DALLAS, July 8, 2015 /PRNewswire/ -- A group of airline
customers has filed a federal class-action lawsuit in Dallas accusing four major U.S. airlines of
violating antitrust laws by conspiring to artificially inflate
airfares in order to reap huge profits.
The lawsuit filed July 8 says
Texas-based Southwest Airlines
(NYSE:LUV) and American Airlines (NASDAQ:AAL), Atlanta's Delta Airlines (NYSE:DAL) and
Chicago's United Airlines
(NYSE:UAL) conspired to restrict capacity by limiting routes and
the number of available seats in order to charge artificially high
prices.
"The defendants are so intent on raising profits that they
appear to have colluded to gouge customers' pocketbooks and keep
airfares sky high," says Dallas
attorney Warren T. Burns of Burns Charest LLP, who represents the
plaintiffs. "Agreeing to restrict capacity to keep your profits
high marks the very definition of an antitrust violation."
The lawsuit describes a series of economic conditions that
should have resulted in more available airline seats and lower
ticket prices, including increasing public demand for airline seats
and the fact that airlines paid at least $1.50 per gallon less for jet fuel in 2014
compared to 2013. Instead, the supply of seats has remained
virtually flat and airline fares skyrocketed at an
inflation-adjusted rate of 13 percent from 2009 to 2014, the
lawsuit says.
Today's filing follows last week's announcement from the U.S.
Department of Justice that it is investigating the airlines'
tactics. Similar lawsuits on behalf of airline customers have been
filed in New York, Chicago, San
Francisco, and Washington,
D.C. Mr. Burns and Burns Charest have moved to transfer and
consolidate all the civil cases in the U.S. District Court for the
Northern District of Texas, where
today's lawsuit was filed.
The case is Cumming, et al.
v. American Airlines, Inc., et al., No. 3:15-cv-02253.
Burns Charest is a Dallas and
New Orleans-based trial law firm
with a national practice representing consumers and businesses. The
firm represents clients in large, complex class actions; antitrust
claims; oil and gas royalty disputes; environmental pollution
cases; and asbestos exposure claims. To learn more, visit
http://www.burnscharest.com.
For more information on the class-action lawsuit against
the airlines, please contact Mark
Annick at 800-559-4534 or
mark@androvett.com.
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SOURCE Burns Charest