2001-01-26 Harley-Davidson Response - Minnesota Judicial Branch

efused to supply any factual detail. Instead, he insisted upon payment of the full demand of the
plaintiff group or face a lawsuit (i.e., a growing attorney’s fees claim.) (Affidavit of Michael
Unger & Exhibits 5 & 7.)
As found by Judge Carolan, the claims of plaintiffs are actually based upon individual “oral
representations made over a period of seven years, by various salespersons, at two different
business locations . . . to at least 25 different individual plaintiffs.” (Friederichs Aff., Ex. E, p. 4.)
In order to evaluate the claims, and avoid an unnecessary attorney fee claim, Twin Cities
Harley-Davidson started separate declaratory judgment actions against each claimant in their
counties of residence and sought their depositions to ascertain their individual claims. (Twin Cities
Harley-Davidson requested that petitioners’ lawyer refrain from any unnecessary litigation until the
depositions could be completed and allow the claims to be evaluated on their merits. In return,
Twin Cities Harley-Davidson promised not to file the declaratory judgment actions or serve other
discovery or even require an answer until after it had had an opportunity to evaluate the individual
claims.) (See Unger Aff., Ex. 8.)
Rather than agree to the proposed claims assessment process, petitioners immediately filed
a lawsuit consolidating all 25 plaintiffs in one claim for damages.* Petitioners then moved for
dismissal of the declaratory judgment actions on the grounds that they were unnecessarily
duplicative and multiplying proceedings. Twin Cities Harley-Davidson, in turn, moved to dismiss
the multi-plaintiff action as an improper consolidation of individual claims which would be
prejudicial to Twin Cities Harley-Davidson on determination of the merits. Bo
‘Petitioners suggest that Twin Cities Harley-Davidson lulled them into an extension to
bring suit first and that Twin Cities Harley-Davidson avoided service. This is false. These
allegations were also presented to Judge Carolan who, on a more complete record and oral
argument, found these contentions to be “without merit.” (Friederichs Aff., Ex. C & D, p. 5.)
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