Paul Tassin  |  July 26, 2016

Category: Consumer News

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Dooney-Bourke-logoA federal judge has dismissed a class action lawsuit accusing retailer Dooney & Bourke of misleading consumers with fake sales at outlet stores, finding the claims were inadequately backed up by specific facts.

On July 22, U.S. District Judge Jeffrey T. Miller granted defendant Dooney & Bourke Inc.’s motion to dismiss the consumer class action lawsuit, which alleged the retailer had used fabricated “original” prices to create the illusion of a discount at Dooney & Bourke outlet stores. The judge granted the plaintiff leave to amend her pleadings within 14 days, however.

Judge Miller said that while plaintiff Monica Rael alleged Dooney & Bourke had used false prices, she failed to allege facts showing why those prices were false. The judge also found no facts or legal authority in Rael’s pleadings supporting her allegations that the merchandise offered at Dooney & Bourke outlet stores was substandard.

Dooney & Bourke moved to dismiss Rael’s claims this past June. Rael responded in part with a declaration by her attorney assuring the court that they performed a thorough investigation of Dooney & Bourke’s pricing practices.

Judge Miller found that declaration didn’t help Rael’s case because it only restated conclusory allegations. The declaration says that plaintiff’s counsel investigated Dooney & Bourke and found false pricing, discounts continued beyond the 90-day limit allegedly required by law, and outlet-specific merchandise that was never offered for sale at retail stores.

Judge Miller said that declaration failed to allege specifics like whether counsel visited any Dooney & Bourke stores or its retail website, dates of alleged visits, specific products that were improperly priced, and whether he searched for the specific handbag that the plaintiff alleges she purchased for herself.

For the same reasons, Judge Miller found Rael had failed to adequately plead claims for negligent misrepresentation and for violation of consumer protection laws in 41 states other than California.

Rael’s Dooney & Bourke class action lawsuit claims the retailer uses false pricing to mislead its outlet store customers into thinking they’re getting a bargain that actually doesn’t exist. She says the store marks merchandise with purported “original” or “market” retail prices that are higher than the marked “sale” prices for which the items are offered.

The plaintiff says the marked “original” prices are arbitrarily generated by Dooney & Bourke. She says the merchandise was never actually offered for sale at those “original” prices in Dooney & Bourke’s retail stores. Since the supposed “original” prices are just a fiction, so are the discounts they supposedly offer, she argues.

The plaintiff claims this alleged pricing scheme violates a provision of California consumer protection law that requires an advertised “original” price to be “the prevailing marketing retail prices at the outlet stores within the three months immediately preceding the publication of the advertised former prices.”

Her Dooney & Bourke class action lawsuit raises claims for violation of California’s Unfair Competition Law, False Advertising Law, and Consumer Legal Remedies Act, as well as similar consumer protection laws in other states.

Plaintiff’s counsel are attorneys Todd D. Carpenter, Edwin J. Kilpela and Gary F. Lynch of Carlson Lynch Sweet Kilpela & Carpenter LLP.

The Dooney & Bourke False Advertising Class Action Lawsuit is Monica Rael v. Dooney & Bourke Inc., et al., Case No. 3:16-cv-00371, in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of California.

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