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Class Action Settlement Bars, Cross Claims, And Co-Defendants: The Search For A Uniform Standard - In Re U.S. Oil & (And) Gas Litigation, Craig Richard Heidemann,

Journal of Dispute Resolution

Prior to the U.S. Oil & Gas decision, the federal courts had only considered settlement bars as related to non-settling defendants. In the U.S. Oil & Gas case, all of the defendants sought to settle with the plaintiff. 2 Only one settling defendant chose to contest the entry of the bar order. 3 In U.S. Oil & Gas, the Eleventh Circuit Court of Appeals was faced with a defendant who settled with the plaintiff but opposed an order barring its seemingly independent claims against the third-party defendant who also settled. For this reason it was a case of first impression. …