Robbins Geller, GPM Will Lead Kraft Heinz Securities Litigation

Robbins Geller Rudman & Dowd LLP and Glancy Prongay & Murray LLP will represent co-lead plaintiffs in consolidated shareholder derivative litigation against Kraft Heinz Co., after a federal court said the firms could handle a complex and resource-intensive undertaking.

The U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Illinois said there was no clear winner among the competing proposed lead plaintiffs, so it looked to their proposed legal teams to resolve the draw.

Co-lead plaintiffs Stephen Silverman and Dale Waters, represented by Robbins Geller and GPM, were competing against proposed lead plaintiff Richard Merritts. Merritts is represented by by Hung G. Ta Esq. PLLC, who was proposed as lead counsel, and Zimmerman Law Offices, proposed as liaison counsel. Safirstein Metcalf LLP and Federman & Sherwood also appear on Merritts’ behalf.

Although shareholder cases are “almost never small,” the court said this particular matter “bears the indicia of a larger and more complex undertaking with a sizable amount of money claimed as damages.”

Given “high stakes,” the court said it made more sense to select “lead lawyers with vast resources and experience in cases of this magnitude.”

The competing plaintiffs were all individual, as opposed to institutional, investors, and none disclosed their precise financial stakes. All vigorously prosecuted the case and their respective pleadings were of indistinguishable quality, the court said.

Although he ultimately selected Silverman and Waters, represented by Robbins Geller and GPM, Judge Robert M. Dow Jr. said he recognized “the quality of the work done by Merritts and his lawyers” and their concern over being excluded from work on the case.

In appointing Waters and Silverman’s legal team, Dow said “the Court trusts that lead counsel will consider the Merritts lawyers for appropriate work,” citing the their “thorough pre-suit investigation” and “the sound factual and legal points in their briefs on this motion.”

The underlying allegations stem from the 2015 merger of Kraft Foods Group with the H.J. Heinz company to form Kraft Heinz, and revolve around alleged misrepresentations the new company made about its cost-cutting and growth strategies.

Kraft Heinz is represented by Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison LLP and Jenner & Block LLP.

The case is Hedick v. Kraft Heinz Co., N.D. Ill., No. 1:19-cv-01339, 10/21/21.