Defendant Class Action
Although normally plaintiffs are the class, defendant class actions are also possible. For example, in 2005, the Archdiocese of Portland was sued as part of the Catholic priest sex-abuse scandal. All parishioners of the Archdiocese's churches were cited as a defendant class. This was done to include their assets (local churches) in any settlement. Where both the plaintiffs and the defendants have been organized into court-approved classes, the action is called a bilateral class action.
Read more about this topic: Class Action
Famous quotes containing the words defendant, class and/or action:
“My profession lent itself nicely to my vocation for heights. It freed me of any bitterness towards my fellow men, who were always in my debt, without my owing them anything. It placed me above the judge whom, I in turn judged, above the defendant whom I forced into gratitude.”
—Albert Camus (1913–1960)
“In verity ... we are the poor. This humanity we would claim for ourselves is the legacy, not only of the Enlightenment, but of the thousands and thousands of European peasants and poor townspeople who came here bringing their humanity and their sufferings with them. It is the absence of a stable upper class that is responsible for much of the vulgarity of the American scene. Should we blush before the visitor for this deficiency?”
—Mary McCarthy (1912–1989)
“The philosophy of action for action, power for the sake of power, had become an established orthodoxy. “Thou has conquered, O go-getting Babbitt.””
—Aldous Huxley (1894–1963)