Julian v. Swift Transportation Incorporated

District Court, D. Arizona·Decided December 27, 2019·No. 2:16-cv-00576·Unknown

Opinion

1 WO 2 3 4 5 6 IN THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT 7 FOR THE DISTRICT OF ARIZONA

9 Pamela Julian, No. CV-16-00576-PHX-ROS

10 Plaintiff, ORDER

11 v.

12 Swift Transportation Company Incorporated, et al., 13 Defendants. 14 15 Swift Transportation Company was entitled to deduct from Plaintiffs’ pay no more 16 than eight hours of time, per day, for time Plaintiffs were logged as “sleeper berth.” In 17 theory, that legal ruling should have allowed the parties to calculate the amount of damages 18 due each Plaintiff. Unfortunately, Swift was not able to produce complete and accurate 19 time records that would allow for a simple calculation of damages. But Swift did produce 20 partial records and those partial records were enough to shift the burden of proof to Swift 21 to prove why the damages calculated under the partial records were inaccurate. Swift has 22 not carried its burden, meaning Plaintiffs are entitled to an award of damages in the amount 23 calculated by their expert. The parties’ other disputes involving the compensability of the 24 first day of orientation and additional uncompensated time in the sleeper berth must 25 proceed to trial. 26 BACKGROUND 27 In prior orders, the Court concluded Plaintiffs were entitled to be paid for time they 28 were logged as “sleeper berth” in excess of eight hours per day. After reaching that 1 conclusion, the Court believed Plaintiffs likely could be awarded damages as a matter of 2 law. After all, throughout this litigation Swift has repeatedly argued its time records 3 accurately reflected the amount of time each plaintiff spent logged as “sleeper berth.” (See, 4 e.g., Doc. 157 at 12). But when Plaintiffs filed their motion seeking damages based on 5 Swift’s own records, Swift’s belief in the accuracy of its records evaporated. According 6 to Swift, its records are not, in fact, reliable. Thus, Swift now claims its records are so 7 incomplete and full of errors that they cannot be used to determine Plaintiffs’ damages. 8 While Swift argues the alleged deficiencies in the records means only a jury can determine 9 the appropriate damages, that is not accurate. 10 During discovery, Swift produced two types of records that are relevant for 11 determining damages: 1) “DOT driver logs” and 2) “compensation data.” (Doc. 223 at 9). 12 The “DOT driver logs” refer to the records kept by Plaintiffs to comply with Department 13 of Transportation requirements. Those logs contained the following information for the 14 time period from June 30, 2015 through August 28, 2017: date, driver ID, and a driver’s 15 status throughout each day (i.e., “driving,” “off duty,” “on duty,” and “sleeper berth”). 16 (Doc. 223-1 at 8). As for the “compensation data” Swift produced, those records contained 17 the driver ID, hours worked, amount paid, and a description of the hours worked as either 18 “on duty [driving]” or “on duty not [driving].” (Doc. 234-6 at 39). Swift was not able to 19 produce complete DOT driver logs or “compensation data” for every Plaintiff. 20 Beginning with the DOT drivers logs, Swift produced logs related to 8,238 21 Plaintiffs. However, 10,210 opt-in consent forms have been filed. (Doc. 237 at 12). The 22 parties agree that some of those opt-in consent forms are duplicates but they disagree on 23 the exact number. It is undisputed, however, that there are at least 9,552 unique opt-in 24 forms, meaning there are at least 9,552 Plaintiffs. Given that number, and the DOT driver 25 logs produced, Swift did not produce any data for 1,314 (9,552-8,238) opt-in plaintiffs. In 26 other words, Swift did not produce DOT driver logs for 13.7% of the collective.1 27 As for the “compensation data,” Swift was not able to produce anything close to 28 1 The 13.7% figure assumes the collective is, in fact, limited to 9,552 individuals. 1 comprehensive data. The DOT driver logs covered approximately 52,541 employee 2 workweeks but Swift was able to produce “compensation data” for less than half of those 3 workweeks. (Doc. 237 at 4, 8). Moreover, the “compensation data” did not indicate the 4 amount of time Plaintiffs spent in the sleeper berth. Given that the “compensation data” 5 did not cover over half of the relevant time and contained no information regarding sleeper 6 berth time, the “compensation data” is of very limited use for calculating the damages 7 presently at issue. The DOT driver logs are the only realistic basis for calculating those 8 damages and that is what Plaintiffs’ expert primarily relied upon in reaching his 9 conclusions. 10 Plaintiffs retained an expert, David Breshears, to provide damages calculations.2 11 Breshears used both the DOT driver logs and the “compensation data” to complete his 12 calculations but the “compensation data” was only used to make a preliminary calculation 13 regarding hourly rates. Starting with the “compensation data,” Breshears calculated “a 14 ‘driving’ pay rate” as the amount paid under the “description of ‘D-On Duty Driv. Hrl’” 15 divided by the hours under that description. Breshears then calculated “a ‘non-driving’ 16 pay rate” as the amount with an income description of “D-On Duty Not Drv” divided by 17 the hours under that description. These two calculations gave Breshears hourly pay rates 18 he then applied to the information contained in the DOT driver logs. 19 Using the DOT driver logs, Breshears calculated each “employee’s weekly total 20 pay” as “(a) the driving hours in the log records . . . multiplied by the related driving pay 21 rate . . . plus (b) the on duty hours in the log records multiplied by the related non-driving 22 pay rate.” (Doc. 223-1 at 10). The sum of those two calculations was an individual’s 23 “weekly total pay.” Breshears then calculated each individual’s “daily sleeper hours more 24 than eight.” Breshears combined those sleeper hours with the “on duty hours” and the 25 “driving hours” to get a total number of hours that should have been compensated. Finally, 26 Breshears divided the “weekly total pay” by the total hours that should have been

27 2 Breshears is a Certified Public Account who has “consulted on and/or testified in over 250 matters involving wage and hour-related disputes.” (Doc. 223-1 at 7). Swift does not 28 dispute that Breshears is qualified but Swift does attack the substance of Breshears’ calculations. Swift did not depose Breshears. 1 compensated and compared that to the amount the individual would have been paid if he 2 had earned the federal minimum wage for all compensable time. An example using a 3 particular driver illustrates each of Breshears’ steps. 4 Using the “compensation data,” Breshears determined driver D354514 had a 5 “driving pay rate” of $9.50 per hour and a “non-driving pay rate” of $7.25 per hour. 6 Breshears then looked to the DOT driver logs for the week ending July 6, 2014. Those 7 logs indicated D354514 had 50.67 hours for which he was in a status that required 8 compensation. That is, the logs reflected D354514 logged 4.92 hours of “on duty” time 9 and 45.75 hours of “driving time.” Applying the respective hourly rates to these hours 10 (4.92 hours multiplied by $7.25 per hour and 45.75 multiplied by $9.50 per hour) resulted 11 in D354514 being entitled to $470.28 based on the “on duty” and “driving time” reflected 12 in the DOT driver logs. But the DOT driver logs also indicated that during this particular 13 week, D354514 logged “26.83 daily sleeper hours more than eight per day.” Thus, 14 Breshears added the 26.83 hours to the 50.67 hours to arrive at a total of 77.5 hours that 15 should have been compensated. The total compensation D354514 had been entitled to 16 receive under Swift’s calculation was then divided by the total hours ($470.28 divided by 17 77.5 hours) to determine this individual had been paid an effective hourly rate of only $6.07 18 per hour.

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