On July 17, the Missouri Court of Appeals affirmed a ruling of the Cole County Circuit Court dismissing a putative class action under the Fair Credit Reporting Act against multinational staffing company, Kelly Services, Inc.

A three-judge panel of the Missouri Court of Appeals issued a one-page order and eleven-page memorandum opinion upholding the lower court’s ruling that the plaintiff lacked standing to pursue his claim since he alleged only bare procedural violations without the requisite concrete injury.

The panel held: “Not even the most liberal construction of his pleading would support a construction favorable to finding that Mr. Boergert pleaded a concrete and actual injury. …  Because Mr. Boergert did not plead an invasion of a legally protected interest that is concrete and particularized and actual or imminent, not conjectural or hypothetical, the trial court did not err in dismissing his complaint for lack of standing.”

Plaintiff Cott Boergert claimed Kelly Services violated the FCRA when it fired him from a job placement based on information in his consumer report indicating that he had been on probation in 2009 for commission of a felony. Boergert had previously indicated that he had not been on probation for a felony in the preceding seven years when he filled out the employment application.

He then filed the class action in Cole County Circuit Court, claiming that Kelly Services violated the FCRA by including more information in its disclosure form than was allowed and by not providing him with either the report or a summary of his rights. Interestingly, the case was removed to federal court but was dismissed in 2016 under the U.S. Supreme Court’s Spokeo v. Robins decision. That federal district court, however, rethought its decision and the case was remanded back to state court.

The panel’s ruling added: “While alleging that Kelly Services knowingly violated the FCRA by using a disclosure form that contained extraneous information – a bare procedural violation – and that he was therefore entitled to statutory damages for these violations, Mr. Boergert did not plead any concrete or actual injury. … Although he testified during a deposition that the form confused him, he did not plead that it did so or that he did not see the disclosure or authorize Kelly Services to obtain a consumer report.”

Troutman Sanders will continue to monitor these developments and provide further updates as they are available.