LOS ANGELES (Legal Newsline) – The U.S. District Court for the Central District of California will consider a plea to dismiss a lawsuit brought by individuals who ordered drone flying machines and claimed the products were falsely advertised as to their performance capabilities.
Allen Black, Christopher Jones, Roger Watts and Robert Matos Rivera brought suit earlier this year against the makers and suppliers of drone model aircraft, including Shenzen Sunshine Technology Development; Acumen Robot Intelligence; Sam Tsu, doing business as Onagofly; and Does 1-100 alleging breach of contract, fraud and other counts.
They alleged that drone aircraft they ordered over the internet failed to have options as advertised - for example, failure to fly at consistent speed and camera capability that was exaggerated. Two of the plaintiffs also allege that they never received the drones they had ordered.
ARI filed a motion to dismiss July 27, noting it was included as a defendant because of its crowdfunding campaign.
However, ARI alleges that the plaintiffs had failed in their class action suit to state a claim against ARI. The plaintiffs had instead purchased an Onagofly drone from Indiegogo and never purchased anything directly from ARI or made any payment to that firm to acquire the Onagofly drone.
ARI also alleges that the plaintiffs had also failed to show that a contract existed between themselves and ARI, the motion stated.
In addition, ARI claims that failure to include the website Indiegogo in the suit because the website received the payments made it an indispensable party to the action. This omission should subject the complaint to dismissal unless the website was included in the lawsuit, the defendant claims.
In addition, ARI states that claims of fraud were also lacking because the claims did not specify the individuals who made the fraudulent misrepresentations. The defendants also claim that the plaintiffs fail to allege a valid contract for their claims of breach of implied covenant of good faith and fair dealing.
ARI is represented by Yalan Zheng of the Law Ofices of Park & Zheng in Irvine, California.