louis.
While the pans are manufactured from raw aluminum in Illinois, the lawsuit claims the company still violates the California laws by selling products allegedly made with metal sourced from ore mined outside the U.S.
To abide by California law, the lawsuit claims Handi-Foil needs to also obtain the aluminum from U.S. mines.
However, the lawsuit asserts only a small fraction of the ore from which aluminum is sourced, known as bauxite, comes from domestic mines. The vast majority - as much as 95% of bauxite - comes from mines outside the U.S., the lawsuit asserts.
The lawsuit claims plaintiffs are allegedly misled into paying more for the pans compared to alternatives which do not claim to be "Made in the USA" on their labels.
The plaintiffs are seeking potentially hefty statutory and punitive damages from the company, as allowed under the various California laws.
In response to the action, Handi-Foil sought to dismiss the lawsuit, asserting it falls short under the California law that primarily undergirds it, the California Consumers Legal Remedies Act.
Specifically, they pointed to a special "safe harbor" in the law, which allows companies to advertise products as being "Made in the USA," even if a small portion of their raw materials or components come from foreign sources or if they cannot reasonably obtain the raw materials or components in the U.S.
The judge noted the plaintiffs don't advance evidence pinpointing the sources of Handi-Foil's aluminum or how much foreign ore they use in their products. The judge called the claims in the lawsuit "mere legal conclusions" which don't support the lawsuit's claims.
The judge also rejected attempts by the plaintiffs to move forward with their lawsuit to use the discovery process to obtain facts about the amount and sources of bauxite used by Handi-Foil.
"... Discovery is not the proper remedy for a deficient complaint based on a plaintiff’s mere hope that liability will arise once discovery commences," Seeborg said. "Complaints that offer no more factual averments than what Hood presents here are routinely dismissed for deficient pleadings."
The judge dismissed the lawsuit without prejudice, and gave Hood 30 days to amend her lawsuit to address the legal shortcomings identified by the judge.
Handi-Foil has been represented by attorneys Michael P. Esser, Michael A. Glick, Megan McGlynn, Gabrielle Durling and Mary-Kathryn Hawes, of the firm of Kirkland & Ellis, of San Francisco and Washington, D.C.