Bragar Eagel & Squire, P.C., a nationally recognized shareholder rights law firm, announces that a class action lawsuit has been filed in the United States District Court for the Northern District of Texas on behalf of investors that purchased Southwest Airlines Co. (NYSE: LUV) securities between February 7, 2017 and June 25, 2019 (the “Class Period”). Investors have until April 20, 2020 to apply to the Court to be appointed as lead plaintiff in the lawsuit.
Click here to participate in the action.
The complaint, filed on February 19, 2020, alleges that throughout the Class Period defendants made materially false and misleading statements regarding the Company’s business, operational and compliance policies. Specifically, defendants made false and/or misleading statements and/or failed to disclose that: (i) Southwest’s operations were non-compliant with government maintenance and safety regulations; (ii) the foregoing issues were exacerbated by Southwest’s undue influence over FAA officials and, consequently, lax regulatory oversight of the Company’s operations; (iii) all of the foregoing significantly increased the safety risks to passengers traveling on Southwest flights and heightened governmental scrutiny into the Company; and (iv) as a result, the Company’s public statements were materially false and misleading at all relevant times.
On April 17, 2018, news sources reported that a Southwest plane had blown an engine, which exploded and caused shrapnel to strike the plane. The explosion resulted in the death of one passenger, who was partially pulled through a large hole as the cabin suffered rapid decompression, and injured seven others. According to the Chairman of the National Transportation Safety Board, the incident marked “the first passenger fatality in a U.S. airline accident since 2009,” and that, out of twenty-four fan blades in the engine at issue, one was missing.
On this news, Southwest’s stock price fell $0.62 per share, or 1.13%, to close at $54.27 per share on April 17, 2018.
On April 19, 2018, the FAA announced that it would “order inspections of at least 220 aircraft engines as investigators are focusing on a broken fan blade in an engine that exploded.” According to news sources, the order was initially proposed in August 2016, following the earlier incident in which engine failure had also resulted from a broken fan blade. Critics also reportedly questioned why the FAA had not acted sooner in conjunction with their European counterparts.
On this news, Southwest’s stock price fell $1.02 per share, or 1.83%, to close at $54.80 per share on April 19, 2018.
On June 21, 2018, news sources reported that eight passengers were suing Southwest in connection with the engine explosion in April 2018.
On this news, Southwest’s stock price fell $1.24 per share, or 2.33%, to close at $51.91 per share on June 22, 2018.
Finally, on June 25, 2019, the Wall Street Journal published an article entitled “FAA Reassigns Senior Managers in Office Overseeing Southwest Airlines,” which reported that the FAA had “removed three senior managers in the office overseeing Southwest Airlines Co., amid allegations of lax safety enforcement raised by agency whistleblowers and various resulting government inquiries.” The article also noted that “[t]he [DOT]’s inspector-general has been looking into some of the safety issues for many months . . . including lapses by the airline in documenting maintenance for more than 100 of its jets,” as well as “failures to reliably compute the weight of checked baggage and hazardous landing incidents in which one aircraft smacked a wingtip on the tarmac and another ran off the strip in stormy weather.”
On this news, Southwest’s stock price fell $0.30 per share, or 0.59%, to close at $50.70 per share on June 26, 2019.
If you purchased Southwest securities during the Class Period, are a long-term stockholder, have information, would like to learn more about these claims, or have any questions concerning this announcement or your rights or interests with respect to these matters, please contact Melissa Fortunato or Marion Passmore by email at investigations@bespc.com, telephone at (212) 355-4648, or by filling out this contact form. There is no cost or obligation to you.
About Bragar Eagel & Squire, P.C.:
Bragar Eagel & Squire, P.C. is a nationally recognized law firm with offices in New York and California. The firm represents individual and institutional investors in commercial, securities, derivative, and other complex litigation in state and federal courts across the country. For more information about the firm, please visit www.bespc.com. Attorney advertising. Prior results do not guarantee similar outcomes.
View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20200220005892/en/
Contacts:
Melissa Fortunato, Esq.
Marion Passmore, Esq.
(212) 355-4648
investigations@bespc.com
www.bespc.com
