Lucio-Cantu v. Vela

United States Court of Appeals
Fifth Circuit
F I L E D
IN THE UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
May 8, 2007
FOR THE FIFTH CIRCUIT
_____________________ Charles R. Fulbruge III
Clerk
No. 06-20787
Summary Calendar
_____________________
MARGARET LUCIO-CANTU; DAWN MICHELLE RODRIGUEZ, and all
others similarly situated; MARISA MORALES,
Plaintiffs - Appellees,
versus
BLASA VELA, doing business as Blasa Vela Allstate Agency;
VELA & VELA AGENCIES, INC.,
Defendants - Appellants.
_________________________________________________________________
Appeal from the United States District Court
for the Southern District of Texas, Houston
USDC No. 4:04-CV-3353
_________________________________________________________________
Before JOLLY, GARZA, and DENNIS, Circuit Judges.
PER CURIAM:*
Blasa Vela and Vela & Vela Agencies, Inc. (“Vela”) appeal the
district court’s judgment awarding unpaid overtime, attorneys’
fees, and costs to Margaret Lucio-Cantu, Dawn Michelle Rodriguez,
and Marisa Morales (collectively, “Plaintiffs”) following a jury
trial. We AFFIRM.
*
Pursuant to 5TH CIR. R. 47.5, the Court has determined that
this opinion should not be published and is not precedent except
under the limited circumstances set forth in 5TH CIR. R. 47.5.4.
I.
Plaintiffs, former employees of Vela, sued Vela in federal
district court, alleging that Vela failed to pay them overtime as
required by the Fair Labor Standards Act, 29 U.S.C. § 201, et seq.
(“FLSA”). The parties consented to have the matter referred to a
magistrate judge, and the matter proceeded to a jury trial. The
jury found, inter alia, that Vela failed to pay Plaintiffs overtime
as required by the FLSA in the following amounts: $3348.29 to
Lucio-Cantu, $52.50 to Rodriguez, and $1296.00 to Morales.
Additionally, the jury found that Vela’s actions in failing to pay
Plaintiffs overtime were not willful. Despite the jury’s finding
on willfulness, however, the district court exercised its
discretion to award liquidated damages to Plaintiffs because Vela
did not show that she made all necessary good faith efforts to
comply with the FLSA or that she reasonably believed she was acting
in conformity with the law. The district court awarded liquidated
damages equal to the unpaid overtime amounts found by the jury,
thereby doubling the Plaintiffs’ recovery. The district court also
awarded costs and $51,750 in Plaintiffs’ attorneys’ fees. Vela
appealed.
II.
Vela attacks the judgment of the district court on numerous
grounds. We reject all of Vela’s arguments, for the following
reasons.
A.
2
First, Vela argues judicial estoppel. Vela contends that the
district court failed to give “full faith and credit” to a Texas
state court judgment in which, Vela alleges, plaintiffs Lucio-Cantu
and Morales received deferred adjudications for pocketing insurance
premium payments from Vela’s clients for their personal use while
issuing false receipts and false confirmations that the underlying
insurance policies were still effective. According to Vela, the
Texas deferred adjudications judicially estop Lucio-Cantu and
Morales from arguing in federal court that Vela failed to pay them
overtime, because during the periods of unpaid overtime, according
to Vela, Lucio-Cantu and Morales did not perform work “primarily
for the benefit” of their employer but instead for the benefit of
their criminal activities. See Vega v. Gasper, 36 F.3d 417, 424
(5th Cir. 1994) (quoting Dunlop v. City Elec., Inc., 527 F.2d 394,
401 (5th Cir. 1976)).
We do not reach the merits of Vela’s judicial estoppel
argument because it is unsupported by the record. The district
court refused to admit Vela’s Exhibits 67 and 68, copies of the
Texas deferred adjudications, and Vela failed to proffer Exhibits
67 and 68 to preserve them in the record.1 Without the Texas
deferred adjudications before us, we are unable to determine
whether the district court properly held them inadmissible, whether
1
Vela later filed a motion in this Court to supplement the
record with Exhibits 67 and 68. We denied Vela’s motion on January
24, 2007.
3
they judicially estop Lucio-Cantu and Morales from bringing their
FLSA claims against Vela, and whether the district court should
have given them “full faith and credit.”
B.
Next, Vela argues that Plaintiffs are not the “prevailing
parties” and therefore are not entitled to attorneys’ fees. See
Hensley v. Eckerhart, 461 U.S. 424, 433 (1983); Saizan v. Delta
Concrete Prod. Co., Inc., 448 F.3d 795, 799 (5th Cir. 2006); Tyler
v. Union Oil Co. of Calif., 304 F.3d 379, 404 (5th Cir. 2002).
According to Vela, Rodriguez is not a prevailing party because her
$52.50 award is “de minimis.” Vela also argues that Lucio-Cantu
and Morales are not prevailing parties because their awards, when
offset by the restitution amounts and costs they are allegedly
paying under the Texas deferred adjudication, are either de minimis
or zero. Alternatively, Vela argues that there is insufficient
evidence to support Plaintiffs’ awards and that the jury’s findings
are contrary to the overwhelming weight of the evidence.
We conclude that Plaintiffs are the prevailing parties. As
the district court correctly explained in its August 21, 2006
order, Plaintiffs prevailed on their most significant issue in the
case: whether Vela violated the FLSA by failing to pay them for
overtime. Plaintiffs provided sufficient evidence to support the
jury’s findings, each testifying to the number of overtime hours
4
they worked that Vela never compensated.2 Vela’s remaining
arguments are without merit and are unsupported by case law.
Accordingly, under Hensley, Plaintiffs are prevailing parties
entitled to attorneys’ fees. See 461 U.S. at 433.
C.
Vela also challenges the amount of attorneys’ fees the
district court awarded, arguing the award is excessive in the light
of Plaintiffs’ limited recovery. We find no abuse of discretion.
The district court properly calculated the lodestar amount and then
properly considered the Plaintiffs’ limited recovery when it
reduced the lodestar amount by ten percent. See Saizan, 448 F.3d
at 799-803.
D.
Finally, Vela challenges the district court’s liquidated
damages award. We agree with the district court’s analysis in its
August 21, 2006 order and uphold the award. In her testimony
before the jury, Vela failed to show that she “had reasonable
grounds for believing that [her] act or omission was not a
violation of the Fair Labor Standards Act.” See Martinez v. Food
2
Also, by their testimony, Plaintiffs met their initial
burden of producing sufficient evidence of the amount and extent of
the unpaid overtime they worked. See Harvill v. Westward Comm’ns,
L.L.C., 433 F.3d 428, 441 (5th Cir. 2005). Vela was unable to
rebut Plaintiffs’ evidence because she had destroyed Plaintiffs’
employment records. See id.
5
City, Inc., 658 F.2d 369, 376 (5th Cir. 1981) (quoting 29 U.S.C. §
260).
III.
For the foregoing reasons, the judgment of the district court
is
AFFIRMED.
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