Hughes v. City of Stockton

Full title: JAIME HUGHES, MARY CORONADO, AUDREY MILLS, VIRGINIA CARDOZA, KAREN…

Court: United States District Court, E.D. California

Date published: Oct 3, 2005

NO. CIV. S 03-0166 MCE DAD (E.D. Cal. Oct. 3, 2005)

Opinion

NO. CIV. S 03-0166 MCE DAD.

October 3, 2005

ORDER

MORRISON ENGLAND, District JudgePage 2

Through this motion, Plaintiffs seeks Judgment as a Matter of Law ("JMOL") under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure¹ 50(b).²

1 All further references to "Rule" or "Rules" are to the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure unless otherwise noted.

2 Plaintiffs' counsel previously moved for JMOL under 50(a). That motion, which was denied, was a prerequisite for bringing the present Rule 50(b) motion. Janes v. Wal-Mart Stores, Inc., 279 F.3d 883, 886-87 (9^th Cir. 2002).

JMOL is proper only if "the evidence, construed in the light most favorable to the nonmoving party, permits only one reasonable conclusion, and that conclusion is contrary to that of the jury." White v. Ford Motor Co., 312 F.3d 998, 1010 (9^th Cir. 2002). To justify relief through JMOL, there must be a "complete absence of probative facts to support . . . [the] conclusion reached so that no reasonable juror could have found for . . . [the] nonmoving party." Eich v. Board of Regents for Central Missouri State Univ., 350 F.3d 752, 761 (8^th Cir. 2003). JMOL should not be granted unless there is an overwhelming amount of evidence in favor of the Plaintiffs as moving parties, and fair minded persons could not have arrived at a verdict against them. See Meloff v. New York Life Ins. Co., 240 F.3d 138, 145 (2d Cir. 2001); Strickland Tower Maintenance, Inc. v. American Tel Tel. Comm., Inc., 128 F.3d 1422, 1426 (10^th Cir. 1997). In assessing the propriety of JMOL, the Court may not make credibility determinations or weigh the evidence. City Solutions, Inc. v. Clear Channel Communications, 365 F.3d 835, 841 (9^th Cir. 2004).

The circumstances of the instant case do not approach these rigorous criteria, and do not justify the extraordinary relief represented by JMOL. First, despite Plaintiffs' apparent assertion to the contrary, the standard outlined above makes it clear that the Court cannot reweigh the evidence offered at trial. The fact that evidence was presented, from which the jury could have based its verdict, is enough to uphold the verdict in the face of a requested JMOL. Here, the jury heard evidence that pursuant to a November 2000 agreement between labor unions representing Plaintiffs and Defendant City of Stockton, regularly scheduled overtime pay was folded into Plaintiffs' base salary. The jury also received evidence that Plaintiff's would have received a 23.7 percent increase in their base salary were overtime not so included, as well as evidence that Plaintiffs' salaries after the 2000 agreement were in fact more than they had been prior to the agreement, when overtime had been expressly reflected in their pay calculations. Given that evidence, the Court cannot conclude, as it must to justify JMOL, that no reasonable jury could have found in favor of the City of Stockton.

Plaintiffs' Motion for Judgment as a Matter of Law is accordingly DENIED.³

3 Because oral argument would not be of material assistance, this matter was deemed suitable for decision without oral argument. E.D. Local Rule 78-230(h).

IT IS SO ORDERED.