Mehri & Skalet represents a lumber company in a proposed class action alleging that defendants, who provide rail freight transportation services, conspired to fix their prices. Price-fixing is one of the most serious antitrust violations, and constitutes a “per se” violation of Section 1 of the Sherman Antitrust Act, a per se violation being one that is so malicious that an inquiry into its reasonableness is unwarranted.
Plaintiffs allege that that the defendants are perpetrating a continuing scheme to keep prices at a level above market value. The suit contends that this is done by assessing customers a rail fuel surcharge, a separately identified fee on customer bills, which purportedly compensates defendants for increases in fuel costs. Plaintiffs allege that defendants, by computing the surcharge as a percentage of revenue rather than as a percentage of the actual cost of fuel, use this device as a mechanism to increase the cost of transport regardless of the price of fuel.
Additionally plaintiffs have alleged that the defendants frequently exchanged information between their companies on the rates that would be charged to customers. The result of this information exchange was perpetually increasing prices to supracompetitive levels that would not be feasible in a free market environment.
This case is currently in litigation in the Federal District Court of Washington, D.C.