Patsy Weatherly, et al. v. Pershing, L.L.C.

The plaintiffs in these lawsuits are individuals who were swindled out of large sums of money in one of the largest “Ponzi” schemes in American history. Convicted financier Allen Stanford, now serving a 110- year prison term, sold billions of dollars’ worth of bogus certificates of deposits to unwitting investors, many of them retirees seeking “safe” investments for their life savings, paying each new investor-victim “profits” out of funds solicited from newly duped investor-victims. The plaintiffs were initially part of a class action suit seeking recovery, but each of them decided to leave the class and sue on their own. Years later, the district court denied certification of the putative class. Thus, the questions presented are:

1. Whether in a class action filed in federal court based on diversity jurisdiction, the tolling rule of American Pipe & Const. Co. v. Utah, 414 U.S. 538 (1974), applies, as the Eighth Circuit has held, or whether state tolling law applies as the Fifth Circuit ruled in this case and as the Second, Fourth, Sixth, Seventh, and Ninth Circuits have held.

2. If federal tolling applies, whether tolling occurs when a plaintiff brings an individual action before the district court has ruled on the class certification question, as the Second, Ninth, and Tenth Circuits have ruled, or whether tolling does not apply as the First and Sixth Circuits have ruled.