Since my report on the “Eliminate Useless Reports Act of 2024” is taking longer than anticipated (but should be worthwhile once complete), I’d like to instead highlight a recent order issued by Judge Gregory Presnell in Florida’s Middle District.
Longtime readers might remember Judge Presnell from a 2006 case in which he famously ordered two lawyers to settle a petty dispute by playing a game of “rock, paper, scissors.” He has a reputation for cutting through legal nonsense with blunt, no-nonsense rulings—like in Jones v. Ramos and Bell v. Florida, where he criticized parties for wasting the court’s time.
One attorney who clearly hasn’t learned this lesson is Spencer Sheehan, a New York-based plaintiffs’ lawyer known for filing questionable consumer class actions—some of which I’ve written about before. These include lawsuits over slightly misleading product labels, like whether mac and cheese takes longer than advertised or if Pop-Tarts are less healthy than expected. Courts across the country have criticized Sheehan for filing frivolous or weak cases.
His recent case, Durant v. Big Lots, wasn’t the worst of his lawsuits, but it wasn’t strong either. The plaintiff claimed she couldn’t get the advertised “up to 210” servings of coffee from a container, even after enlisting “independent lab experts.” But the judge noted that brewing instructions for larger batches had been ignored and, crucially, that “up to 210” servings doesn’t mean at least 210—so the label wasn’t misleading to a reasonable consumer.
Judge Presnell dismissed the case in March 2024 and recently issued an order awarding Big Lots attorney’s fees and sanctions. Not only had Sheehan filed nearly the same case in New York (which was dismissed), but he also couldn’t provide evidence that the supposed lab testing even existed—a move that previously led another court to hold him in contempt.
Trying to defend themselves, Sheehan’s team argued that a weak case isn’t automatically frivolous. But Judge Presnell wasn’t buying it. A baseless complaint, he said, can be both weak and frivolous—and this one clearly was.
