Calzadillas v. Wonderful Co.
| Decision Date | 03 June 2019 |
| Docket Number | No. 1:19-cv-00172-DAD-JLT,1:19-cv-00172-DAD-JLT |
| Court | U.S. District Court — Eastern District of California |
| Parties | SALVADOR CALZADILLAS, on behalf of himself and others similarly situated, Plaintiff, v. THE WONDERFUL COMPANY, LLC, and DOES 1-25, Defendants. |
ORDER GRANTING PLAINTIFFS' MOTION FOR LIMITED DISCOVERY AND HOLDING DEFENDANT'S MOTION TO COMPEL ARBITRATION IN ABEYANCE
This matter is before the court on defendant The Wonderful Company's ("Wonderful") April 5, 2019 motion to compel arbitration and to stay or dismiss this action. (Doc. No. 7.) Soon after that motion was filed, plaintiff Salvador Calzadillas filed an ex parte application to continue the hearing date, contending that resolution of defendant's motion required discovery and time to conduct that discovery. (Doc. No. 11.) A hearing on both the motion to compel arbitration and the ex parte application was held on May 7, 2019. Attorney Eric Kingsley appeared on behalf of plaintiff and the putative class members (hereinafter "plaintiffs"), and attorney Lisa A. Stilson appeared on behalf of defendant. Having considered the parties' briefing and heard from counsel, and for the reasons that follow, plaintiffs' ex parte application for discovery will be granted, and defendant's motion to compel arbitration and to stay or dismiss this action will be held in abeyance pending limited discovery as discussed below.
Plaintiffs commenced this action by filing a class action complaint on February 7, 2019. In that complaint, plaintiffs allege as follows. Plaintiffs are seasonal agricultural workers within the meaning of the Agricultural Worker Protection Act ("AWPA"), 29 U.S.C. § 1802(10). (Doc. No. 1 ("Compl.") at ¶ 10.) Plaintiffs are, and have been throughout the relevant period, non-exempt employees within the meaning of California Labor Code § 500 et seq. and the rules and regulations of California Industrial Welfare Commission Wage Order No. 14-2001 ("IWC Wage Order 14"). (Id. at ¶ 22.) Defendant is the world's largest grower of tree nuts and America's largest citrus grower. (Id. at ¶ 13.) Plaintiffs are employed to work in defendant's fields, and are either employed directly or through various Farm Labor Contractors ("FLCs"). (Id. at ¶¶ 4, 15.)
Under the parties' working arrangement, defendant is required to pay plaintiffs their agreed-upon wages for all hours worked, to pay workers for required rest periods, to provide meal periods, and to abide in all respects with IWC Wage Order 14. (Id. at 29.) The complaint alleges, however, that plaintiffs have not been compensated by defendant for all time worked. (Id. at ¶ 30.) Specifically, it alleges that plaintiffs work on a piece-rate basis, picking mandarins in the morning. (Id. at ¶ 32.) After this "first pick," workers then switch to non-piece rate work in the late morning or afternoon, doing work such as picking up fruit off the ground, doing a second or third pass through, or picking "la china," but workers are not compensated for this work. (Id.) Instead, defendants use the earlier piece-rate earnings as a credit to satisfy minimum wage obligations in violation of California law and/or fail to pay workers for this non-piece-rate work. (Id.) Plaintiffs also are sometimes compensated on a "per bin" basis and paid a specific rate per bin, but they often do not get credit for all the bins they pick, thus depriving workers of wages earned. (Id. at ¶ 33.) In addition, plaintiffs are scheduled to report to work at a specific time, but upon doing so are frequently told to wait before they can begin harvesting because the citrus trees are wet. (Id. at ¶ 34.) This waiting time is neither recorded nor are the workers paid for that waiting time by defendant. (Id.) Plaintiffs also do not regularly receive rest breaks as required by California law, nor are they compensated for those rest breaks. (Id. at ¶ 37.) The complaint further alleges that by words, conduct, practice, agreement, or custom and usage, defendantagreed to provide plaintiffs with all necessary tools and equipment, yet during the relevant period, plaintiffs were required to provide their own tools, including pruning shears, picking clippers, cloth sacks, protective gloves, and similar items. (Id. at ¶ 38-39.) Plaintiffs have not been reimbursed for the cost of purchasing these items. (Id. at ¶ 40.) As part of their employment, plaintiffs were required to travel between fields to perform work tasks, which required plaintiffs to use their own vehicles because defendants did not provide transportation. (Id.) Defendants failed to reimburse plaintiffs for use of their vehicle. (Id. at ¶ 41.) In addition, this travel time between fields was not recorded by defendants and was not compensated. (Id. at ¶ 42.) Defendant also failed to provide plaintiff with meal periods as required under California law and failed to issue itemized wage statements accurately reflecting all of the hours and rates worked by plaintiffs. (Id. at ¶ 43-44.)
Based on these allegations, plaintiffs assert a total of eleven causes of action, alleging violations of both state and federal law. (Id. at ¶¶ 58-94.) As noted, on April 5, 2019, defendant moved to compel arbitration and to stay or dismiss this action. (Doc. No. 7.) As also noted, on April 17, 2019, plaintiff filed an ex parte application for an order permitting plaintiff to conduct discovery and an order continuing the hearing date on defendant's motion. (Doc. No. 11.) On April 23, 2019, plaintiff filed an opposition to defendant's motion. (Doc. No. 12.)
A written provision in any contract evidencing a transaction involving commerce to settle a dispute by arbitration is subject to the Federal Arbitration Act ("FAA"). 9 U.S.C. § 2. The FAA confers on the parties involved the right to obtain an order directing that arbitration proceed in the manner provided for in a contract between them. 9 U.S.C. § 4. In deciding a motion to compel arbitration, the "court's role under the Act . . . is limited to determining (1) whether a valid agreement to arbitrate exists and, if it does, (2) whether the agreement encompasses the dispute at issue." Chiron Corp. v. Ortho Diagnostic Sys., Inc., 207 F.3d 1126, 1130 (9th Cir. 2000).
There is an "emphatic federal policy in favor of arbitral dispute resolution." Mitsubishi Motors Corp. v. Soler Chrysler-Plymouth, 473 U.S. 614, 631 (1985). As such, "'any doubtsconcerning the scope of arbitrable issues should be resolved in favor of arbitration, whether the problem at hand is the construction of the contract language itself or an allegation of waiver, delay, or a like defense to arbitrability.'" Id. at 626 (quoting Moses H. Cone Mem'l Hosp. v. Mercury Const. Corp., 460 U.S. 1 at 24-25 (1983)). "Because waiver of the right to arbitration is disfavored, 'any party arguing waiver of arbitration bears a heavy burden of proof.'" Fisher v. A.G. Becker Paribas Inc., 791 F.2d 691, 694 (9th Cir. 1986) (quoting Belke v. Merrill Lynch, Pierce, Fenner & Smith, 693 F.2d 1023, 1025 (11th Cir. 1982)). Therefore, an arbitration agreement may only "be invalidated by 'generally applicable contract defenses, such as fraud, duress, or unconscionability,' but not by defenses that apply only to arbitration or that derive their meaning from the fact that an agreement to arbitrate is at issue." AT & T Mobility LLC v. Concepcion, 563 U.S. 333, 339 (2011) (quoting Doctor's Assocs., Inc. v. Casarotto, 517 U.S. 681, 687 (1996)). Courts may not apply traditional contractual defenses, like duress and unconscionability, in a broader or more stringent manner to invalidate arbitration agreements and thereby undermine FAA's purpose to "ensur[e] that private arbitration agreements are enforced according to their terms." Id. at 344 (quoting Volt Info. Scis., Inc. v. Bd. of Trs., 489 U.S. 468, 478 (1989)).
To be clear, there are effectively two separate motions now before the court. The first is defendant's motion to compel arbitration, in which defendant contends that a valid arbitration agreement exists that precludes resolution of this dispute in federal court. (Doc. No. 7.) Second is plaintiff's ex parte application, wherein plaintiff seeks a continuance of the hearing on defendant's motion in order to conduct discovery to determine whether the arbitration agreement is valid and enforceable. (Doc. No. 11.) By minute order, the court has already denied plaintiff's application to the extent it requests a continuance of the hearing on defendant's motion. (Doc. No. 13.) However, the issue of whether plaintiff is entitled to discovery in connection with defendant's motion remains to be decided. Because the issues raised in each motion are intertwined, the court will address them simultaneously.
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The first issue is whether this court may properly decide the threshold question of arbitrability. Defendant argues the question of whether this dispute must be resolved through arbitration must itself be resolved by an arbitrator, rather than by this court. (Doc. No. 7-1 at 11-13.)
"Generally, in deciding whether to compel arbitration, a court must determine two 'gateway' issues: (1) whether there is an agreement to arbitrate between the parties; and (2) whether the agreement covers the dispute." Brennan v. Opus Bank, 796 F.3d 1125, 1130 (9th Cir. 2015). Resolution of these issues "is typically an issue for judicial determination." Granite Rock Co. v. Int'l Bhd. of Teamsters, 561 U.S. 287, 296 (2010) (internal quotation marks and brackets omitted). Thus, "[c]ourts should not assume that the parties agreed to arbitrate arbitrability unless there is clear and unmistakable evidence that they did so." First Options of Chicago, Inc. v. Kaplan, 514 U.S. 938, 944 (1995) (emphasis added) (internal quotation marks and brackets omitted); Kramer v. Toyota Motor Corp., 705 F.3d 1122, 1127 (9th Cir. 2013). As the Supreme Court has explained:
the law...
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