Source: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-alsd-1_06-cv-00267/USCOURTS-alsd-1_06-cv-00267-0/pdf.json

Nature of Suit Code: 710
Nature of Suit: Fair Labor Standards Act
Cause of Action: 29:206 Collect Unpaid Wages

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IN THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT

FOR THE SOUTHERN DISTRICT OF ALABAMA

SOUTHERN DIVISION

J. DANIEL GODARD, JR., et al., )

 )

Plaintiffs, )

 )

v. ) CIVIL ACTION 06-0267-WS-C

 )

ALABAMA PILOT, INC., )

 )

Defendant. )

ORDER

This matter is before the Court on defendant Alabama Pilot, Inc.’s Motion for Leave to Amend

Answer (doc. 21), pursuant to Rule 15(a), Fed.R.Civ.P. The Motion, which is opposed by plaintiffs,

has been briefed and is ripe for disposition.

I. Background.

Plaintiffs, who consist of nine employees of defendant Alabama Pilot, maintain that defendant

violated the Fair Labor Standards Act, 29 U.S.C. §§ 201 et seq. (“FLSA”), by incorrectly classifying

them as “seamen” who are exempt from the overtime pay requirements of 29 U.S.C. § 207(a). 

(Amended Complaint (doc. 10), ¶¶ 17-20.) According to plaintiffs, Alabama Pilot intentionally,

knowingly and willfully violated the FLSA by misrepresenting them as seamen and failing to pay them

overtime compensation. (Id., ¶¶ 18-19.) This action is brought by plaintiffs on behalf of themselves

and all others similarly situated.

In its Answer (doc. 11), Alabama Pilot proffers nine affirmative defenses, including specific

assertions that plaintiffs and others similarly situated were properly classified as seamen, and are

therefore exempt for overtime purposes. Of particular note, the Answer recites as a Sixth Defense that

Alabama Pilot did not act willfully or in reckless disregard of its FLSA obligations, such that liquidated

damages are unavailable and the applicable limitations period is two years. (Answer, at 3.) Moreover,

as its Eighth Defense, Alabama Pilot states that it acted reasonably and in good faith, precluding an

award of liquidated damages. (Id. at 4.)

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On November 29, 2006, within the court-imposed timeframe for amending pleadings and

joining parties, Alabama Pilot filed its Motion for Leave to Amend Answer, through which it seeks to

interpose a Tenth Defense, to-wit: that plaintiffs are estopped from recovery by their actions and those

of their collective bargaining agent, as reflected in collective bargaining negotiations and agreements. 

Plaintiffs counter that the estoppel defense is unavailable here, as a matter of law, such that the

amendment should be denied.

II. Analysis.

Rule 15(a), Fed.R.Civ.P., provides that leave to amend pleadings “shall be freely given when

justice so requires.” Id.; see also Spanish Broadcasting System of Fla., Inc. v. Clear Channel

Communications, Inc., 376 F.3d 1065, 1077 (11th Cir. 2004) (“leave to amend must be granted

absent a specific, significant reason for denial”). The Eleventh Circuit has explained that such leave

should be “freely given,” as required by the rule, except in the presence of countervailing factors such as

“undue delay, bad faith or dilatory motive on the part of the movant, repeated failure to cure

deficiencies by amendments previously allowed, undue prejudice to the opposing party by virtue of

allowance of the amendment, futility of amendment, etc.” McKinley v. Kaplan, 177 F.3d 1253, 1258

(11th Cir. 1999) (quoting Foman v. Davis, 371 U.S. 178, 182, 83 S.Ct. 227, 9 L.Ed.2d 222 (1962));

see also Carruthers v. BSA Advertising, Inc., 357 F.3d 1213, 1218 (11th Cir. 2004) (explaining that

despite “freely given” language of Rule 15(a), leave to amend may be denied on such grounds as undue

delay, undue prejudice, and futility). Although whether to grant leave to amend rests in the district

court’s discretion, Rule 15(a) “severely restricts” that discretion. Sibley v. Lando, 437 F.3d 1067,

1073 (11th Cir. 2005). Indeed, denying leave to amend is an abuse of discretion in the absence of a

showing of one or more of the Foman factors. See, e.g., Bryant v. Dupree, 252 F.3d 1161, 1163-64

(11th Cir. 2001) (lower court should have permitted amendment to complaint where there was no

evidence of prejudice or undue delay); McKinley, 177 F.3d at 1258 (opining that district court abused

discretion in refusing to permit amendment where opposing party would not be prejudiced); Florida

Evergreen Foliage v. E.I. DuPont De Nemours and Co., 470 F.3d 1036, 1041 (11th Cir. 2006)

(“Unless a substantial reason exists to deny leave to amend, the discretion of the District Court is not

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broad enough to permit denial”) (citation omitted).

In objecting to the proposed amendment, plaintiffs proceed exclusively on a futility theory. In

particular, they contend that the Tenth Defense is not viable, as a matter of law, because (a) plaintiffs’

right to FLSA overtime pay is not waivable and trumps any conflicting provisions in a collective

bargaining agreement; and (b) employers cannot rely on collective bargaining agreement provisions to

show good faith or lack of willfulness.

Leave to amend a pleading may properly be denied under Rule 15(a) “when such amendment

would be futile.” Hall v. United Ins. Co. of America, 367 F.3d 1255, 1263 (11th Cir. 2004). Cases

in this Circuit applying the futility test to a new defense in a proposed amended answer are few and far

between; therefore, the Court derives guidance from analogous authorities relating to amended

complaints. “When a district court denies the plaintiff leave to amend a complaint due to futility, the

court is making the legal conclusion that the complaint, as amended, would necessarily fail.” St.

Charles Foods, Inc. v. America’s Favorite Chicken Co., 198 F.3d 815, 822-23 (11th Cir. 1999). 

Translating that standard to the amended answer context, a finding of futility is, in effect, a legal

conclusion that the proposed defense would necessarily fail. See also Miller v. Rykoff-Sexton, Inc.,

845 F.2d 209, 214 (9th Cir. 1988) (“a proposed amendment is futile only if no set of facts can be

proved under the amendment to the pleadings that would constitute a valid and sufficient claim or

defense”); Massie v. Board of Trustees, Haywood Community College, 357 F. Supp.2d 878, 884

(W.D.N.C. 2005) (motion to amend answer to state new affirmative defense in FLSA case should be

denied as futile only if amendment is “clearly insufficient or frivolous on its face”).

It is well settled that an employee’s FLSA rights to overtime compensation eclipse and

outweigh any contrary provisions in a collective bargaining agreement. See, e.g., Barrentine v.

Arkansas-Best Freight System, Inc., 450 U.S. 728, 740-41, 101 S.Ct. 1437, 67 L.Ed.2d 641

(1981) (“we have held that congressionally granted FLSA rights take precedence over conflicting

provisions in a collectively bargained compensation arrangement”). Rather than challenging that point,

Alabama Pilot protests that plaintiffs misconstrue the nature of the proposed estoppel defense. Rather

than arguing that the applicable collective bargaining provisions preclude all FLSA liability, Alabama

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1 Thus characterized by Alabama Pilot, the Tenth Defense appears redundant of the Sixth

and Eighth Defenses. More importantly, to argue, as Alabama Pilot does in briefing the Motion, that

the collective bargaining negotiations and agreements are relevant to the good faith and willfulness issues

is analytically distinct from stating, as the proposed Tenth Defense does, that those negotiations and

agreements estop plaintiffs in some fashion. The parties’ briefs do not explore this apparent disconnect. 

At most, Alabama Pilot’s brief hints at emergent facts from recent depositions that might lend support to

couching this defense in estoppel terms. Given the lack of briefing and evidentiary development on the

topic, the validity of Alabama Pilot characterizing its Tenth Defense as one of “estoppel” rather than

something else is best reserved for another day.

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Pilot intends for the Tenth Defense to bolster its good faith and lack of willfulness defenses (as pleaded

in the Sixth and Eighth Defenses), as a means of averting liability for liquidated damages and of

shortening the applicable look-back period for backpay from three years to two years. Alabama Pilot

contends that the contents of the collective bargaining agreements and their surrounding negotiations go

directly to its good faith and lack of wrongful intent.1

In response, plaintiffs argue that the terms of a collective bargaining agreement cannot be proof

of good faith or lack of willfulness. They offer no Eleventh Circuit case law, nor any published authority

of any stripe, to support this proposition. Instead, plaintiffs rely exclusively on Ackler v. Cowlitz

County, 2001 WL 115019 (9th Cir. Feb. 8, 2001). On its face, Ackler states that an employer cannot

satisfy its burden of establishing good faith and reasonableness for FLSA-violative conduct by “simply

point[ing] to the employees’ failure to ascertain and prevent the violation.” Id. at *1. One possible

reading of Alabama Pilot’s Tenth Defense is that defendant seeks to show good faith solely by reliance

on plaintiffs’ failure to ascertain that Alabama Pilot had improperly classified them as seamen for FLSA

purposes. That construction would fall within the proscriptions of Ackler. But other readings of the

Tenth Defense are possible, and it is unclear at this juncture whether plaintiffs and their union simply

passively accepted the seamen designation or whether, unlike in Ackler, they had a more active role. 

Clearly, then, the impact of Ackler on this case is indeterminate without a fact-specific analysis of the

interactions between union and employer on this point. Any such inquiry is obviously premature at this

time. Moreover, it is far from clear that Ackler is good law in this Circuit. Plaintiffs’ approach would

have this Court declare an amendment frivolous on its face based on a legal principle that plaintiffs have

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been unable to locate in any Eleventh Circuit opinion, or any published authority from any other circuit. 

Whatever the merits of the Tenth Defense might ultimately be found to be, the Court cannot

categorically say that it is inadequate to pass muster under the extraordinarily low non-futility threshold. 

See Hall v. Operative Plasterers’ and Cement Masons’ Int’l Ass’n Local Union 143, 188 F.

Supp.2d 1013, 1018-19 (S.D. Ill. 2001) (proposed amendment to assert new defense might not

ultimately prevail, but was not futile because binding appellate court had not spoken on key issue

relating to that proposed defense).

III. Conclusion.

Because the Court cannot find as a matter of law that the proposed Tenth Defense is clearly

insufficient or frivolous on its face, or that it must necessarily fail, the requested amendment is not futile. 

As plaintiffs have invoked no other Foman factors for opposing an amendment, and as Rule 15(a)

provides that leave to amend should be freely given, the Motion for Leave to Amend Answer (doc. 21)

is granted. That said, defendant has filed only a piecemeal proposed amendment, rather than an

integrated, complete proposed amended answer. Pursuant to Section II.A.6. of this District Court’s

Administrative Procedures for Filing, Signing and Verifying Documents by Electronic Means, defendant

is ordered, on or before January 12, 2007, to file a single Amended Answer, combining the proposed

amendment set forth in its Motion to Amend with the original Answer (doc. 11) to form a freestanding,

self-contained pleading.

DONE and ORDERED this 5th day of January, 2007.

s/ WILLIAM H. STEELE 

UNITED STATES DISTRICT JUDGE

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