Huggins v. Wiener
- Paul Crotty
- 1:18-cv-01037
- U.S. District Court · Southern District of New York
- 3
In Huggins v. Wiener, Judge Crotty denied defendants’ reconsideration motion, leaving conditional certification in place pending further discovery.
The ruling affected the plaintiffs seeking to proceed as an FLSA collective action, potential opt-in plaintiffs who could receive notice, and defendants Chestnut Holdings Inc. and Jonathan Wiener. It left the joint-employer issue unresolved for a later stage after discovery.
What happened
In Huggins v. Wiener, plaintiffs brought a Fair Labor Standards Act case and asked the court to notify potential participants in a group lawsuit. The court had conditionally approved that request on May 29, 2020.
Chestnut Holdings Inc. and Jonathan Wiener asked the court to reconsider, arguing that it should first decide whether either defendant employed the superintendents under a shared-employer theory. They argued that the court had overlooked controlling legal authority and its own earlier ruling.
The court denied the reconsideration motion because the shared-employer issue was premature at the first certification stage and had already been reserved for the second stage after more discovery. Judge Paul A. Crotty directed the clerk to close the motion.
The detailed version
- Huggins v. Wiener · No. 1:18-cv-01037
- Paul Crotty
- July 16, 2020
Background
The plaintiffs brought this action under the Fair Labor Standards Act, a federal wage-and-hour law, and sought conditional certification of a collective action under 29 U.S.C. § 216(b). Conditional certification is an initial decision allowing notice to be sent to people who may choose to join the case. On May 29, 2020, the court granted conditional certification under the two-step process used in the Second Circuit.
Motion for Reconsideration
Chestnut Holdings Inc. and Jonathan Wiener moved for reconsideration of that decision. They argued that the court had overlooked controlling authority and its own earlier order and had made plain error by failing to decide whether Chestnut Holdings or Wiener employed any superintendents under a joint-employer theory.
The court held that the joint-employer argument was premature at the initial certification stage. It explained that the issue involved fact-intensive questions better addressed at the second stage of collective-action certification, after further discovery. The defendants did not identify any case, including controlling authority, requiring the court to decide joint-employer status at the first stage.
The defendants relied on an earlier discovery order stating that the joint-employer issue would significantly affect the scope and viability of the collective action. The court said that statement did not commit it to deciding the issue based on limited discovery at the first certification stage. The court also noted that the earlier statement arose while defendants had refused to produce proposed collective-action discovery, including discovery concerning whether they jointly employed the plaintiff.
The court further concluded that its May 29 conditional-certification order had already addressed the issue by reserving it for the second step after additional discovery. It therefore characterized the reconsideration motion as an attempt to relitigate an issue already decided.
Disposition
The court denied the motion for reconsideration and directed the clerk to close the motion at Docket No. 74. The opinion does not decide whether Chestnut Holdings or Jonathan Wiener were joint employers; it leaves that issue for the later certification stage.
Read the full 3-page opinion on CourtListener, the free public archive maintained by the Free Law Project.