New AT&T Cert Petition Filed
on Oct 25, 2007 at 2:23 pm
We filed this petition today on behalf of AT&T, along with co-petitioner Sprint, in a case involving the question of standing to sue. The defendant petitioners are long-distance telephone companies, which are required to pay various fees to the owners of pay phones (PSPs). The individual PSPs generally submit their claims to intermediaries known as “aggregators,” which collect them all and submit them to the telephone companies, later distributing the payments to the PSPs. When a dispute arose over the amount of compensation due, the PSPs assigned their claims to the aggregators “for purposes of collection.” The aggregators then filed suit “on behalf of” the PSPs, which are not parties to the case. The PSPs are financing the litigation, and all the proceeds will go to the PSPs.
The D.C. Circuit held (2-1) that the assignments give the aggregators standing to sue by transferring the PSPs’ rights and injuries in toto to the aggregators. The dissent took the view that the aggregators lacked standing because they had no individual stake in the case. The petition alleges a conflict with Supreme Court and federal appellate precedent. As with all of our petitions that we post, we will post the brief in opposition when it is available.
