Opinion ID: 171886
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 4

Heading: exclusion of holland's testimony

Text: Mr. Zokari also contends that the district court erred by excluding the testimony of Emmett Holland, an African-American senior auditor from the Richardson office of DCAA. We review the district court's decision to exclude his testimony for an abuse of discretion. See Coletti v. Cudd Pressure Control, 165 F.3d 767, 776 (10th Cir.1999). In the pretrial report Mr. Zokari stated that Holland would testify that he was rated lower than non-black counterparts,. . . testify about errors made on A-3's [internal auditing forms], [and] testify about his conversations with Defendants Counsel about such and the atmosphere of discrimination in the agency that he relayed while being interviewed by Defense Counsel. Zokari, No. CIV-04-0950 (Final Pretrial Report at 15). At trial, counsel for DCAA sought to exclude the evidence on the ground of lack of personal knowledge. He argued: According to the statements of the final pretrial report, he would testify that he was rated lower than non-black counterparts. I'm concerned they will not be able to lay a foundation that this witness has access to every evaluation of every employee similarly situated to himnot similarly situated in the context of colorbut he would have to be able to have access to that and then if he doesn't have access to that, then he is testifying as an expert and he is not an expert. He would also testify about errors made on A-3s. He did not work in this office. He did not work with any of these senior auditors that prepared the A-3s that are subject to the lawsuit. I think that that is not relevant, what A-3s that somebody else in the Dallas office prepared. Finally, in conversations with defense counsel, I think that is irrelevant. Atmosphere discrimination in the agency, I would like to know the foundation of his knowledge there. Unless he has personal experience throughout the worldwide offices of DCAA, he is not able to testify with his personal knowledge and he has not been designated as an expert. Aplt.App. Vol. IV(A) at 191-92. When counsel for Mr. Zokari then spoke, she did little to suggest Mr. Holland's personal knowledge. She began by saying that Holland got his information from the business records of the Union when he was contemplating filing a grievance against . . . Peters for his low ratings, so he has personal knowledge about which he can testify. Id. at 192. In response to questions from the court, she added, The A-3s are about when he came up as he has gone through and had people working under and around him, that they are prevalent, the errors are prevalent in those. That has been his experience everytime he has been with [DCAA]. I believe he has been there over 20 years. Id. at 192-93. She also said: He will testify to his experience at DCAA, his conversations with [DCAA's trial attorney] where he informed him that there is an atmosphere of discrimination at that agency, and the A-3s, the errors that he has seen. He came in and out of the Oklahoma City office, he would come to Oklahoma City and do audits also. That is the only reason why he is going to be able to testify to those things. Id. at 193-94. The court said that it would decide the admissibility issue after counsel conducted a voir dire of Holland outside the jury's presence. On direct examination by DCAA's counsel at voir dire, Holland testified as follows: He had been employed by DCAA for 20 years and was currently a senior auditor at DCAA and a steward for the local union. As a union steward he had access to DCAA employee evaluations upon request. He had not requested any information for Mr. Zokari's case, but he had examined records in 2003 or 2004 when he had considered bringing his own claim of discrimination against DCAA. In preparation for his case, he had obtained the evaluations for all DCAA employees in the Richardson branch office for the year of his grievance. (He had not reviewed employee evaluations for 2000 or 2001, the years that Mr. Zokari worked at DCAA.) He admitted that he was not familiar with the work performance of the DCAA employees whose evaluations he had reviewed and that he had not looked at the files used to evaluate the employees. Holland's cross-examination by Mr. Zokari's counsel was brief: Q: During your 20 years at the DCAA, have you seen African-Americans and minorities have a difficult time with regard to evaluations and ratings and mentoring and on-the-job training? I know that is a lot of questions, do you want me to break it up? A: Yes, yes, and yes. Q: You answered my question. A: Yes. Q: Okay. A: Because I think it was two or three parts and the answer is yes. Q: Has that been while Paul Peters has been the branch manager? A: I have been here since 1989, I have been in this agency since 1987. The answer to that question would be yes. Id. at 204. Because the district court had announced that it would decide the admissibility of Holland's testimony upon completion of the voir dire, it was incumbent on Mr. Zokari to establish the basis on which Holland would testify. This he failed to do. It was clear from the voir dire that Holland did not have personal knowledge of discriminatory evaluations by DCAA. He knew the evaluation scores for employees two or three years after Mr. Zokari's termination, but he could not know if the evaluations were discriminatory because he knew nothing regarding the work performance of any employee except himself. Although he may have had knowledge of other discriminatory conduct, his testimony did not provide sufficient information concerning his knowledge of such conduct for the district court to decide that he had personal knowledge of matters relevant to Mr. Zokari's trial. In this circumstance, the district court did not abuse its discretion in ruling that Holland's testimony should be excluded for lack of personal knowledge. See Fed.R.Evid. 602 (A witness may not testify to a matter unless evidence is introduced sufficient to support a finding that the witness has personal knowledge of the matter.).