Opinion ID: 470074
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Refusal to Allow Compliance Officer Testimony

Text: 24 The Secretary contends that the district court erred in excluding the CO's testimony about her back wage computations that were based in part on employees' statements as to overtime. That testimony was offered not for the truth of the employee statements, but to describe the methodology in preparing the wage transcription and computation sheets. 25 We find that such testimony was erroneously excluded. See Avery v. Commissioner, 574 F.2d 467, 468 (9th Cir.1978) (IRS agent testimony about deficiency computations based on third party statements not excludable as hearsay where admitted only to support the reasonableness of the agent's actions in computing the deficiency). See also DiMauro v. United States, 706 F.2d 882, 885 (8th Cir.1983) (affidavit, inadmissible to prove the assertions contained therein, was admissible for the limited purpose of determining whether the agent's reconstruction of wages rested on a reasonable basis). 26 We have not decided this precise issue in the context of alleged FLSA violations. However, at least two other circuits have ruled that not only the CO's testimony but the actual computations are admissible as evidence in support of an award of back wages. 27 In Hodgson v. Humphries, 454 F.2d 1279 (10th Cir.1972), the court upheld the admission of the CO's computation sheets not as direct evidence of [wages and hours] as to which employees had testified, but only as a 'helpful summary or chart.'  Id. at 1282. Even though primarily based upon information obtained through interviews with the employees, the computation sheets were properly receive[d] ... in evidence for the limited purpose they were intended to serve. Id. at 1282-83. The Tenth Circuit emphasized that the back wages claim [did] not rest solely upon the computation sheets. Id. at 1283. Here, we find, as did the court in Humphries, that [t]he testimony of the former employees, standing alone, made out the Secretary's prima facie case. Id. In such circumstances both the CO's testimony and the computations are admissible. 28 Similarly, the Sixth Circuit in Hodgson v. American Concrete Construction Co., Inc., 471 F.2d 1183 (6th Cir.), cert. denied, 412 U.S. 949, 93 S.Ct. 3007, 37 L.Ed.2d 1001 (1973), held that where, as here, the CO's computations of overtime pay were based in part on employer records, those computations were improperly excluded. It concluded that the computations were relevant and competent evidence and should be admitted and considered on retrial .... Id. at 1186. 29 We find that the district court abused its discretion in excluding the CO's testimony about the overtime computations where it was limited to showing the methodology of the computations and not the veracity of the employees' statements.