June 16, 2025
Grubhub cannot cite a deceptive practices settlement it entered into with the Federal Trade Commission and Illinois officials to terminate the city of Chicago’s lawsuit targeting prices it shows to customers, a state judge said on Monday.
Grubhub’s deal with the FTC and Illinois attorney general cannot flip the res judicata switch on Chicago’s case because settlement agreements do not constitute final judgments on the merits under relevant precedent, Cook County Circuit Judge William Sullivan ruled after hearing arguments on the company’s bid for judgment on the pleadings.
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Representing Chicago, however, Brian Bowcut of Cohen Milstein Sellers & Toll PLLC asserted Grubhub’s motion was “very much an end-around.” Res judicata is an equitable doctrine, and “there is nothing fair or just about what Grubhub has attempted here,” Bowcut told the judge.
The city was aware the FTC was investigating Grubhub, but the federal case and settlement the regulator filed on the same day “was a surprise. It was unknown,” Bowcut said during the hearing. Nor was the city aware of any state investigation, he told Judge Sullivan.
“Grubhub is trying to accomplish by motion what it couldn’t accomplish in any settlement, which is a release of the city’s claims,” Bowcut added.
Beyond those circumstances, however, Chicago has its own sovereign interest in legally pursuing violations of its municipal code and recovering penalties for those violations, Bowcut argued.
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Some of Chicago’s claims may overlap with Grubhub’s settled litigation, such as those on behalf of customers and unaffiliated restaurants, but the city’s claims on affiliated restaurants’ behalf mark a significant distinction from the federal litigation, Bowcut told Judge Sullivan on Monday. That’s a “whole ‘nother world” from what is covered in the settlement at issue, he said.
Chicago is represented in-house by Lucy Prather of the City of Chicago Law Department and Brian Bowcut and Donna Evans of Cohen Milstein Sellers & Toll PLLC.
Read Grubhub Can’t Use FTC Deal to End Chicago’s Deception Suit.