Plaintiff in Silicon Valley Hiring Suit Maligns Deal

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Apple has more than $150 billion in the bank, eclipsing the combined cash reserves of Israel and Britain. Google, Intel and Adobe have a total of about $80 billion stored up for a rainy day. Against such tremendous cash hoards, $324 million is chump change. But that is what the four technology companies have agreed to pay to settle a class action brought by their own employees.

Michael Devine, a 46-year-old freelance programmer who is one of the four plaintiffs named in the suit, thinks the companies are getting off far too lightly. In a very rare form of protest, he sent a letter to the judge in the case, Lucy H. Koh of United States District Court for the Northern District of California, asking her to reject the deal that his own lawyers negotiated. “The class wants a chance at real justice,” he wrote. “We want our day in court.” He noted that the settlement amount was about one-tenth of the estimated $3 billion lost in compensation by the 64,000 class members. In a successful trial, antitrust laws would triple that sum.


Plaintiff in Silicon Valley Hiring Suit Maligns Deal