HP Pavilion Notebooks

Summary of Pending Case: On January 6, 2009, Shepherd, Finkelman, Miller & Shah, LLP (“SFMS”), along with co-counsel, filed a Class Action Complaint (“Complaint”) on behalf of Mr. Cass Wilson (“Plaintiff”) against Hewlett-Packard Company (“HP”) in the Superior Court of California, County of Santa Clara, Civil Action No. 1 09-CV-132004. The Complaint alleges that HP misrepresented and concealed material facts regarding certain laptops, including a design defect, which causes the power jacks of the laptops to fail. Specifically, the defect affects the attachment of the power jacks to the motherboards of the laptops. As a result of the defect, the solder connection between the motherboard and the power jack is interrupted, which ultimately causes the laptops to fail. In addition, SFMS has learned from certain consumers that the defect may cause the laptops to catch fire. The HP Pavilion laptops at issue in Plaintiff’s case include laptops in the following series: dv, zd, ze, zt, zv and zx. Please click here for a list of laptop models that are excluded from Plaintiff’s case, as they were covered by a separate case and subsequent settlement. The case SFMS is handling does not relate to any problems regarding the NVIDIA graphics processing unit or the media communications chip. Those problems are the subject of a different lawsuit. To view the complaint filed in the NVIDIA GPU Litigation and obtain contact information for counsel in that case, please click here. 

Plaintiff seeks to represent a class of all persons or entities in the United States who purchased, not for resale, HP Pavilion Notebook model computers from the dv, zd, ze, zt, zv and zx series (with the exception of the excluded models mentioned above), directly from HP or from authorized resellers.

Status of Pending Case: In March 2009, HP filed a demurrer to the Complaint. Plaintiff opposed Defendant’s Motion on April 6, 2009. After a hearing on Defendant's Motion, the Court overruled the demurrer with respect to Plaintiff’s Unfair Competition Law claim. Further, the Court overruled HP’s demurrer to the first and second causes of action for failure to specifically plead a cause of action grounded in fraud and overruled HP’s demurrer with respect to the first and second cause of action for lack of standing. The Court sustained HP’s demurrer with respect to Plaintiff’s claims under the CLRA and for breach of warranty, but granted leave to amend.

On May 11, 2009, Plaintiff filed an Amended Class Action Complaint and, on May 21, 2009, HP filed a notice to remove this case to Federal Court. A hearing was held before the Court on August 28, 2009 concerning Plaintiff’s Motion to Remand the case and Defendant’s Motion to Dismiss.

On September 17, 2009, the Court denied Plaintiff’s Motion to Remand and granted Defendant’s Motion to Dismiss with leave to amend. In response to the Court’s Order, Plaintiff filed a Second Amended Complaint (“SAC”) on October 7, 2009, which added Douglas Kruschen as a named Plaintiff and clarified the allegations that the defect in the HP Pavilion models at issue constitutes a safety hazard. The SAC alleges that the laptops at issue get extremely hot and, as a result of the defect, can, and do, catch fire, posing a serious threat to users. Through the SAC, Plaintiffs allege violations of the California Consumer Legal Remedies Act and the California Unfair Competition Law.

Defendant filed a Motion to Dismiss the SAC and a hearing on that Motion took place on January 15, 2010. The Court granted Defendant's Motion to Dismiss and Plaintiff is in the process of appealing this decision.

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