‘April Fool’s Joke Gone Wrong’?: Judge Dismisses Securities Suit Over VW’s ‘Voltswagen’ Campaign—For Now
“Merely alleging a daily monitoring function and the participation in the preparation of public statements does not allow this Court to infer that Volkswagen AG ‘collaborated with the authors to such an extent that they controlled the [press release’s] publication,'” Alston wrote, citing the Second Circuit’s 2022 holding in Noto v. 22nd Century Grp. Inc. “In other words, the Amended complaint does not sufficiently allege that Individual Defendants and VWGoA more broadly ‘lacked final control over the [press release’s] contents or did not make the ultimate decision as to what specific information to include.