Unhappy with the outcome of a class-action anti-trust lawsuit against PoolCorp, one set of plaintiffs has appealed the case.
PoolCorp and the Big 3 manufacturers faced lawsuits from two separate groups — one of industry professionals and one of consumers — both alleging anti-competitive practices. The manufacturers settled, while PoolCorp continued on. As part of its strategy, the megadistributor’s legal team filed a series of summary judgment motions, hoping the judge would throw out one accusation at a time. That is how the case ended on July 1, when the final summary judgment was granted.
The plaintiffs had 30 days to appeal. At month’s end, the industry group had done just that. But a unique sequence in the judge’s filings may buy the consumer plaintiffs more time. After the last summary judgment, PoolCorp requested a free-standing order officially declaring the case was found in the distributor’s favor. The judge filed the order on Aug. 4, which the consumer group may be able to use as a new start date.
