Beldock v. Microsoft Corporation ( 2022 )

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT WESTERN DISTRICT OF WASHINGTON 8 AT SEATTLE 9 10 JUSTIN BELDOCK, et al., CASE NO. C22-1082JLR 11 Plaintiffs, ORDER v. 12 MICROSOFT CORPORATION, et 13 al., 14 Defendants. 15 Before the court are two motions for leave to file amici curiae briefs in support of 16 Defendants Microsoft Corporation, the Board of Trustees of Microsoft Corporation, the 17 401(k) Administrative Committee of the Microsoft Corporation Savings Plus 401(k) 18 Plan, and Does Nos. 1-20’s (collectively, “Defendants”) motion to dismiss (see MTD 19 (Dkt. # 27)) filed by (1) a group comprised of American Benefits Council, ERISA 20 Industry Committee, American Retirement Association, and Committee on Investment of 21 Employee Benefit Assets, Inc. (collectively, “ABC”) (see ABC Mot. (Dkt. # 31)), and 22 1 (2) the Chamber of Commerce of the United States of America (the “Chamber”) (see 2 Chamber Mot. (Dkt. # 39); Chamber Reply (Dkt. # 48)). Plaintiffs Justin Beldock, 3 Gordon Broward, and Shaadi Nezami (collectively, “Plaintiffs”) oppose both motions. 4 (See Resp. to ABC Mot. (Dkt, # 43); Resp. to Chamber Mot. (Dkt. # 47).) Defendants do 5 not oppose either motion. (See Dkt.) The court has reviewed the parties’ submissions, 6 the relevant portions of the record, and applicable law. Being fully advised, the court 7 GRANTS ABC’s and the Chamber’s motions to file amicus briefs in support of 8 Defendants’ motion to dismiss. 9 District courts may consider amicus briefs from non-parties “concerning legal 10 issues that have potential ramifications beyond the parties directly involved or if the 11 amicus has unique information or perspective that can help the court beyond the help that 12 the lawyers for the parties are able to provide.” Macareno v. Thomas, 378 F.Supp.3d 13 933, 940 (W.D. Wash. 2019) (quoting NGV Gaming, Ltd. v. Upstream Point Molate, 14 LLC, 355 F.Supp.2d 1061, 1067 (N.D. Cal. 2005)) (internal quotation marks omitted). 15 The court has “broad discretion” to appoint amici curiae. Hoptowit v. Ray, 682 F.2d 16 1237, 1260 (9th Cir. 1982), abrogated on other grounds by Sandin v. Conner, 515 U.S. 17 472 (1995). 18 The court finds that ABC and the Chamber each have unique perspectives that 19 may help the court decide the legal questions at issue in Defendants’ motion to dismiss. 20 See Macareno, 378 F.Supp.3d at 940. Accordingly, the court GRANTS ABC’s motion to 21 file an amicus brief in support of Defendants’ motion to dismiss (Dkt. # 31) and 22 // 1 GRANTS the Chamber’s motion to file an amicus brief in support of Defendants’ motion 2 to dismiss (Dkt. # 39)1. 3 Dated this 9th day of December, 2022. 4 A 5 6 JAMES L. ROBART United States District Judge 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 1 The Chamber’s motion is labeled as a “motion for leave to participate as amicus 21 curiae.” (See Chamber Mot. at 1.) The court only permits the Chamber to file its proposed amicus curiae brief in support of Defendants’ motion to dismiss. (See id., Ex. A.) The Chamber 22 is not permitted to otherwise “participate” in this litigation without explicit leave of the court. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22