WASHINGTON-A hearing today on an industry motion to consolidate in a single federal court nearly a dozen billing lawsuits against two national mobile-phone carriers revealed Nextel Communications Inc. has been hit with another 17 suits.
Up until this morning’s hearing before the Judicial Panel on Multidistrict Litigation, Nextel and Sprint PCS had to contend with 10 billing lawsuits between them.
In support of his argument to transfer all billing lawsuits to U.S. District Court for the Western District of Missouri, Thomas Gilbertsen, an attorney for Nextel, told the seven-judge panel that 17 more billing suits had been filed against the carrier since the time Nextel first asked to have the billing lawsuits consolidated in the Missouri federal court.
The same Missouri court today considered preliminary approval of a settlement of a class-action lawsuit on how Nextel discloses fees designed to recover the cost of implementing federal mandates like enhanced 911, telephone number pooling and wireless number portability. The court could give final approval in December.
Nextel and Sprint PCS settled a billing lawsuit with Missouri Attorney General Jay Nixon in July.
Jonathan Stein, a lawyer representing plaintiffs, said consolidating the cases in federal court is inappropriate because the issues come under state jurisdiction. Stein said that eight of the 10 billing cases initially moved from state court to federal court now have been returned to state court.
On a related front, Cingular Wireless L.L.C. today is expected file an appeal with the California Public Utilities Commission of a $12 million fine imposed for business practices regulators said broke state laws.
