Disney, Universal Studios Captioning Class Action Lawsuit Dismissed

A captioning class action lawsuit brought by a group of hearing-impaired plaintiffs against several Hollywood studios and other media giants including Disney and Universal Studios has hit a brick wall following a federal judge’s dismissal.

U.S. District Judge Stephen V. Wilson granted a dismissal motion for all named defendants including Netflix Inc., Sony Pictures Corp., Warner Bros. Entertainment Inc., Universal Studios and The Walt Disney Company, finding the plaintiffs failed to adequately plead their claims.

Judge Wilson also determined that the claims attack protected speech in a way that runs afoul of the California anti-SLAPP (Strategic Litigation Against Public Participation) statute.

The judge dismissed the plaintiffs’ claims with prejudice, meaning they will not get a chance to amend the defects in their pleadings.

The plaintiffs began this captioning class action lawsuit in October 2015. Claimants led by lead plaintiff Christine Anthony said the entertainment company defendants falsely label some of the media content in their DVD and streaming video services as having subtitles or captioning, when the captioning failed to include song lyrics.

They allege the missing lyrics are crucial to understanding the premise of a show or its plot development.

Furthermore, they argued the lack of captioning for song lyrics made the products mislabeled.

They say they were misled by representations that the DVDs and streaming media would contain captioning, depriving them of the experience they expected.

Their captioning class action lawsuit raises claims under California’s False Advertising Law, Unfair Competition Law, Consumer Legal Remedies Act, and the Song-Beverly Consumer Warranty Act.

Plaintiffs also allege the lack of captioning violates the Unruh Civil Rights Act by failing to provide equal services to hearing-impaired persons.

Judge Wilson dismissed the misrepresentation-based claims, finding that the plaintiffs failed to allege that a reasonable consumer would have been deceived by the defendants’ representations about captioning, or that they themselves had relied on the alleged misrepresentations in deciding to buy the media.

The judge said the plaintiffs’ warranty-based claims failed because warranties apply only to consumer goods, not media content.

Their civil rights claims fall short because the plaintiffs’ failed to allege the discrimination in question was intentional, the judge said.

Judge Wilson also granted the defendants’ separate motion to strike under California’s anti-SLAPP statute.

The statute was enacted to provide recourse, including assessment of fees, against meritless litigation that suppresses constitutionally protected speech.

Plaintiffs had argued that the captioning at issue was commercial speech, and therefore unprotected.

However, Judge Wilson disagreed finding that the captioning at issue constituted speech protected by the statute and that the defendants’ advertising constitutes acts that are in furtherance of the defendants’ right to free speech.

Judge Wilson determined that each of the plaintiffs’ claims attacks that speech and should be dismissed under the anti-SLAPP statute.

He issued his dismissal with prejudice since he saw no way in which the plaintiffs could fix the flaws in their pleadings by amending them.

The plaintiffs are represented by attorneys John A. Girardi and Jennifer L. Siegel of Girardi Keese.

The Disney, Universal Studios DVD Captioning Class Action Lawsuit is Anthony, et al. v. Buena Vista Home Entertainment Inc., et al., Case No. 2:15-cv-09593, in the U.S. District Court for the Central District of California.