Opinion ID: 195991
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 6

Heading: late-arriving evidence

Text: In general, the view that we take of the flexible interplay between front pay and the collateral source rule 11The Service complains that the lower court erred in figuring the amount of VA benefits used to reduce Lussier's front pay award. Because the factfinder's choice between two or more permissible views of the evidence cannot be deemed clearly erroneous, see Cumpiano v. Banco Santander P.R., 902 F.2d 148, 152 (1st Cir. 1990), we reject this complaint (which, in any event, is anchored in an overly optimistic reading of the record) out of hand. 22 extends to CSRS benefits.12 Withal, the district court's handling of these benefits gives us pause. During the trial, reference was made to Lussier's eligibility for a CSRS disability retirement annuity. The government advanced a rough estimate of the monthly stipend that Lussier would likely receive. Dissatisfied with the trial evidence on this subject, the district court ordered the parties to file within 30 days a status report concerning Lussier's application for CSRS disability benefits. Lussier I, 1994 WL 129776, at . Lussier, though objecting vigorously to the directive, submitted some information anent interim payments. The Service offered no assistance. Eventually, the court reduced its planned front pay award based on the new information. Both parties appeal. Lussier contends that the entire enterprise was procedurally infirm; that the Service failed to prove the amount of any purported offset, thus rendering the issue moot; and, in all events, that the collateral source rule should have operated to disqualify the CSRS benefits from consideration in connection with the front pay award. For its part, the Service asseverates that the court erred in not using the estimate of CSRS benefits introduced at trial, or, alternatively, in not granting its Rule 59(e) motion and using the more precise figure limned therein. 12Lussier argues that CSRS benefits arise, at least in part, out of employee contributions, and, therefore, should not be treated in the same manner as other collateral benefits. We express no opinion on this aspect of the matter. Lussier can, of course, renew the argument before the district court on remand. 23 Since we give our stamp of approval to Lussier's first contention, we need not address the parties' other points. Typically, a district court's decision to reopen the record for the purpose of receiving additional evidence engenders an exercise of the court's discretion, reviewable for abuse of that discretion. See Zenith Radio Corp. v. Hazeltine Research, Inc., 401 U.S. 321, 331-32 (1971); Briscoe v. Fred's Dollar Store, Inc., 24 F.3d 1026, 1028 (8th Cir. 1994); Natural Resources Defense Council, Inc. v. Texaco Ref. & Mktg., Inc., 2 F.3d 493, 504 (3d Cir. 1993); Hartford Accident & Indem. Co. v. Gulf Ins. Co., 837 F.2d 767, 773 (7th Cir. 1988). This rule pertains even when the district court opts to reopen the record on its own initiative. See, e.g., Calage v. University of Tenn., 544 F.2d 297, 301-02 (6th Cir. 1976) (upholding district court's sua sponte solicitation and consideration of post-trial evidentiary submissions in employment discrimination suit); see also Briscoe, 24 F.3d at 1028. Here, however, the district court despite what it said did not reopen the record; instead, the court, over the plaintiff's objection, engaged in a unilateral pursuit of additional evidence without affording the parties the standard prophylaxis that generally obtains at trial.13 While we do not doubt the court's good intentions the judge was clearly motivated by concerns of judicial economy and a desire to 13These protections include, but are not limited to, the right to object to evidence, the right to question its source, relevance, and reliability, the right to cross-examine its proponent, and the right to impeach or contradict it. 24 be fair to all parties it chose a mode of evidence-gathering that offends accepted practice and contradicts existing law. Therefore, we must sustain Lussier's preserved objection to it. And, moreover, because the error affected substantial rights the court used the extra-record information anent interim payments to reduce the amount of the front pay award the judgment must be vacated. We explain briefly. It is a fundamental principle of our jurisprudence that a factfinder may not consider extra-record evidence concerning disputed adjudicative facts. A good illustration of this precept in operation can be found in the realm of judicial notice. Under Fed. R. Evid. 201(b), a judge may take notice of an adjudicative fact only if it is not subject to reasonable dispute in that it is either (1) generally known within the territorial jurisdiction of the trial court or (2) capable of accurate and ready determination by resort to sources whose accuracy cannot reasonably be questioned. Courts have tended to apply Rule 201(b) stringently and well they might, for accepting disputed evidence not tested in the crucible of trial is a sharp departure from standard practice. Hence, in Cooperativa de Ahorro y Credito Aguada v. Kidder, Peabody & Co., 993 F.2d 269 (1st Cir. 1993), petition for cert. filed (U.S. Oct. 12, 1993) (No. 93- 564), we held that the district court exceeded the bounds of Rule 201(b) by gleaning information supposedly known within institutional investment circles from financial periodicals that were not offered into evidence. See id. at 272-73; see also Barr 25 Rubber Prods. Co. v. Sun Rubber Co., 425 F.2d 1114, 1125-26 (2d Cir.) (stating similar legal tenets), cert. denied, 400 U.S. 878 (1970). In this case, the court's acquisition of extra-record information by special delivery is similarly beyond the pale. Its actions cannot be justified under the first furculum of Rule 201(b). Facts that are generally known within the territorial jurisdiction of the trial court are those that exist in the unrefreshed, unaided recollection of the populace at large. See 21 Charles A. Wright & Kenneth W. Graham, Jr., Federal Practice and Procedure 5105, at 489 (1977). Though a court, under this rubric, may take judicial notice of such varied matters as the traditional features of a snowman, Eden Toys, Inc. v. Marshall Field & Co., 675 F.2d 498, 500 n.1 (2d Cir. 1982), or the popularity of certain reusable containers, Price Food Co. v. Good Foods, Inc., 400 F.2d 662, 665 (6th Cir. 1968), or the impossibility of driving from one place to another in a specified period of time, United States v. Baborian, 528 F. Supp. 324, 332 (D.R.I. 1981), it is pellucid that the facts surrounding the interim CSRS payments the amount received, how the amount was derived, its significance in relation to the likely size of Lussier's disability retirement annuity, and the relevance (if any) of the interim benefits to front pay never achieved the requisite level of popular familiarity. By like token, the evidence also fails to satisfy the 26 second branch of Rule 201(b). Court records aside,14 some government documents are subject to judicial notice (albeit under certain limited conditions) on the ground that information contained therein is capable of accurate and ready determination by resort to sources whose accuracy cannot reasonably be questioned. See, e.g., Massachusetts v. Westcott, 431 U.S. 322, 323 n.2 (1977) (per curiam) (taking judicial notice of fishery licenses as reflected in the records of the Coast Guard's Merchant Vessel Documentation Division). The information here at issue does not reach this safe harbor. In the first place, the information is not contained in generally available government records. Second, the court did not acquire it by direct resort to any public record, but, rather, through untested unilateral submissions. Third, a monetary figure affecting a plaintiff's ultimate award, even though eventually quantifiable, seems to us to be the sort of disputed adjudicative fact for which the adversarial truth-finding process is well suited. And, finally, the court gave the parties no real opportunity to address or counter the gleaned evidence.15 14Because courts may take judicial notice of their own records and the records of sister tribunals under a special set of rules, see generally 21 Wright & Graham, supra, 5106, at 256-57 (Supp. 1994), we exempt court documents from this discourse. 15Westcott forms an interesting contrast to this case. There, in addition to the qualitative differences in the information sought and in the data source upon which the court relied, [t]he parties were given an opportunity to comment on the propriety of [the Court's] taking notice of the license, and both sides agreed that [the Court] could properly do so. 433 U.S. at 323 n.2. Neither of these conditions obtains here. 27 Ours is a system that seeks the discovery of truth by means of a managed adversarial relationship between the parties. If we were to allow judges to bypass this system, even in the interest of furthering efficiency or promoting judicial economy, we would subvert this ultimate purpose. As Rule 201(b) teaches, judges may not defenestrate established evidentiary processes, thereby rendering inoperative the standard mechanisms of proof and scrutiny, if the evidence in question is at all vulnerable to reasonable dispute. Here, the district court failed to steer by this beacon. There is no indication, despite the court's contrary characterization,16 that the record was actually reopened or that the parties were afforded anything approximating the evidentiary and procedural guarantees to which they were entitled. Similarly, there is no basis for finding that the parties waived this deprivation, consented to the court's shortcut, or otherwise invited judicial reliance on the extrarecord proof. To the extent that the judgment is premised on this late-arriving evidence, it cannot stand. 16The district court paid lip service to the principle we have discussed, writing that it had reopened the record. But the parties agree that no actual reopening occurred, and calling what the court did a reopening does not make it so. Cf. Siegfriedt v. Fair, 982 F.2d 14, 19 (1st Cir. 1992) (With Juliet we ask `What's in a name?' and with her we conclude `[t]hat which we call a rose by any other name would smell as sweet.') (quoting William Shakespeare, Romeo and Juliet act 2, sc. 2). 28 Accordingly, we vacate the judgment and remand.17 We neither dictate how the district court should proceed on remand nor restrict its range of options. For instance, without limiting the generality of the foregoing, the court may in its discretion choose to reopen the record fully for the purpose of obtaining more information about Lussier's CSRS benefits, and, if the court follows that path, it can then decide what, if any, use to make of the new evidence. Alternatively, the court may, if it so elects, hold the parties to their proof at trial and determine the front pay award on the existing record.