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A federal court in West Virginia dismissed a motion for declaratory judgment prohibiting a party from invoking an arbitration agreement, which prohibited class action, for lack of standing because the arbitration agreement was never invoked.
In Jones v. Sears Roebuck & Co., No. CIVA 5:06CV00345, 2007 WL 964401 (S.D. W. Va. Mar. 28, 2007), Mildred Jones entered into a credit card agreement with Sears. After a dispute arose, Jones sought a declaratory judgment prohibiting Sears from invoking its arbitration agreement.
The Court dismissed Jones' claims against Sears, concluding that Jones did not have standing to seek declaratory judgment against Sears for its inclusion of arbitration agreements because the arbitration agreement had never been invoked.
An actual "controversy between the parties" is required to invoke the Court's jurisdiction to grant declaratory judgment. The burden was on Jones to show that she individually satisfied the "constitutional requirements of standing," regardless of whether she sought judgment as a class. Bowen v. First Family Fin. Servs., Inc., 233 F.3d 1331, 1339 n. 6 (11th Cir. 2000).
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