In the United States District Court, Northern District of Illinois, Eastern Division, plaintiffs Matt Marek, Debbie Hale, Stephen Reeves, and Tammy Tacito have filed a class action lawsuit against ASR Group International Inc., American Sugar Refining Inc., Domino Foods Inc., United Sugar Producers & Refiners Cooperative f/k/a United Sugars Corporation, Michigan Sugar Company, Commodity Information Inc., and Richard Wistisen. The case is identified as 24-cv-3216 and was filed on April 22nd, 2024.
The plaintiffs allege that the defendants colluded to illegally fix the price of white refined table sugar throughout the United States. They claim that the defendants used Commodity Information Inc. and Richard Wistisen as conduits for communication to exchange detailed non-public information regarding sugar prices, capacity, sales volume, supply and demand.
The lawsuit asserts that due to this unlawful conduct which violates the Sherman Antitrust Act and state antitrust laws, indirect end-user purchasers of granulated sugar in the U.S. paid supra-competitive prices for granulated sugar sold by the producing defendants from January 1st, 2019 onwards.
The plaintiffs are seeking judgement for violations of federal antitrust laws as well as state consumer protection law. They argue that their claims are based upon a common nucleus of operative fact and should be tried as one judicial proceeding. The court has subject matter jurisdiction under CAFA because the amount in controversy exceeds $5 million (exclusive of costs and interest), there are more than 100 putative members of the class, and minimal diversity exists between the litigants.