SARAH S. VANCE, District Judge.
Defendants EKF Diagnostics Inc. and Stanbio Laboratory L.P.'s move to dismiss plaintiff's complaint for lack of Article III standing, or, in the alternative, to strike the complaint's class action allegations as insufficient to establish an ascertainable class.
In this "junk fax" case, Dr. Sartin alleges that defendants Stanbio Laboratory and its parent company, EKF Diagnostics, violated the Telephone Consumer Protection Act of 1991 (TCPA) by sending unsolicited faxes advertising their products and services. Dr. Sartin alleges that he "was the recipient of [a] fax advertisement sent by Defendants on September 24, 2014."
On March 3, 2016, Dr. Sartin filed this lawsuit against defendants, seeking statutory damages and injunctive relief.
Dr. Sartin filed an amended complaint alleging that the unsolicited fax caused Dr. Sartin and the class members to suffer statutory damages, and caused Dr. Sartin to "waste[] valuable time reviewing the fax, time that was taken away from his medical practice, and time that he could have otherwise spent performing billable medical procedures."
A standing motion challenges the Court's subject matter jurisdiction, and it is governed by Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 12(b)(1). "A case is properly dismissed for lack of subject matter jurisdiction when the court lacks the statutory or constitutional power to adjudicate the case." Home Builders Ass'n of Miss., Inc. v. City of Madison, 143 F.3d 1006, 1010 (5th Cir. 1998) (quoting Nowak v. Ironworkers Local 6 Pension Fund, 81 F.3d 1182, 1187 (2d Cir. 1996)). A district court may dismiss for lack of subject matter jurisdiction on any one of three bases: "(1) the complaint alone; (2) the complaint supplemented by undisputed facts in the record; or (3) the complaint supplemented by undisputed facts plus the court's resolution of disputed facts." Clark v. Tarrant County, 798 F.2d 736, 741 (5th Cir. 1986) (citation omitted). Furthermore, plaintiff bears the burden of demonstrating that subject matter jurisdiction exists. See Paterson v. Weinberger, 644 F.2d 521, 523 (5th Cir. 1981).
Defendants offer no evidence by affidavit or otherwise to support their argument that plaintiff lacks standing. In the absence of such evidence, the Court treats defendants' motion as a "facial attack" on the complaint, in which case review "is limited to whether the complaint is sufficient to allege jurisdiction." Id.; see also Russell v. Choicepoint Servs., Inc., 302 F.Supp.2d 654, 663 (E.D. La. 2004). Accordingly, the Court accepts as true all factual allegations set forth in the complaint. Ass'n of Am. Physicians & Surgeons, Inc. v. Texas Med. Bd., 627 F.3d 547, 550 (5th Cir. 2010) (quoting Pennell v. City of San Jose, 485 U.S. 1, 7 (1988)).
The TCPA makes it unlawful to use a fax machine to send an unsolicited advertisement. 47 U.S.C. § 227(b)(1)(C).
Defendants first contend that Dr. Sartin lacks standing to bring his claims. The requirement that a party have standing to bring suit flows from Article III of the Constitution, which limits the scope of the federal judicial power to the adjudication of "cases" or "controversies." U.S. Const. art. III, § 2. Standing consists of three elements: (1) the plaintiff must have suffered an "injury-in-fact," which is an "actual or imminent" invasion of a legally protected interest that is "concrete and particularized"; (2) the injury must be "fairly traceable" to the challenged conduct of the defendant; and (3) it must be likely that plaintiff's injury will be redressed by a favorable judicial decision. Lujan v. Defs. of Wildlife, 504 U.S. 555, 560 (1992). As the party invoking federal jurisdiction, the plaintiff bears the burden of establishing each element. Spokeo, Inc. v. Robins, 578 U.S. ___, ___, 136 S.Ct. 1540, 1547 (2016).
As the Supreme Court recently emphasized in Spokeo, supra, the Constitution mandates an injury in fact, and "Congress cannot erase Article III's standing requirements by statutorily granting the right to sue to a plaintiff who would not otherwise have standing." Spokeo, 136 S. Ct. at 1547-48 (2016) (quoting Raines v. Byrd, 521 U.S. 811, 820 n. 3 (1997)). Congress may, however, "create a statutory right or entitlement[,] the alleged deprivation of which can confer standing to sue even where the plaintiff would have suffered no judicially cognizable injury in the absence of statute." Warth v. Seldin, 422 U.S. 490, 514 (1975) (citing Linda R.S. v. Richard D., 410 U.S. 614, 617 n. 3 (1973)). In other words, "[t]he actual or threatened injury required by Art[icle] III may exist solely by virtue of `statutes creating legal rights, the invasion of which creates standing.'" Id. at 500 (quoting Linda R.S., 410 U.S. at 617 n. 3).
Nonetheless, Spokeo held that an injury in fact does not automatically exist "whenever a statute grants a person a statutory right and purports to authorize that person to sue to vindicate that right." Spokeo, 136 S. Ct. at 1549. Article III requires a concrete injury even in the context of a statutory violation. Id. Therefore, a plaintiff cannot "allege a bare procedural violation, divorced from any concrete harm, and satisfy the injury-in-fact requirement . . . ." Id. Instead, a plaintiff suing to vindicate a statutory right must identify a concrete and particularized injury that he or she suffered as a result of the statutory violation. Id.; see also Palm Beach Golf Ctr.-Boca, Inc. v. John G. Sarris, D.D.S., P.A., 781 F.3d 1245, 1251 (11th Cir. 2015) ("[W]here a statute confers new legal rights on a person, that person will have Article III standing to sue where the facts establish a concrete, particularized, and personal injury to that person as a result of the violation of the newly created legal rights.").
Relying on standing doctrine and the Supreme Court's recent decision in Spokeo, this Court dismissed Dr. Sartin's initial complaint because he failed to allege how defendants' purported violation of the TCPA caused him concrete harm. Now, Dr. Sartin's amended complaint alleges that the defendants' TCPA violation caused him and other class members injury by wasting their time, taking their time away from income producing activities, and tying up fax machines relied on in their businesses. Defendants contend that despite these additions in his amended complaint, Dr. Sartin still alleges only a bare violation of the TCPA and fails to establish a judicially cognizable injury in fact.
In making it unlawful to use a fax machine to send an unsolicited advertisement, the TCPA vests all persons with a legal right to be free from the intrusion of unsolicited fax advertisements. Davies v. W.W. Grainger, Inc., No. 13-3546, 2016 WL 1298667, at *2 (N.D. Ill. Apr. 4, 2016) ("[T]he relevant legal right created by Congress under the TCPA is the right to be free from fax advertisements whose opt-out notices are not TCPA-compliant."); see also Palm Beach, 781 F.3d at 1251 (noting that statutory rights "may be inferred from conduct prohibited by [the statute]"); Jamison v. Esurance Ins. Servs., Inc., No. 15-2484, 2016 WL 320646, at *2 (N.D. Tex. Jan. 27, 2016) (finding that the TCPA's prohibition on automatic dialing creates a legal right to be free of such calls). At issue is whether defendants' alleged violation of this statutory right caused Dr. Sartin a concrete and particularized injury in fact.
The Fifth Circuit has not yet addressed what type of injury an individual must suffer to have Article III standing to sue for a TCPA violation. Other courts have addressed the type of injuries at issue here. In Palm Beach, the Eleventh Circuit held that Article III does not require proof of receipt of the allegedly unlawful fax. 781 F.3d at 1251. It reasoned that, regardless of whether faxes are printed or viewed, an unsolicited fax creates "a concrete and personalized injury in the form of the occupation of [one's] fax machine for the period of time required for the electronic transmission of the data . . . ." Id. This occupation of a plaintiff's fax machine for a period of time "is among the injuries intended to be prevented by the statute and is sufficiently personal or particularized to [plaintiff] as to provide standing." Id. at 1252.
Further, in American Copper & Brass, Inc. v. Lake City Industrial Products, Inc., the Sixth Circuit reasoned that "unsolicited fax advertisements impose costs on all recipients, irrespective of ownership and the cost of paper and ink, because such advertisements waste the recipients' time and impede the free flow of commerce." Id. (emphasis added); see also Arnold Chapman & Paldo Sign & Display Co. v. Wagener Equities Inc., 747 F.3d 489, 491-92 (7th Cir. 2014) (stating that "[w]hether or not the user of the fax machine is an owner, he may be annoyed, distracted, or otherwise inconvenienced if his use of the machine is interrupted by unsolicited faxes to it . . . ."). The Seventh Circuit employed similar reasoning in Ira Holtzman, C.P.A. v. Turza, 728 F.3d 682 (7th Cir. 2013). Although not ruling on the issue of standing, the court explained that "[e]ven a recipient who gets the fax on a computer and deletes it without printing [the fax] suffers some loss: the value of the time necessary to realize that the inbox has been cluttered by junk." Id. at 684.
Consistent with the broad definition of cognizable harm in Palm Beach, American Copper, and Holtzman, a number of district courts have found that the wasted time associated with receipt of an unlawful fax or telephone call suffices to confer standing to sue under the TCPA. See Leung v. XPO Logistics, Inc., No. 15-03877, 2015 WL 10433667, at *4 (N.D. Ill. Dec. 9, 2015) (collecting cases); Martin v. Leading Edge Recovery Sols., LLC, No. 11-5886, 2012 WL 3292838, at *3 (N.D. Ill. Aug. 10, 2012) ("Plaintiffs . . . were directly injured by defendants' violations of the TCPA because they had to spend time tending to unwanted calls and their cell phone minutes were depleted."); Kane v. Nat'l Action Fin. Servs., Inc., No. 11-11505, 2011 WL 6018403, at *5 (E.D. Mich. Nov. 7, 2011) (finding that plaintiff's allegation that he received several hundred phone calls on his cell phone was sufficient to establish standing to bring claim under TCPA, regardless of whether he incurred charges for any of the calls); King v. Time Warner Cable, 113 F.Supp.3d 718, 728 (S.D.N.Y. 2015) (same).
Both sides rely on non-precedential, post-Spokeo TCPA cases to support their arguments for or against standing. See Rogers v. Capital One Bank (USA), N.A., No. 15-4016, 2016 WL 3162592, at *2 (N.D. Ga. June 7, 2016) (finding injury in fact based on unwanted calls to TCPA plaintiffs' personal cell phones because phones were unavailable for use during the unwanted calls); Booth v. Appstack, Inc., No. 13-1533, 2016 WL 3030256, at *5 (W.D. Wa. May 25, 2016) (same); Brodsky v. HumanaDental Ins. Co., No. 10-3233, 2016 WL 5476233, at *10-11 (N.D. Ill. Sept. 29, 2016) (finding that TCPA plaintiffs had standing because unwanted faxes occupied their fax machines and wasted their time). But see Transcript of Hearing on Motion to Dismiss at 22-26, Susinno v. Work Out World, Inc., No. 15-5881 (D.N.J. Aug. 1, 2016), ECF No. 31 (granting motion to dismiss after finding that TCPA plaintiff had not suffered an injury in fact from only one unwanted cell phone call); Romero v. Dep't Stores Nat'l Bank, No. 15-193, 2016 WL 4184099, at *4-6 (S.D. Cal. Aug. 5, 2016) (finding no standing because plaintiff's alleged injury was not connected to the alleged TCPA violation). Of these, the best reasoned and the most clearly analogous is Brodsky, which is the only case that involved faxes.
In Brodsky, the court analyzed the plaintiff's alleged harm in light of Spokeo and determined that the plaintiff's alleged injuries of wasted time and the occupation of his fax line and machine were sufficiently particularized and concrete to satisfy Article III's injury-in-fact requirement. Brodsky, 2016 WL 5476233, at *10-11. In making this determination, the Brodsky court found that the alleged injuries were tangible, but even if they were intangible, they satisfied Spokeo. Id. at *11. The Brodsky court noted that Spokeo instructed courts to look to the "`judgment' of Congress" in ascertaining whether an intangible harm constitutes an injury in fact. Id. at *10 (quoting Spokeo, 136 S. Ct. at 1549). Following Spokeo's instructions, the Brodsky court found that the "Congressional judgment similarly suggests" that the plaintiff had standing, since Congress "enacted the TCPA's restrictions on unwanted faxes `to protect citizens from the loss of the use of their fax machines during the transmission of fax data.'" Id. at *11 (quoting Palm Beach, 781 F.3d at 1252). The Court finds the reasoning of Brodsky to be persuasive, especially in light of the legislative history of the TCPA. See S. Rep. No. 102-178, 1991 WL 211220, at 2 (1991) as reprinted in 1991 U.S.C.C.A.N. 1968, 1969 (noting that consumers have identified, inter alia, wasted time and tied up machines as problems caused by unsolicited calls and faxes; H.R. Rep. 102-317, 1991 WL 245201, at 10 (1991) (noting that unsolicited faxes are problematic because fax machines are "unavailable for legitimate business messages while processing and printing the junk fax"). Thus, Dr. Sartin's alleged injuries are of the type that the TCPA sought to redress, and Congressional judgment supports finding that these alleged injuries satisfy Article III's requirements. See Wendt v. 24 Hour Fitness USA, Inc., 821 F.3d 547, 552 (5th Cir. 2016) (noting that where "plaintiff's claim of injury in fact depends on legal rights conferred by statute, it is the particular statute and the rights it conveys that guide the standing determination").
Defendants' additional argument that because Dr. Sartin "was not the recipient or primary addressee of the [f]ax, and the [f]ax was not sent to a phone line he owned or to which he subscribed,"
Because Dr. Sartin's amended complaint alleges judicially cognizable injuries that are traceable to defendants and can be remedied by a ruling in Dr. Sartin's favor, Dr. Sartin has standing and defendants' motion to dismiss is denied.
Next, defendants ask the Court to strike Dr. Sartin's class allegations under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 12(f). Dr. Sartin defines the putative class as follows:
Defendants challenge Dr. Sartin's class definition on two grounds. Neither ispersuasive.
First, defendants argue that Dr. Sartin is not a member of the proposed class because defendants' fax was allegedly "sent," not to Dr. Sartin, but to the subscriber of the fax number, East Jefferson General Hospital. While defendants are correct that a plaintiff cannot lead a class to which he or she does not belong, see, e.g., Gen. Tel. Co. of Sw. v. Falcon, 457 U.S. 147, 156 (1982), the pleadings reveal no such problem here. Dr. Sartin alleges that he received an unsolicited fax advertisement from defendants. The fax, which is attached as an exhibit to the complaint, is addressed to both "East Jefferson General Hospital" and "Dr. Barry Sartin."
Further, the sole case cited by defendants in support of their argument that Dr. Sartin is not a member of this class is Edwards v. Oportun, Inc., No. 16-519, 2016 WL 4203853, at *3 (N.D. Ca. June 14, 2016). Although the court in Edwards struck class allegations in a TCPA case, the plaintiff there sought to define the class as those who "received calls `made by or on behalf of Defendant in order to promote its products or services.'" Id. (quoting plaintiff's First Amended Complaint). Because the plaintiff in Edwards did not allege that he ever received calls made by the defendant to promote its products or services, the court granted the motion to strike with leave to amend to change the class definition. Id. Dr. Sartin, on the other hand, has alleged facts indicating he is a member of the class, i.e., that he received a fax from defendants with content that discusses and promotes defendants' product.
Second, defendants argue that Dr. Sartin's proposed class definition fails to establish an ascertainable group, whose boundaries can be defined and policed in an administratively feasible way. To maintain a class action, the proposed class must be adequately defined and clearly ascertainable by reference to objective criteria. Union Asset Mgmt. Holding A.G. v. Dell, Inc., 669 F.3d 632, 639 (5th Cir. 2012) (quoting DeBremaecker v. Short, 433 F.2d 733, 734 (5th Cir. 1970)). The class definition must be sufficiently definite in that it is administratively feasible for the court to determine whether a particular individual is a member. Mike v. Safeco Ins. Co. of Am., 223 F.R.D. 50, 52-53 (D. Conn. 2004) (citing Wright & Miller, 7A Federal Practice and Procedure, § 1760 (2d ed.)). Nonetheless, "the court need not know the identity of each class member before certification; ascertainability requires only that the court be able to identify class members at some stage of the proceeding." Frey v. First Nat. Bank Sw., 602 F. App'x 164, 168 (5th Cir. 2015). Thus, "if the general outlines of the membership of the class are determinable at the outset of the litigation, a class will be deemed to exist." Lee v. Am. Airlines, Inc., No. 01-1179, 2002 WL 31230803, at *4 (N.D. Tex. Sept. 30, 2002) (quoting Wright & Miller, 7A Federal Practice and Procedure, § 1760 (2d ed.)).
Dr. Sartin's proposed class meets the ascertainability requirement. In their briefs, defendants and Dr. Sartin both refer to fax logs or fax lists showing the numbers to which defendants sent fax transmissions.
Defendants correctly note that class membership cannot be ascertained from the fax logs alone. Because individual faxes may have been sent to multiple recipients—including the fax allegedly sent to Dr. Sartin, which was addressed to both Dr. Sartin and Eastern Jefferson General Hospital—single entries on defendants' fax logs might in fact signify multiple potential class members. Nonetheless, Rule 23 does not require that all members of a class be instantly determinable without any individual examination; it need only be "administratively feasible for the court to determine whether a particular individual is a member of the proposed class." Young v. Nationwide Mut. Ins. Co., 693 F.3d 532, 537-38 (6th Cir. 2012) (emphasis added). Although certain faxes shown in the logs may have been sent to multiple recipients, class membership can feasibly be determined by reviewing the actual faxes to determine the individuals and entities to whom they were addressed. This straightforward, mechanical procedure can be done without resort to individualized hearings or inquiry into the merits of each potential class member's claims. Thus, Dr. Sartin's proposed class does not present the type of administrative quandaries that have caused other classes to fail for lack of ascertainability. Cf. Barasich v. Shell Pipeline Co., LP, No. 05-4180, 2008 WL 6468611, at *4 (E.D. La. June 19, 2008) (denying class certification when the determination of whether an individual was a class member could not be made without inquiring into the merits of each person's claim); McGuire v. Int'l Paper Co., No. 92-593, 1994 WL 261360, at *5 (S.D. Miss. Feb. 18, 1994) (finding proposed subclass untenable because determining membership would require prospective subclass members to submit to blood tests and depositions and would necessitate "an inestimable number of individual hearings").
Defendants' argument that this type of review necessarily creates "insurmountable administrative problems"
For the foregoing reasons, the Court DENIES defendants' motion to dismiss for lack of Article III standing, as well as defendants' motion strike plaintiff's class allegations.