Source: http://ri.findacase.com/research/wfrmDocViewer.aspx/xq/fac.20180711_0000101.DRI.htm/qx
Timestamp: 2019-04-20 20:29:21+00:00

Document:
BROWN UNIVERSITY in Providence in the State of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations, Defendant.
This case is one of many, look-alike lawsuits filed nationwide by current and former members of faculty and staff of private (mainly elite) universities in which it is alleged that the universities imprudently managed retirement accounts to the detriment of their employee-plan participants. Plaintiffs Diane G. Short, Samira Pardanani, Judith Daviau, and Joseph Barboza (collectively, “Plaintiffs”), eligible faculty and staff at Defendant Brown University (“Brown” or “Defendant”), and vested participants in one of Brown's two retirement plans, sue individually and as representatives of a class of participants and beneficiaries of the Brown University Deferred Vesting Retirement Plan (“Deferred Vesting Plan”) and the Brown University Legacy Retirement Plan (“Legacy Plan”) (collectively, “Plans”). Plaintiffs suggest they were short-changed by Brown in saving for their retirement. More precisely, Plaintiffs allege that Brown, as the Plans' named fiduciary and plan administrator, has breached its duties of prudence and loyalty contra to the Employee Retirement Income Security Act of 1974 (“ERISA”), 29 U.S.C. §§ 1001-1461. Brown moves to dismiss (ECF No. 21), suggesting Plaintiffs have not overcome the pleading standard of Rule 12(b)(6) of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure. For the below reasons, Brown's Motion is granted in part and denied in part.
is vested with exclusive and complete responsibility and discretionary authority to control the operation, management and administration of the Plans, with all powers necessary to enable it properly to carry out such responsibilities, including the selection and compensation of the providers of administrative services to the Plans and the selection, monitoring, and removal of the investment options made available to participants for the investment of their contributions and provision of their retirement income.
(Id. ¶ 22.) For similar reasons, Brown is a fiduciary to the Plans because it maintains discretionary authority and/or control with respect to the Plans' management, management and disposition of Plan assets, and discretionary authority or responsibility in the Plans' administration. (Id. ¶ 23.) Brown's Plans are known as 403(b) retirement plans.
To overcome a motion to dismiss under Rule 12(b)(6), a complaint must possess sufficient facts “to state a claim for relief that is plausible on its face.” Ashcroft v. Iqbal, 556 U.S. 662, 678 (2009) (quoting Bell Atl. Corp. v. Twombly, 550 U.S. 544, 570 (2007)). “The court must take all of the pleaded factual allegations in the complaint as true, ” Foley v. Wells Fargo Bank, N.A., 772 F.3d 63, 71 (1st Cir. 2014), and draw all reasonable inferences in favor of the plaintiff. Riggs v. Curran, 863 F.3d 6, 10 (1st Cir. 2017). “Barring ‘narrow exceptions,' courts tasked with this feat usually consider only the complaint, documents attached to it, and documents expressly incorporated into it.” Foley, 772 F.3d at 71-72 (quoting Watterson v. Page, 987 F.2d 1, 3 (1st Cir. 1993)). “[A] primary purpose of a Rule 12(b)(6) motion is to weed out cases that . . . based on the factual scenario on which the case rests, the plaintiff could never win.” Id. at 72. “[P]laintiffs are not required to submit evidence to defeat a Rule 12(b)(6) motion, but need only sufficiently allege in their complaint a plausible claim.” Id.
Further, at the motion-to-dismiss stage, “further record development - and particularly input from those with expertise in the arcane area of the law where ERISA's . . . provisions intersect with its fiduciary duty requirements . . . [is] essential to a reasoned elaboration of that which constitutes a breach of fiduciary duty in this context.” LaLonde v. Textron, Inc., 369 F.3d 1, 6 (1st Cir. 2004). “In factually complex ERISA cases like the instant ones, dismissal is often inappropriate.” Brotherston v. Putnam Invs., No. 15-13825-WGY, 2016 WL 1397427, at *1 (D. Mass. 2016); see also Braden v. Wal-Mart Stores, Inc., 588 F.3d 585, 598 (8th Cir. 2009) (“No matter how clever or diligent, ERISA plaintiffs generally lack the inside information necessary to make out their claims in detail unless and until discovery commences.”).

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