Krystal Gurule v. Land Guardian, Incorporat

912 F.3d 252
CourtCourt of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit
DecidedDecember 27, 2018
Docket17-20710
StatusPublished
Cited by42 cases

This text of 912 F.3d 252 (Krystal Gurule v. Land Guardian, Incorporat) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Krystal Gurule v. Land Guardian, Incorporat, 912 F.3d 252 (5th Cir. 2018).

Opinions

STUART KYLE DUNCAN, Circuit Judge:

*255This case asks us to explore the relationship between the cost-shifting mechanism in Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 68 and the fee-shifting provision in the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA), 29 U.S.C. § 201 et seq. One of the plaintiffs rejected a Rule 68 offer of judgment and proceeded to trial, where she prevailed on her FLSA claim and was awarded damages and attorney's fees. There was a catch, however: the damages she won at trial were lower than the offer she had earlier spurned, and so Rule 68 required her to pay the defendants' post-offer costs. The issue is what effect, if any, this should have on the plaintiff's fee award. Several circuits have held that, in assessing a plaintiff's degree of success under a fee-shifting provision like the FLSA's, a court should consider a plaintiff's rejection of a Rule 68 offer that would have given her more than what she ultimately obtained at trial. We think that approach makes sense and so join those circuits. We AFFIRM the fee award, however, because the district court properly considered the rejected Rule 68 offer in its considerable downward adjustment of the lodestar. We AFFIRM the district court's judgment in all other respects.

I.

Appellants Krystal Gurule ("Gurule"), Melissa Hall ("Hall"), Ryan Matte ("Matte"), and Kimberly Taylor ("Taylor") were employees at the midtown Houston nightclub, Gaslamp. Gaslamp is owned and operated by Appellees Land Guardian and Mohammad Ayman Jarrah (collectively "Gaslamp"). Gurule and Hall were employed as bottle-service waitresses, Matte and Taylor as bartenders. In December 2015, those employees sued Gaslamp under the FLSA for failure to pay minimum wage and overtime. See 29 U.S.C. §§ 206(a), 207(a). Their complaint alleged that Gaslamp violated the minimum wage requirement by systematically diverting tips from tipped employees, id. §§ 206(a), 203(m), and the overtime requirement by failing to pay time-and-a-half to employees working more than 40 hours per workweek, id. § 207(a). As relief they sought minimum wage for hours worked, "wrongfully diverted" tips, overtime wages, as well as liquidated damages, attorney's fees, and costs. In February 2016 Hall settled her claims against Gaslamp for $300. In April 2017 Gaslamp moved for partial summary judgment on Matte and Taylor's claims. That same month Gurule, Matte, and Taylor were granted stipulated dismissal of their overtime claims.

In July 2017 the court granted Gaslamp summary judgment on Matte and Taylor's remaining claim. The court found that Matte and Taylor failed to produce any evidence showing "as a matter of just and reasonable inference" that they had "performed uncompensated work." See Harvill v. Westward Commc'ns, LLC , 433 F.3d 428, 441 (5th Cir. 2005) (an FLSA plaintiff meets her initial burden " 'if [she] proves that [she] has in fact performed work for which [she] was improperly compensated and if [she] produces sufficient evidence to show the amount and extent of that work as a matter of just and reasonable inference' ") (quoting Anderson v. Mt. Clemens Pottery Co. , 328 U.S. 680, 687-88, 66 S.Ct. 1187, 90 L.Ed. 1515 (1946) ). Matte and Taylor admitted they lacked "any evidence of their own supporting their claims," but instead "exclusively rel[ied] on the representative testimony of Plaintiff Gurule to prove their hours worked and tips received." As the court explained, such "representational testimony" may establish a prima facie FLSA case under certain circumstances.

*256See, e.g., Tyson Foods, Inc. v. Bouaphakeo , --- U.S. ----, 136 S.Ct. 1036, 1047, 194 L.Ed.2d 124 (2016) ; see also Albanil v. Coast 2 Coast, Inc. , 444 F. App'x 788, 806 (5th Cir. Oct. 13, 2011) (unpublished) (discussing representational testimony in FLSA cases and collecting authorities). But not here, the court concluded, given that Gurule had different duties from Matte and Taylor, lacked "personal knowledge" of their work, and "could only speculate" about their hours. The court therefore granted summary judgment on Matte and Taylor's claims.1

All that remained was Gurule's minimum wage claim, which would be tried to a jury in September 2017. About a year-and-a-half before that, in February 2016, Gaslamp made Gurule an offer of judgment under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 68 in the amount of $3,133.44, which she rejected. She also declined to accept subsequent offers ranging from $1,566 to $5,000 in the months leading up to trial. After a one-day trial, a jury returned a verdict in Gurule's favor and awarded her $1,131.39 in compensatory damages. The district court subsequently awarded her $1,131.39 in liquidated damages and $25,089.30 in attorney's fees. See 29 U.S.C. § 216(b) (providing for liquidated damages equal to compensatory damages and reasonable attorney's fees). Because she had declined Gaslamp's more favorable Rule 68 offer in February 2016, however, Gurule was ordered to pay Gaslamp $1,517.57 in costs. See FED. R. CIV. P. 68(d) (if offeree's final judgment is "not more favorable than the unaccepted offer," offeree "must pay the costs incurred after the offer was made"); see also Marek v. Chesny , 473 U.S. 1

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Bluebook (online)
912 F.3d 252, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/krystal-gurule-v-land-guardian-incorporat-ca5-2018.