In Re Natural Gas Anti-Trust Cases

In these coordinated class action lawsuits, the superior court granted a request of the class plaintiffs’ counsel to declare Attorney Ernest M. Thayer a vexatious litigant based on his history of filing objections to class action settlements (most particularly, the attorney fee awards in connection with those settlements) in which he was a member of the plaintiff class or represented a member of such a class. Thayer appeals the order, arguing that (1) the vexatious litigant statutes (Code Civ. Proc., §§ 391-391.7) do not apply to nonrepresentative members of a class who appear to assert objections because they do not have the status of a party in the traditional sense; (2) the statutes only apply against an attorney who appears as a party in propria persona; and (3) even if he was a “party” to the class actions in which he objected to the settlements, the statutes do not apply to his conduct. (All further statutory references are to the Code of Civil Procedure.) We conclude that objecting nonrepresentative class members who engage in the conduct specified in the vexatious litigant statutes are not exempt from being designated as vexatious litigants, but that Thayer’s…