Date: 07-03-2025

Case Style:

Dennis Speerly, et al. v. General Motors, LLC

Case Number: 19-CV-11044

Judge: David M. Lawson

Court: United States District Court for the Eastern District of Michigan (Wayne County)

Plaintiff's Attorney: Powell Miller, Lynn Sarko, Melissa Yeaters,
Ryan McDevitt, Sharon Almonrode, Rachel Bentley, Steve Calamusa, Gretchen Cappio, Abigail Gertner, Maxwell Goins, Laura Goolsby, Tyler Graden, Dan Gustafson, Majdi Hijazin, Emily Hughes, Jordan Jacobson, Nathan Kiyam, Ted Leopold, Dennis Lienhardt, Jim Maro, Geoff Stahl, Brian Saxe, Beth Rivers, Shahin Rezvani, Karina Puttieva, Lisa Port, Michael Pitt, Madelyn Petersen, Russell Paul, Amey Park, Cody Padgett, Mark Ozzello, Greg Mitchell,

Defendant's Attorney: Paul Collier, Lindsay Demoss, Stephanie Douglas, Richard Godfrey, Samuel Ikard. Derek Linkous, Jared Levine, Derek Linkous, John Mack, Kathleen Sooy, Renee Smith, Patrick Seyferth, Jeremy Roux, Evan Ribot, Allan Pixton, Jerome Murphy, Roger Meyers

Description: Detroit, Michigan consumer law lawyers represented this plaintiffs who sought to sue on a class action basis on product liability theory.

With the introduction of automatic transmissions in cars, clutch pedals became obsolete for drivers who do not enjoy using a stick shift. General Motors’ Hydra-Matic became the first readily accessible automatic transmission on the market in 1939. It had four gears. From 2015 to 2018, GM offered an eight-gear Hydra-Matic transmission. That version had two alleged problems. It led some GM cars occasionally to shudder, and it led some GM cars occasionally to lurch. The two problems had nothing to do with operator error, even if some of the symptoms called to mind the experience of getting a ride from a novice stick-shift driver.

A group of car buyers filed a class action against GM to answer for the two defects under a range of state common law and statutory theories: express warranty, implied warranty, consumer protection laws, and fraudulent omission. The district court certified 26 state-wide subclasses with a total of 59 state-law claims on behalf of roughly 800,000 individual car buyers. Because the subclasses do not meet the rigorous requirements for handling all of these cases in one district court, whether as one case or as 26 cases, we vacate the class-certification order.

Outcome: Class certification vacated and case remanded.

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