Tinnin v. Sutter Valley Med. Found.

647 F.Supp.3d 864

Kristeena TINNIN, on behalf of herself and all others similarly situated, Plaintiff, v. SUTTER VALLEY MEDICAL FOUNDATION,and Does 1 through 20, inclusive, Defendants.

Case No. 1:20-cv-00482-JLT-EPG

United States District Court, E.D. California

Signed December 27, 2022

Daniel C. Keller, Hector Rodriguez Martinez, Stanley Mallison, Mallison & Martinez, Oakland, CA, for Plaintiff.

Amanda M. Osowski, Kacie L. Manisco, Teresa Ghali, Thomas E. Geidt, GBG LLP, San Francisco, CA, for Defendants.

ORDER DENYING MOTION TO DISMISS, STAY, AND/OR STRIKE

Jennifer L. Thurston, UNITED STATES DISTRICT JUDGE

I. INTRODUCTION

Kristeena Tinnin alleges her former employer committed wage and hour violations under the federal Fair Labor Standards Act, various provisions of the California Labor Code, and California's Unfair Competition Law, Cal. Bus. & Prof. Code § 17200, et seq. (Doc. 1.) In the instant motion, Defendant argues that the FLSA cause of action should be dismissed for failure to state a claim; and that the California class action claims should be dismissed or stayed, or, failing this, that the class allegations should be stricken. (Doc. 32.) For the reasons set forth below, Defendant's motion is DENIED.

II. MOTION TO DISMISS THE FLSA CLAIM

A. Motion to Dismiss Standard

A Rule 12(b)(6) motion "tests the legal sufficiency of a claim." Navarro v. Block, 250 F.3d 729, 732 (9th Cir. 2001). In ruling on a motion to dismiss filed pursuant to Rule 12(b), the Court "may generally consider only allegations contained in the pleadings, exhibits attached to the complaint, and matters properly subject to judicial notice." Outdoor Media Grp., Inc. v. City of Beaumont, 506 F.3d 895, 899 (9th Cir. 2007) (citation and quotation marks omitted).

Dismissal of a claim under Rule 12(b)(6) is appropriate when "the complaint lacks a cognizable legal theory or sufficient facts to support a cognizable legal theory." Mendiondo v. Centinela Hosp. Med. Ctr., 521 F.3d 1097, 1104 (9th Cir. 2008). Thus, "[t]o survive a motion to dismiss, a complaint must contain sufficient factual matter, accepted as true, to 'state a claim to relief that is plausible on its face.' " Ashcroft v. Iqbal, 556 U.S. 662, 678, 129 S.Ct. 1937, 173 L.Ed.2d 868 (2009) (quoting Bell Atl. Corp. v. Twombly, 550 U.S. 544, 570, 127 S.Ct. 1955, 167 L.Ed.2d 929 (2007)). The Supreme Court explained,

A claim has facial plausibility when the plaintiff pleads factual content that allows the court to draw the reasonable inference that the defendant is liable for the misconduct alleged. The plausibility standard is not akin to a "probability requirement," but it asks for more than a sheer possibility that a defendant has acted unlawfully. Where a complaint pleads facts that are "merely consistent with" a defendant's liability, it "stops short of the line between possibility and plausibility of 'entitlement to relief.' "

Iqbal, 556 U.S. at 678, 129 S.Ct. 1937 (internal citations omitted).

When considering a motion to dismiss, the Court must accept the factual allegations made in the complaint as true. Hosp. Bldg. Co. v. Rex Hosp. Tr., 425 U.S. 738, 740, 96 S.Ct. 1848, 48 L.Ed.2d 338 (1976). A court must construe the pleading in the light most favorable to the plaintiffs and resolve all doubts in favor of the plaintiffs. Jenkins v. McKeithen, 395 U.S. 411, 421, 89 S.Ct. 1843, 23 L.Ed.2d 404 (1969). However, legal conclusions need not be taken as true when "cast in the form of factual allegations." Ileto v. Glock, Inc., 349 F.3d 1191, 1200 (9th Cir. 2003). To the extent pleadings can be cured by the plaintiff alleging additional facts, leave to amend should be granted. Cook, Perkiss & Liehe, Inc. v. N. Cal. Collection Serv., Inc., 911 F.2d 242, 247 (9th Cir. 1990) (citations omitted).

B. Analysis of FLSA Claim

Plaintiff's first claim for relief arises under the FLSA, which regulates the minimum wages paid to employees, including wages for "overtime" work. See 29 U.S.C. §§ 206-207; Dent v. Cox Commc'ns. Las Vegas, Inc., 502 F.3d 1141, 1143 (9th Cir. 2007). Under the FLSA, an employee who works more than forty hours a week must be paid at least one and one-half times his or her regular rate for the additional hours. 29 U.S.C. § 207(a)(1). An employer who violates Section 207 "shall be liable to the employee or employees affected in the amount of their . . . unpaid overtime compensation . . . and in an additional equal amount as liquidated damages." 29 U.S.C. § 216(b).

In moving to dismiss, Defendant relies principally (see Doc. 32 at 11-12) on Landers v. Quality Commc'ns, Inc., in which the Ninth Circuit addressed for the first time "the degree of specificity required to state a claim for failure to pay minimum wages or overtime wages under the FLSA" following the Supreme Court's decisions in Twombly and Iqbal. 771 F.3d 638, 640 (9th Cir. 2015). The Ninth Circuit noted: "Pre-Twombly and Iqbal, a complaint under the FLSA for minimum wages or overtime wages merely had to allege that the employer failed to pay the employee minimum wages or overtime wages." Id. at 641. However, the Ninth Circuit observed that with Twombly and Iqbal, the Supreme Court clarified plaintiffs must allege facts sufficient to "state[ ] a plausible claim for relief." Id. Therefore, the Ninth Circuit determined that "to survive a motion to dismiss, a plaintiff asserting a claim to overtime payments must allege that she worked more than forty hours in a given workweek without being compensated for the overtime hours worked during that workweek." Id. at 644-45. Landers explained:

[T]he plausibility of a claim is "context-specific." A plaintiff may establish a plausible claim by estimating the length of her average workweek during the applicable period and the average rate at which she was paid, the amount of overtime wages she believes she is owed, or any other facts that will permit the court to find plausibility. Obviously, with the pleading of more specific facts, the closer the complaint moves toward plausibility. However, like the other circuit courts that have ruled before us, we decline to make the approximation of overtime hours the sine qua non of plausibility for claims brought under the FLSA.

Landers, 771 F.3d at 645 (internal citations omitted). Accordingly, generalized allegations of FLSA violations will not suffice. Id. at 645-66.

Landers alleged his employer "implemented a 'de facto piecework no overtime' system and/or failed to pay . . . overtime wages for the hours worked by Landers," which resulted in "the plaintiffs not being paid time and one-half their 'regular hourly rate' for work in excess of 40 hours a week." Id. at 645-46. Further, Landers asserted he "worked more than 40 hours per week for the defendants, and the defendants willfully failed to make said overtime and/or minimum wage payments." Id. at 646. The Ninth Circuit determined these allegations were insufficiently specific, observing: "Notably absent from the allegations in Landers's complaint . . . was any detail regarding a given workweek when Landers worked in excess of forty hours and was not paid overtime for that given workweek and/or was not paid minimum wages." Id. Though FLSA plaintiffs "cannot be expected to allege 'with mathematical precision,' the amount of overtime compensation owed by the employer, they should be able to allege facts demonstrating there was at least one workweek in which they worked in excess of forty hours and were not paid overtime wages." Id. (citation omitted). Therefore, Landers failed to allege facts sufficient to support a claim for violation of the FLSA. Id.

Following Landers, courts have rejected allegations that do no more than parrot the elements of an FLSA claim. See, e.g., Tan v. GrubHub, Inc., 171 F. Supp. 3d 998, 1007-08 (N. D Cal. 2016) (finding FLSA claim too conclusory because "[t]here are no allegations about what period of time or type of conduct Plaintiffs are counting as hours worked. Without these basic factual allegations, the Court cannot conclude that Plaintiffs' minimum wage or overtime claims are plausible."); Shann v. Durham Sch. Servs., L.P., 182 F. Supp. 3d 1044, 1047 (C.D. Cal. 2016) (finding insufficient allegation that plaintiffs "worked more than 40 hours per week, without being paid the proper overtime pay as required by the FLSA, during the period of time they worked 'off the clock' ").

For example, in Perez, cited here by Defendant, the plaintiffs alleged they suffered minimum wage and overtime wage violations under the FLSA because they:

(1) were interrupted during their breaks, (2) were paid for less than the overtime hours actually worked, (3) were not provided with premium payments for all meal and rest periods that defendants forced them to miss, (4) had their time records improperly adjusted to reflect meal breaks that were not actually taken, (5) were required to finish their allotted work even after clocking out for the day, and (6) did not have the value of certain fringe benefits factored into the calculation of their rate of pay for overtime hours.

Perez v. DNC Parks & Resorts at Sequoia, 2020 WL 4344911 at *8 (E.D. Cal. July 29, 2020). Of particular note, the Perez plaintiffs did not "identify a single workweek where they were not paid the . . . overtime pay for any hours worked in excess of eight hours in one workday and forty hours in any one workweek." Id. Perez noted that though one plaintiff alleged she "often works 48 hours per week over 6 days, but . . . is only paid for 43 to 45 hours for those [hours]," she did not allege "what constitutes 'often' and whether it even represents the 'average workweek during the applicable period.' " Id. (quoting Landers, 771 F.3d at 645). Furthermore, the Perez plaintiffs did not identify the average rates at which they were paid or estimate the amount of overtime wages owed. Id. Accordingly, dismissal of the overtime claim was appropriate. Id.; see also Barajas v. Blue Diamond Growers Inc., No. 1:20-CV-0679 JLT SKO...