Rowe v. Google LLC
- Rearden
- 1:19-cv-08655
- U.S. District Court · Southern District of New York
- 3
In Rowe v. Google LLC, Judge Rearden partly granted trial-time requests and denied Rowe’s request to exclude Patricia Florissi’s testimony.
Ulku Rowe and Google LLC, whose trial presentations were affected by the additional 24 minutes granted to each side and by the limits placed on Patricia Florissi’s testimony.
What happened
In Rowe v. Google LLC, the court addressed two matters during the ongoing trial: the parties’ requests for additional trial time and U lku Rowe’s renewed request to exclude Patricia Florissi’s testimony. Rowe’s claims include equal-pay and gender-discrimination claims involving year-to-year pay decisions.
The court gave each side 24 additional minutes, rather than the 46 minutes Rowe requested and the 48 minutes Google requested. The court also ruled that Florissi’s testimony could be admitted because she had firsthand knowledge of Rowe’s work and performance from approximately April 2022 through the present.
Judge Rearden granted the parties’ requests for additional trial time in part and denied Rowe’s renewed request to exclude Florissi’s testimony. Florissi’s questioning was limited to Rowe’s work and performance under Florissi’s management; she could not testify about Rowe’s compensation, the earlier decision setting Rowe’s level, or the work of Rowe’s chosen comparators.
The detailed version
- Rowe v. Google LLC · No. 1:19-cv-08655
- Rearden
- Oct. 16, 2023
Background
During the ongoing trial, the court resolved two matters: the parties’ respective requests for additional trial time and U lku Rowe’s renewed application to exclude the testimony of Patricia Florissi.
Rowe’s equal-pay and gender-discrimination claims are based in part on pay decisions made from year to year. The opinion explains that, under New York Labor Law § 194, an employer may attempt to justify a pay disparity with a bona fide factor other than a protected status, such as education, training, or experience. Rowe conceded that Google’s defense needed to explain the year-to-year pay differential and that her compensation for 2022 and 2023 was relevant.
Trial-Time Requests
Rowe requested 46 additional minutes of trial time, and Google requested 48 minutes. The court declined to award either side the full amount. It granted the parties’ respective applications in part and awarded each side an additional 24 minutes.
Testimony of Patricia Florissi
The court denied Rowe’s renewed application to exclude Florissi’s testimony. It found the testimony’s potential usefulness strong because Florissi had firsthand knowledge of Rowe’s work from approximately April 2022 through the present. Google represented that managers’ evaluations of Rowe’s work were a basis for annual decisions about her base salary, actual bonus relative to target, and discretionary equity awards. The court concluded that, within defined limits, the testimony’s usefulness was not substantially outweighed by the risks identified in Federal Rule of Evidence 403, including unfair prejudice, confusion, misleading the jury, undue delay, wasted time, or cumulative evidence.
The court limited Florissi’s examination to the nature of Rowe’s work and her performance under Florissi’s management from April 2022 to the present. Florissi could not testify about Rowe’s compensation, the earlier decision setting Rowe’s level, or the nature of Rowe’s chosen comparators’ work.
Disposition
Judge Rearden granted the parties’ respective requests for additional trial time in part, giving each side 24 additional minutes, and denied Rowe’s renewed application to exclude Florissi’s testimony. The order addressed trial management and the scope of evidence; it did not decide the underlying equal-pay or gender-discrimination claims.
Read the full 3-page opinion on CourtListener, the free public archive maintained by the Free Law Project.