Article by Todd B. Hilsee, Gina M. Intrepido, and Shannon R. Wheatman
As necessarily retold in a recent court decision in one of numerous lawsuits related to Hurricane Katrina, which struck “on August 29, 2005, at around 6:10 a.m., Hurricane Katrina devastated the Gulf Coast of the United States.” The storm made landfall in Southeastern Louisiana, and then moved across Mississippi and Alabama, destroying houses and other structures. After the storm, the levees in New Orleans were breached and 80% of metropolitan New Orleans was submerged under water. Elsewhere the storm spared few, destroying a vast majority of the structures along Mississippi's Gulf Coast.
Pursuant to the storm and flooding, thousands of people were forced from their homes and more than 1000 people died, mostly in Louisiana. The fate of the evacuees, their whereabouts, and whether the demographics of those affected and displaced by the hurricane reflected a disproportionate number of low income and/or minority people has been extensively written about, published, and broadcast nationally.
Though secondary to matters of human suffering, what has not been adequately discussed in legal forums to date, are the problems faced by the courts that must inform these displaced people of their rights to participate in class action lawsuits pending on their behalf. The ability to do so is greatly impacted not only by the mobility, but also by the demographics of those displaced. While it would be easy to go through the motions to give notice—for example, simply mailing a notice to a last known address—that approach may not satisfy due process.
This Article reviews the high standards that class action notice efforts must meet in order truly to satisfy due process considerations: the added difficulties that a mobile population places on the notice expert, especially a class heavily concentrated within the lower socioeconomic segments of society; the solutions employed in several cases before and since those fateful late summer days of 2005; and the lessons learned which highlight the importance of notice in any class action.
About the Author
Todd B. Hilsee. President of Hilsoft Notifications.
Gina M. Intrepido. Vice President and Media Director of Hilsoft Notifications.
Shannon R. Wheatman. Vice President and Notice Director of Hilsoft Notifications.
Citation
80 Tul. L. Rev. 1771 (2006)