“These errors were prejudicial, so we reverse,” Judge Koh said.
However, U.S. Circuit Judge Patrick J. Bumatay said in a dissent that the jury’s verdict should’ve been affirmed because it’s up to the district court — not the appellate court — to determine the reasonable cutoff date for relevant evidence.
“So broad is the district court’s discretion in this context that, to my knowledge, no federal circuit court has ordered a retrial based on the setting of a reasonable evidence cutoff date,” he said. “We are now the first.”
The class of roughly 3 million premium payors allege that Sutter used its market power to illegally force insurers to agree to contract terms blocking plans that steered patients to lower-cost hospitals. Sutter also forced insurers to contract for services at Sutter’s more expensive hospitals in order to get access to the hospitals that members needed, the purchasers claimed. The suit was initially filed more than a decade ago.
The class is composed of those who purchased health insurance policies from Blue Shield, Anthem Blue Cross, Aetna, Health Net or United Healthcare, which accounts for the vast majority of all fully insured patients in California, according to an expert for the plaintiffs.
