Sears Kenmore Dryer Class Action Lawsuit Denied Certification

A federal judge has denied a motion to certify a class action lawsuit against Sears Roebuck & Co. and Electrolux Home Products Inc. accusing the companies of deceptively marketing their Kenmore and Frigidaire dryers, saying that the lawsuit lacked common issues of fact.

Plaintiff Martin Murray alleges in the Sears dryer class action lawsuit hat he purchased a Kenmore dryer from Sears in San Bruno, California. He says it worked well for two to three years when he started noticing stains showing up on his clothes. He then started noticing tears and cuts showing up near where the stains were and started to think that the dryer might be the cause.

Murray claims that after removing the door of the dryer in 2007, so he could get a good look at the inside, he noticed the dryer’s drum had developed rust on the frontal exterior.

“He believed that the stains, tears, and cuts in his clothing were the result of his clothes coming into contact with this rust during the drying process,” U.S. District Judge Claudia Wilken explained in his Feb. 12 order.

Murray filed the Sears dryer class action lawsuit in November 2009 for all California residents who bought the same Kenmore dryer that he did.

He accused Sears of marketing the dryer as being made with a stainless steel drum when part of it was made with mild steel, which can corrode, chip and rust more easily.

Murray charged Sears with unjust enrichment, breach of contract, and violating California’s Consumer Legal Remedies Act and Unfair Competition Law.

In February 2010, Sears asked to have a “stay” put on Murray’s class action lawsuit as Sears awaited the outcome of a similar lawsuit filed by a man named Steven Thorogood, who claimed he had a similar problem with the same Kenmore dryer and was represented by the same attorneys as Murray. Initially the other case was granted class certification, but that decision was reversed by the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals on Feb. 12, 2010, less than a week after Sears asked for the stay.

The Seventh Circuit said that the other Kenmore dryer class action lawsuit lacked “common issues of law or fact.”

Murray then filed an amended Kenmore dryer class action lawsuit a week later in which he added claims that were not in the original case, such as the fact that Kenmore dryers were advertised as coming with an “all stainless steel drum,” which was supposed to make “the dryers more durable and less susceptible to corrosion and chipping than other models.” He also included consumers who had purchased a Frigidaire dryer from Sears.

According to Judge Wilken, however, “Murray’s motion for class certification suffers from the same fatal defect . . . . [Murray] has failed to present any evidence that Defendants represented on a class-wide basis that the dryer’s drum front was made of stainless steel (rather than mild steel) and that this feature would prevent its user’s clothes from developing rust stains or tears.”

Some Sears’ sales managers had said in depositions that the stainless steel feature of the drum was promoted by Sears in ads for the dryers, they also said that it was never stated that the purpose of the drums was to prevent rust stains or tearing.

Judge Wilken denied Murray’s motion for class certification and scheduled a case management conference for March 12, 2014.

The plaintiff is represented by Mark Boling, and Clinton A. Krislov and Kenneth T. Goldstein of Krislov & Associates Ltd.

The Sears Dryer Class Action Lawsuit is Martin Murray v. Sears Roebuck and Co., et al., Case No. 4:09-cv-05744, in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California.