ALLENTOWN – An attorney who recently filed a class action lawsuit in a Philadelphia federal court on behalf of all U.S. citizens impacted by the coronavirus against the People’s Republic of China has brought another similar case against the Chinese nation and its foremost political party – only now in Allentown and specifically on behalf of more than 20 different professionals and business owners, plus an FBI employee.
The litigation was filed on May 11 with 26 named plaintiffs. All of them have been or are currently represented by the plaintiff counsel, or otherwise have a connection to them and want their representation in the case.
25 of the plaintiffs are business owners located throughout the United States, with the vast majority of them being located either in or around the Philadelphia general metropolitan area, but three of them are based in South Carolina.
Two of the plaintiffs have themselves been stricken ill with the coronavirus, with one of those being an automobile salesman in Plymouth Meeting and the other an employee of the FBI, a William L. Krzemien Jr., of Bethlehem.
Per the lawsuit, “The delay and failure by the senior officials of the government of China, which was the first country to face the new coronavirus and the source of the virus, directly resulted in the global pandemic. The coronavirus pandemic currently has resulted in more than 4 million cases in the world, more than 1.3 million COVID-19 cases in the United States and approximately 80,000 U.S. deaths.”
“The Chinese Community Party and the government of China knew of the devastation of the coronavirus and prevented Chinese citizens from leaving or entering the city of Wuhan. However, the Chinese Communist Party and the government of China allowed foreign citizens to come in and out of the city of Wuhan.”
Further referenced in the lawsuit is a recent Associated Press article that details that by no later than Jan. 14, Chinese health officials knew that person-to-person transmission of the coronavirus was possible, that it may spread to other countries and advised President Xi Jinping, Premier Li Keqiang and Vice-Premier Sun Chunlan of the same.
“Despite possessing such information and knowledge, however, at that time, the officials of the Chinese Communist Party and the government of China did not publicly disclose the strong possibility of the spread of the coronavirus by human-to-human transmission, including spread to other countries and the danger that the coronavirus infection in Wuhan would develop into a major public health event and global pandemic,” the suit states.
“Instead, officials of the Chinese Communist Party and the government publicly downplayed the risk of the spread of the coronavirus, stated publicly that the risk of human-to-human transmission of the virus was low and that there was no evidence of such transmission.”
The suit charges that subsequently, its plaintiffs suffered severe and significant economic losses resulting from shutdown measures associated with the virus.
Member of plaintiff counsel Charles D. Mandracchia of Mandracchia & McWhirk in Montgomery County, previously stated that his other, class action suit was filed to say that Americans are willing to fight for what they believe in, for what they’ve worked for and for what their country stands for.
“The bottom line is the American people don’t want to get pushed around. [China] has destroyed our economy, our country and the American businessperson, people with small businesses. We just want to take a stand and say we will not tolerate this,” Mandracchia had said.
“China needs to pay and needs to pay in a big way. It needs to be proportioned similar to the payroll protection plan. It’s definitely negligent, what they did is outrageous.”
For counts of negligence, reckless indifference and misrepresentation, the plaintiffs are seeking compensatory damages in excess of $75,000 per plaintiff, punitive damages, costs of suit, attorney’s fees and such other and further relief as the Court may deem proper.
The plaintiffs are represented by Charles D. Mandracchia of Mandracchia & McWhirk in Skippack and Christopher D. Mandracchia of CDM Law, in Conshohocken.
U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania case 5:20-cv-02235
From the Pennsylvania Record: Reach Courts Reporter Nicholas Malfitano at nick.malfitano@therecordinc.com