We wouldn’t be discussing winged buffalos if Aimen Halim hadn’t walked into a Buffalo Wild Wings and ordered Boneless Wings. He broke one open, saw it contained chicken breast instead of wing meat, and had the epiphany that he must file a Federal Court class action to right this wrong against him and everyone else in the United States who’d ever eaten bogus Boneless Wings. No need to thank Aimen or confirm you’re on board. He’s volunteered us all to be part of this.
Buffalo Wild Wings has asked the case be thrown out of court and posted this social media confession: “It’s true. Our boneless wings are all white meat. Our hamburgers contain no ham. Our buffalo wings are 0% buffalo.” They don’t seem too remorseful.
So what’s really going on here? I’ve been defending class actions for over 20 years – – serious cases for companies like Trader Joe’s, Costco, Walmart – – and here’s the “inside baseball.”
Mr. Halim’s lawyers (who are funding this circus) couldn’t give a chicken feather about what’s in a boneless wing. What they really want to know is whether some judge will certify this as a bona fide class action rather than throw it out of court. Some Federal Judges have their own agendas and if this case gets certified, it’s ca ching for plaintiff’s lawyers.
A Federal jury can be as few as 6 people, and if you draw the right jurors, plaintiff might get a $200 million or more verdict. There’s a monstrous pay-off in there for plaintiff’s lawyers. If the Judge certifies the Boneless Wings class action, Buffalo Wild Wings will settle the case and pay off Hamlin’s attorneys to avoid rolling the $200 million dice in front of a jury. Typical plaintiff’s lawyers have 30 or more of these cases percolating at any one time. It’s a numbers game. Sometimes they get thrown out and sometimes plaintiff’s lawyers get paid off. In one really ugly case, I offered plaintiff’s attorneys $250,000 to settle. They refused the offer, we made a high-risk motion to dismiss that was granted, the judge threw the case out of court, and plaintiff’s attorneys got nothing. And that’s the way the game is played.
Our firm has had a lot of success knocking these things out before the certification stage, but the plaintiff’s lawyers’ gambit is always the same. Throw a load out there and see what sticks on the judicial wall.
Funny thing is, Aimen Halim’s lawyers overlooked their big payday. The Buffalo Wild Wings’ logo isn’t a buffalo – – it’s a bison. Buffalos are found only in Africa. If he’d played his cards right, Aimen could have filed a class action to recover every dime every customer ever spent at Buffalo Wild Wings because we’ve all been hoodwinked. The place should be called “Bison Wild Wings.” Correcting that in court would really set the world straight.
And the legal millstone grinds on.