Blue Cross Subscriber Antitrust Suits Stay in State Court

Blue Cross Blue Shield affiliates jumped the gun on moving two state-court filed antitrust class actions into federal consolidated litigation, the Eleventh Circuit said Jan. 10.

Blue Cross moved to intervene in both cases but the motions hadn’t yet been granted when the affiliates removed the cases under the Class Action Fairness Act.

“Until a defendant is properly and formally a party in the action, we cannot determine whether there is a diversity of citizenship,” the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit said.

Several class actions were filed against Blue Cross Blue Shield Association and its licensees alleging ...