Plaintiff Arbitration consultant Charles Bennett recently obtained an order from County Court at Law #2 in Dallas on a nonsubscriber workplace injury case denying as premature Defendant’s motion to compel arbitration and granting Plaintiff’s motion for a jury trial on the making of the agreement to arbitrate and on arbitrability. Cause No. CC-22-01477-B, White v. Builders FirstSource, Inc.
In part, Mr. Bennett utilized the US Supreme Court’s 2022 ruling in Morgan v. Sundance that says courts must treat arbitration agreements the same as any other contract, and all contractual defenses are available in court to contest the agreement. Generally speaking, employee plaintiffs forced to arbitrate against their companies do far worse in arbitration than in front of juries. Professor Alexander Colvin, who has testified before congress, says employees win on average about 9% of the value plaintiffs win in state court. That is not a typo. 9%.
How does this ruling help Plaintiffs? Imagine in every nonsubscriber case, instead of simply going to arbitration and getting a 91% discount off jury trial exposure, the defendants have to try a jury trial to figure out whether they have to try a second jury trial or go to arbitration to decide the merits of the case.
Plaintiff Arbitration consistently pushes issues like this to make good arbitration law for plaintiffs, and make it more difficult for companies, their lawyers, and their insurance carriers to force employees and consumers into unfair, rigged arbitrations.