Beck v. Test Masters Educational Services, Inc. ( 2010 )

UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT
FOR THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA
JARROD BECK, et al., :
:
Plaintiffs, :
:
v. : Civil Action No. 04-1391 (JR)
:
TEST MASTERS EDUCATIONAL :
SERVICES, INC., :
:
Defendant. :
MEMORANDUM
This completely unmeritorious case is a spinoff from
protracted litigation conducted elsewhere between Robin Singh
Educational Service, Inc. and Test Masters Educational Services,
Inc. It began as a dispute over the right to an Internet domain
name, testmasters.com, and then metastasized. The first case
ended in the Fifth Circuit, with an order invalidating Singh’s
claims to “Test Masters” as a trademark and allowing Test Masters
to retain the domain name. Refusing to accept that outcome,
Singh continued the struggle to the point where a district judge
in Texas enjoined him from pursuing registration of the mark,
interfering with Test Masters’ registration of the mark, and
harassing Test Masters and its employees. At least two other
cases were then filed, this being one of them. This suit has
nominally individual plaintiffs, but they might as well be straw
parties: the defendant asserts that the litigation is sponsored
and controlled by Singh – in effect, that this is a proxy war -
and the assertion is nowhere denied. The suit was first filed in
Superior Court for the District of Columbia in 2004, removed to
this court by Test Masters, transferred to the Southern District
of Texas by order of the Multidistrict Litigation Panel in 2005,
and then returned to this district by order of the MDL judge in
Texas in 2009 – accompanied by a fully briefed motion for summary
judgment that has never been spread on the public record of this
court because everything was filed under seal in Texas.
The sponsored plaintiffs - Beck, Galloway, and Reddy -
claim that the conduct of Test Masters’ includes acts of fraud
and negligent misrepresentation, and that it violated the D.C.
Consumer Protection Procedures Act (“CPPA”).
In 2003, each plaintiff was attending college or
working in the D.C. metropolitan area, and each plaintiff was
planning to attend law school the following year. To improve his
or her score on the LSAT - the standardized test that most law
schools consider heavily in making admissions decisions - each
plaintiff planned to take a preparation course. All three
plaintiffs say that they had decided to take Singh’s course,
basing their decisions upon the company’s national reputation and
upon glowing reviews of the course from friends and
acquaintances. All allege that they were duped into taking the
“wrong” course – the Test Masters course – by the omissions and
misrepresentations of Test Masters. They allege that Test
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Masters had a duty to correct their mistaken beliefs that they
were registering for and attending Singh’s course but failed to
do so; that the Test Masters website falsely stated that it had
been offering LSAT courses since 1991; and that Test Masters
falsely promised an LSAT course in College Park, Maryland, in
August 2003.
Test Masters moves for summary judgment on the grounds
inter alia that plaintiffs have not established and cannot
establish damages or causation, and that in any case their claims
for damages are merely speculative. Plaintiffs resist summary
judgment, citing Fed. R. Civ. P. 56(f) and demanding wide-ranging
discovery. Broad discovery was permitted in the earlier cases,
but plaintiffs insist that they need responses to further
discovery requests made in this one, requests designed to
establish that Test Masters’ intent was to deceive, that the Test
Masters product was inferior, and that Singh’s company was better
regarded than Test Masters.
Whatever the facts that bear upon those contested
issues, none of them is material to the causation and damages
issues that are dispositive here. No further discovery has been
sought on causation and damages, which are of course for
plaintiffs to prove with facts within their own provenance.
Plaintiff has failed to demonstrate the existence of a genuine
issue of material fact as to damages and has presented only the
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most speculative concept of causation. Test Masters is
accordingly entitled to summary judgment.1
Plaintiffs allege that they were misled into paying for
Test Masters’ “inferior product,” but an action for fraud,
fraudulent misrepresentation and violation of consumer protection
statutes is not a comparative hearing on the quality of competing
products. The question is, how were the plaintiffs injured by
the conduct of Test Masters. The answer to that question – at
least the answer established by the undisputed facts of record –
is that they weren’t. Two of the plaintiffs - Beck and
Galloway - improved their LSAT scores after taking the course.
Both scored in the 84th percentile or higher. Both were admitted
to law schools. Neither took the Singh course, so neither can
show that he or she would have done better with the Singh course.
Plaintiff Reddy did take the Singh course, but she scored only
one point higher on the LSAT after doing so, a de minimis
difference that may reflect only the experience of having taken
the test once before, and in any event she elected not to apply
for or attend law school at all.
1
After Test Masters filed this dispositive motion,
plaintiffs moved for Rule 37 sanctions, alleging that within, or
behind, Test Masters’ refusal to respond to its discovery demands
lurked spoliation, obstruction, and discovery misconduct [Dkt.
#34]. It was unnecessary to decide that motion while the motion
for summary judgment was pending, and it will now be denied as
moot.
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The rest of plaintiffs’ implied theory of damages is a
series of “ifs” that gives new meaning to the word “speculation”:
If the plaintiffs had taken the course they thought they had
purchased, they would have achieved higher LSAT scores. If they
had higher LSAT scores, they would have been admitted into better
law schools.2 If they had attended better law schools, they
would have secured better paying, more prestigious jobs.3 No
citation is required to support the necessary conclusion that
plaintiffs have advanced no competent evidence to establish that
they have been injured by the conduct of which they complain, or,
if their careers have been less satisfying than they hoped, that
causation can be found in the actions or omissions of Test
Masters.
The total absence of proof of damages or causation is
enough to dispose of plaintiffs’ common law claims of fraud and
negligent misrepresentation, but another step is required when
considering plaintiffs’ CPPA claim. That is because, in a recent
decision that manages to evade its own precedent, the D.C. Court
of Appeals has held that a CPPA claim brought on behalf of the
2
Never mind that plaintiff Galloway was admitted to Notre
Dame Law School, where she applied “early decision” because she
had determined it was “the place for [her].” [Def. Mot. for SJ,
7]
3
Try that one on the top-tier law school graduates who now
seem to be the hardest hit by the current law firm recession. See
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/01/17/fashion/17lawyer.html?scp=1&sq=
law%20firm%20associates&st=cse
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general public will lie, regardless of whether the plaintiff
experienced injury-in-fact. Grayson v. AT&T, 980 A.2d 1137, 1154
n. 78 (D.C. 2009). The Court of Appeals’ workaround deals with
the law of standing, acknowledging that it has historically hewn
to the “case or controversy” line and that it has declined to
find standing without injury in cases like Friends of Tilden
Park, Inc. v. District of Columbia, 803 A.2d 1201 (D.C. 2002),
but latching onto its 1991 observation in Atchison v. District of
Columbia, 585 A.2d 150, 153, that “this court . . . enjoys
flexibility in regard to [the case or controversy requirement]
not possessed by the federal courts.” There is no CPPA claim in
this case that purports to be brought on behalf of the general
public, so plaintiffs’ CPPA claims probably would not survive
even “flexible” review in the District of Columbia courts after
the Court of Appeals’ startling decision in Grayson. In this
federal court, however, which is an Article III court and which
lacks jurisdiction of claims that do not present a case or
controversy, Lujan v. Defenders of Wildlife, 504 U.S. 555, 559
(1992), plaintiffs’ CPPA claim is fatally deficient and must be
dismissed. See Hoyte v. Yum! Brands, Inc., 489 F. Supp. 2d 24(D.D.C. 2007) (actual or threatened injury required to bring a
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DCCPPA claim) (citing Williams v. Purdue Pharma. Co., 297 F.
Supp. 2d 171, 178 (D.D.C. 2003)).
An appropriate order accompanies this memorandum.
JAMES ROBERTSON
United States District Judge
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