Opinion ID: 6346803
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Narrowing the Class

Text: In seeking certification of the California Labor Law class, Owino alleged that detainees’ participation in the Program violated a variety of state labor law provisions, as well as California’s Unfair Competition Law (“UCL”), Cal. Bus. & Prof. Code § 17200, et seq. CoreCivic notes, correctly: “Other than the California UCL claim [which has a four-year statute of limitations, id. § 17208], all other state law claims have a one-, two-, or three-year statute of limitations.” CoreCivic thus argues that Owino is barred from representing this class at all, because his last day in the Work Program was May 22, 2013, which is more than four years before he filed the May 31, 2017, complaint. (Owino disputes this date, claiming he worked until his release on March 9, 2015.) CoreCivic further argues that Gomez is time-barred from pursuing non-UCL claims, because his last day in the Work Program was September 7, 2013. The district court held that, for the purposes of the certification motion, even if the plaintiffs’ claims under the California Labor Code are time-barred, they could still recover for the majority of the alleged violations under the UCL because the UCL prohibits unfair competition, defined as “any unlawful, unfair or fraudulent business act or practice,” Cal. Bus. & Prof. Code § 17200, and naturally this includes such violations of California’s wage and hour law. OWINO V. CORECIVIC 19 Under this characterization, the class period for all claims seeking remedies under the UCL begins May 31, 2013; the period for waiting-time and failure-to-pay claims begins May 31, 2014; and the period for claims as to the alleged failure to provide wage statements begins May 31, 2016 (for remedies pursuant to Cal. Code Civ. Proc. § 340), or May 31, 2014 (for remedies pursuant to Cal. Code Civ. Proc. § 338). As to the named plaintiffs, the district court ruled that neither Owino nor Gomez is typical of the members of the California Labor Law class seeking penalties under California Labor Code § 226 (which requires employers to provide wage statements to employees), and that Gomez is not typical of members of the California Labor Law Class seeking waiting-time penalties under California Labor Code § 203. Nonetheless, the court found that Owino is part of the California Labor Law class for the wage claims, for failure to pay compensation upon termination, and for waiting time penalties and actual damages for the failure to provide wage statements, while Gomez is part of the California Labor Law class for the wage claims. Due to CoreCivic’s “belated assertion of . . . factual disputes concerning whether Mr. Owino worked during the Class Period for the California Labor Law Class,” the district court stated it was “disinclined to resolve this issue at the class certification stage . . . particularly given that Mr. Gomez remains a viable class representative for the majority of the claims of the California Labor Law Class.” Because plaintiffs can recover for almost all of the alleged violations under the UCL, the district court properly rejected CoreCivic’s argument against certification as predicated on “a distinction without a difference.” The district court appropriately exercised its discretion by 20 OWINO V. CORECIVIC declining to resolve a factual matter that CoreCivic raised for the first time in its post-hearing supplemental brief, and which the district court concluded was not dispositive of certification. We agree with the district court that Owino and Gomez are typical of the class they are seeking to represent and their allegations, if true, fit within the statutes they invoke. Although they may run into statute of limitations issues— some disputed and unproven—narrowing the class based on statute of limitations is not required at the certification stage. Cf. Int’l Woodworkers of Am. v. Chesapeake Bay Plywood Corp., 659 F.2d 1259, 1270 (4th Cir. 1981) (“Courts passing upon motions for class certification have generally refused to consider the impact of such affirmative defenses as the statute of limitations on the potential representative’s case.”).