Shutterfly, Lifetouch class action suit dismissed

A U.S. District Court judge dismissed a proposed Shutterfly LLC and Shutterfly Lifetouch LLC class-action suit over allegedly unsolicited school photographs sent as part of Lifetouch’s “Family Approval Program.” The complaint, The ruling on the suit, filed in the Northern District of California, No. 5:20-cv-06040, said the plaintiffs failed to distinguish the conduct of the respective entities in their complaint.

By lumping the companies together, the plaintiffs’ complaint “obfuscates what roles each Defendant played in the alleged harm,” Judge Beth Labson Freeman wrote in the Wednesday ruling, according to Bloomberg Law. The plaintiffs, Don Cullen and Ellen Ross, claim under the Postal Reorganization Act failed, too.

In their original complaint, Cullen and Ross claimed Lifetouch takes unsolicited photos of preschool children in the spring, which are then packaged and sent to parents, requesting payment in kind. According to the lawsuit, parents are often “blindsided” when they receive the photos and feel pressured to pay for them “or return them to the school to an unknown fate,” according to Top Class Actions.