No. 5-99-0830 IN THE APPELLATE COURT OF ... - Appellate.net

could not have been used to restore their vehicles to pre-loss condition. See C. 15686A; R.
6117, 6191.
Before trial, the circuit court denied State Farm’s motion for summary judgment
against the individual class representatives, on the ground that there were genuine issues of
material fact to be tried. Then, however, the court refused to ask the jury to resolve those
issues of fact, denying State Farm’s request that the jury render a verdict with respect to the
claim of each individual who remained a class representative. The court accepted plaintiffs’
argument that “there is no requirement that the named class representatives prove their
individual cases,” and that the entitlement of the class representatives who appeared at trial,
as well as those that plaintiffs had dropped, depended entirely on “their membership in the
class.” R. 12544-45. That argument, however, turns the Illinois rule on its head. Under
Illinois law, it is not some composite class claim that determines the right of an individual
to recover. Rather, it is “successful adjudication of the purported class representatives’
individual claims” that is supposed to be used to “establish a right of recovery in other class
members.” Slimack, 227 Ill.App.3d at 292-93.
In this case, as plaintiffs’ own arguments reflect, adjudication of the class
representatives’ widely varying claims proved absolutely nothing about the claims of other
class members. Even if one or more of them could have shown that they had personally
suffered an economic loss as a result of a breach of contract by State Farm, such a showing
would have meant nothing for other class members who had different vehicles with different
pre-loss conditions and who received estimates specifying different non-OEM parts under
different circumstances. Because it was apparent at least by the time the case was tried, if
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