Meyenhofer v. Larsen & Toubro Infotech Ltd.

• Decision Date: 30 November 2020
• Docket Number: 19-cv-9349 (AJN)
• Citation: 503 F.Supp.3d 39
• Parties: MEYENHOFER, et al., Plaintiffs, v. LARSEN & TOUBRO INFOTECH LIMITED, et al., Defendants.
• Court: U.S. District Court — Southern District of New York

503 F.Supp.3d 39

MEYENHOFER, et al., Plaintiffs,

v.LARSEN & TOUBRO INFOTECH LIMITED, et al., Defendants.

19-cv-9349 (AJN)

United States District Court, S.D. New York.

Signed November 30, 2020

Daniel Kotchen, Daniel Low, Kotchen & Low LLP, Washington, DC, for Plaintiffs.

Mark J. Goldberg, Loeb & Loeb LLP, New York, NY, Michelle La Mar, Bradley James Raboin, Terry D. Garnett, Loeb & Loeb LLP, Los Angeles, CA, for Defendants.

MEMORANDUM OPINION & ORDER

ALISON J. NATHAN, District Judge:

Plaintiffs bring claims against Defendants for employment discrimination under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and Section 1981 of the Civil Rights Act of 1866, alleging that Defendants preferentially hire, promote, and retain persons of South Asian descent from India who are in the United States with work visas. Defendants move to dismiss certain claims for failure to state a claim and move to strike portions of the Complaint. For the reasons stated below, Defendants motion is GRANTED IN PART and DENIED IN PART.

I. Background

The following facts are drawn from Plaintiffs’ Amended Complaint. Dkt. No. 32. Plaintiffs Markus Meyenhofer and Andrew Ragland bring claims for discrimination against Defendants Larsen & Toubro Infotech Limited and its subsidiary Larsen & Toubro Infotech LLC (collectively, "LTI") under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, as amended 42 U.S.C. § 2000e, et seq. , ("Title VII"), and Section 1981 of the Civil Rights Act of 1866, as amended, 42 U.S.C. § 1981 (" Section 1981"). Amended Complaint ¶ 1-2.

LTI is an Indian company with primary headquarters in Mumbai and a U.S. headquarters in New Jersey. Id. ¶ 1, 5-6. LTI generated 69% of its $1.35 billion revenue in the fiscal year 2018 in the United States, where it provides information technology ("IT") services to clients such as Apple, Inc. Id. ¶ 1, 10, 17. LTI staffs clients’ projects with existing LTI employees as well as external applicants who interviewed for the position. Id. ¶ 11. After a project is finished, the employees are "benched" and must reapply for positions on a new project. Id. If the employee is not placed on a new project after an extended period of time, LTI terminates their employment. Id.

Plaintiffs Meyenhofer and Ragland are Caucasian and natural born citizens of the United States. Id. ¶ 3-4. They argue that Defendants discriminated against them on the basis of their race, national origin, and citizenship status as a part of its policy and practice of preferentially hiring, staffing, promoting and retaining primarily persons of South Asian descent from India, whom LTI brings to the United States on work visas. Id. ¶¶ 12-13.

Plaintiffs allege a four-pronged policy and practice of discrimination by LTI in favor of persons from South Asia (primarily India) who are not U.S. Citizens. First, LTI allegedly maintains an "inventory" of "visa ready" workers from India to fill positions at the company by petitioning the federal government's lottery program to obtain a large amount of H-1b visas, and preferences hiring from this pool of applicants over U.S. citizens and visa-ready individuals not from South Asia (in particular, India). Id. ¶¶ 13-15. Plaintiffs allege that Defendants obtained at least some of these visas by submitting fraudulent documents with forged signatures from clients attesting to the amount of personnel needed for projects, leading to LTI securing significantly more visas than it had positions available. Id. ¶¶ 16-19. Plaintiffs further allege that Defendants are currently under federal investigation by multiple agencies for this practice. Id.

Second, LTI's internal and third-party recruiters in the United States disproportionately select South Asian and Indian applicants located in the United States over non-South Asian, non-Indian applicants located in the United States, even if applicants are less qualified. Id. ¶ 21. Third, LTI promotes South Asian, Indian, visa holders at disproportionately high rates, in particular by giving these workers higher scores on their quarterly and annual employee appraisals. Id. ¶ 22. Fourth, and finally, LTI terminates non-South Asian, non-Indian, and non-visa holders at disproportionately higher rates, in part because these workers are relegated to the "bench" more often and then are not staffed on more projects. Id. ¶ 33.

As a result of this four-pronged policy and practice of discrimination, LTI employs a disproportionately high percentage of South Asians and Indians in the United States that far exceeds the proportion of those individuals in the relevant labor market. Id. ¶ 21. Specifically, while 12% of the United States’ IT industry is South Asian, 95% or more of LTI's workforce is South Asian and is primarily composed of non-citizens form India. Id. ¶ 1.

Plaintiffs claim that they were directly harmed as a result of LTI's discriminatory policies and practices in favor of South Asian visa workers from India.

Plaintiff Meyenhofer is a highly skilled consultant with substantial experience in the banking and financial services industries. Id. ¶ 26. He has previously worked for both the American and New York stock exchanges and has provided consulting services to numerous premiere financial institutions, including BNY Mellon, Bank of America Merill Lynch, Credit Suisse, Morgan Stanley and Wells Fargo. Id. Plaintiff Meyenhofer was recruited by Emplofy LLC, a company that identifies and acquires skilled workers for employers, including LTI. Id. ¶ 27. In September 2018, Emplofy hired Plaintiff Meyenhofer to provide services to a client of LTI's, Broadridge Financial Services, Inc. Id. In particular, he was to oversee quality assurance testing for a wealth management platformed being developed for Broadridge. Id. ¶ 31.

Though he was hired by Emplofy and received payment through Emplofy, Plaintiff Meyenhofer says he "was in fact one of LTI's contractual employees." Id. During the hiring process, three LTI employees interviewed him. Id. The first of approximately five weeks of his employment were performed onsite at LTI's New Jersey Offices before transitioning to the client's offices. Id. ¶ 29. LTI employees provided Plaintiff Meyenhofer with technical support and training, and also offered him a computer. Id. ¶ 28. Though he chose to use his own computer, the "installation process" was handled by LTI tech support personal. Id. Throughout his work on the Broadridge project, LTI "assigned him tasks," "oversaw ... his day to day work," and could "unilaterally change the scope of his responsibilities." Id. ¶ 29. He reported to LTI managers. Id. His hours were set by LTI and he was required to fill out LTI timesheets on an LTI-operated online portal. Id. Lastly, his position with Emplofy ended when his role at LTI ended. Id. ¶ 27. LTI itself refers to workers like Plaintiff Meyenhofer, of which there are about 1,200 at the company, as "contractual employees". Id. ¶ 30.

Initially, Plaintiff Meyenhofer was one of six LTI employees staffed on the Broadridge project, two of whom were South Asian and Indian. Id. ¶ 32. In January of 2019, LTI put a different manager on the project, and that new manager added sixteen additional employees to the project between January and April 2019, the majority of whom were South Asian and Indian. Id. ¶ 32.

While Plaintiff Meyenhofer was working on the project, he performed well – despite the fact that his duties were repeatedly changed and he was shifted to various roles due to "LTI's ineffective management of the Broadridge account," – and received no negative feedback from either LTI or the client. Id. ¶ 31. Nonetheless, in April 2019, LTI assigned a South Asian and Indian employee to the project to take over some of Plaintiff Meyenhofer's responsibilities, despite the fact that the employee had no prior wealth management experience. Id. ¶ 33. Then LTI took Plaintiff Meyenhofer off the project and replaced him with another employee who is also South Asian and of Indian national origin and who was "significantly less experienced" than Plaintiff. Id. ¶ 33-34.

On May 15, 2019, Plaintiff Meyenhofer submitted an application through Quantum World Technologies Inc., a company that recruits applicants for LTI, for a Senior Wealth Management Business Analyst position with LTI, that would entail providing consulting services for one of LTI's clients, City National Bank. Id. ¶ 35. Plaintiff Meyenhofer, who was well qualified because of his wealth management experience, completed the preliminary interview with Quantum and proceeded to the follow-up interview with LTI. Id. Though he performed well in the interview and was told that LTI would follow up with him about the role, he never heard from LTI. Id. Plaintiff Meyenhofer alleges he was not hired due to LTI's discriminatory practices. Id.

Plaintiff Ragland describes a similar experience with LTI. He is a highly skilled worker in the area of operations and delivery management with almost 30 years of professional experience. Id. ¶ 37. He specializes in installation and set-up, testing and evaluation, support system and database report programming, and incident and problem management of second and third level command centers. Id. He was hired by LTI in December 2017 to service LTI client Iconix Brand Group in New York, and was told he would be part of a three-year contract with the client. Id. ¶ 38.

Plaintiff Ragland was to serve as IT Operations manager for the project. He had two immediate supervisors, both of whom are South Asian and Indian and resided in India at the time. Id. ¶ 39. One of those supervisors had initially been Mr. Ragland's peer, but was later promoted to the managerial position. Id. Plaintiff Ragland describes working at the client site with approximately eight other LTI employees who were South Asian and Indian. Id. ¶ 40. Plaintiff Ragland was also in charge of overseeing LTI's offshore team, which was a group of approximately twenty individuals in India. Id.

Despite the fact that Plaintiff Ragland performed...