Although the plaintiff´s evidence regarding her claimed overtime hours was inexact and undocumented, the U.S. District Court for Eastern Louisiana said that in light of the employer´s failure to keep records required by the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA), the lawsuit for unpaid wages and other damages in Templet v. Hard Rock Construction Co. can proceed.
The court acknowledged that Tiffany Templet´s deposition contained "only very general statements regarding the extent of the overtime worked." However, the court nonetheless found that the evidence was enough "to shift the burden to an employer who has failed in its statutory duty to keep accurate time records." The FLSA requires employers to keep records for nonexempt and exempt employees. State statues may contain additional recordkeeping requirements.
Templet´s Claims
Templet began working as a receptionist for Hard Rock Construction Co. in 1999. Less than a year later, she was promoted to a position as accounting and administrative assistant and was, the court noted, a "10 out of 10 stars" employee. In July 2001, Templet announced that she was pregnant. Later that month, she was demoted, and two months later, she was fired.
In addition to alleging that she regularly worked through lunch and often worked other extra hours that exceeded 40 hours a week, Templet sued Hard Rock for sex discrimination - claiming that she was demoted, then fired, for being pregnant - under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964.
The owners of the construction firm maintained that they had legitimate reasons for demoting and firing Templet, based on her performance. The company therefore asked the court to dismiss her lawsuit. However, the court found that Templet presented enough evidence of discrimination to constitute what is called a "mixed-motive" claim under Price Waterhouse v. Hopkins, 490 U.S. 228 (1989). With respect to Templet´s unpaid overtime-wages claim under the FLSA, the court relied on another U.S. Supreme Court decision that established burden-of-proof standards for when an employer fails to keep records required under the law.
"When an employer has failed to maintain the payroll records required by the act, the employee´s initial burden is to make out a prima facie case that the act has been violated and to produce some evidence to show the amount and extent of the violation," the Templet court said, citing Anderson v. Mt. Clemens Pottery Co., 328 U.S. 680 (1946).
That evidence, added the court in Templet, can be inexact or approximate. For example, Templet testified that she worked from 7 a.m. to 4 p.m. - and even longer hours after she became an accounting assistant - and that she nearly always worked through lunch.
Denying Hard Rock´s motion for summary judgment - and again quoting the High Court in Anderson - the court said that "[a] reasonable jury could find from this evidence that plaintiff has produced sufficient evidence to show five hours of overtime per week ´as a matter of just and reasonable inference.´ " (Templet v. Hard Rock Construction Co., E.D. Louisiana, No. Civ.A. 02-0929, Jan. 27, 2003)
This article was excerpted from the April 2003 issue of the Fair Labor Standards Handbook for States, Local Governments and Schools. For more information about this publication, see
http://www.thompson.com/libraries/wagehour/fair/index.html.