Garcia v. Fleetwood Limousine, Inc.

• Decision Date: 14 February 2007
• Docket Number: No. 6:05-cv-673-Orl-JGG.,6:05-cv-673-Orl-JGG.
• Citation: 511 F.Supp.2d 1233
• Parties: Hector L. GARCIA, George Chammas, Plaintiffs, v. FLEETWOOD LIMOUSINE, INC., Ghaleb Aburish, Samih Ibrahim Aburish, and Nina Samih Aburish, Defendants.
• Court: U.S. District Court — Middle District of Florida

511 F.Supp.2d 1233

Hector L. GARCIA, George Chammas, Plaintiffs, v. FLEETWOOD LIMOUSINE, INC., Ghaleb Aburish, Samih Ibrahim Aburish, and Nina Samih Aburish, Defendants.

No. 6:05-cv-673-Orl-JGG.

United States District Court, M.D. Florida, Orlando Division.

February 14, 2007.

N. James Turner, N. James Turner, PA, Orlando, FL, for Plaintiffs.

Albert E. Ford, II, Albert E. Ford II, PA, Lake Mary, FL, for Defendants.

ORDER

JAMES G. GLAZEBROOK, United States Magistrate Judge.

This cause came on for hearing on January 31, 2007 on the following motion:

MOTION: DEFENDANTS' MOTION FOR SUMMARY JUDGMENT (Doc. No. 60)

FILED: October 2, 2006

THEREON it is ORDERED that the motion is DENIED.

Plaintiffs Hector Garcia and George Chammas seek to hold Defendants Fleetwood Limousine, Inc. ["Fleetwood"], Ghaleb Aburish, Samih Aburish ["Aburish"], and Nina Aburish [collectively, "the Defendants"] liable under the Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938, as amended, 29 U.S.C. § 216(b) ["FLSA"]. Docket No. 50 (amended complaint). Plaintiffs claim that Defendants failed to pay them overtime wages for their work as bus drivers for Fleetwood. Id. at 3, 5. Garcia alleges he is owed 499 hours of overtime. Docket No. 63-2 at 1, ¶ 1. Chammas claims he is owed 2,094 hours of overtime. Docket No. 50 at 5, ¶ 27.

Defendants do not dispute that Plaintiffs worked overtime hours, but instead, claim that they are exempt from the overtime provisions of the FLSA.¹ Defendants have filed a motion for summary judgment (now before the Court) in which they argue that Plaintiffs are exempt employees pursuant to 29 U.S.C. § 213(b)(1), the "motor carrier exemption." Docket No. 60. At the request of Defendants, the Court heard argument on the motion on January 31, 2007.

I. BACKGROUND

Fleetwood, a Florida corporation doing business in Orange County, Florida, provides transportation by cars, limousines, vans, and buses. Fleetwood advertises that it provides services by car, limousine, van, and bus to pick up passengers from the airport. Docket No. 59 at 7 (advertisement).

Garcia worked as a bus driver for Fleetwood from August 23, 2003 through April 29, 2005. Garcia never made an airport trip while he worked for Fleetwood. Docket No. 62-3 at 1, ¶ 3; Docket No. 66-3 at 27. According to Garcia, other Fleetwood drivers picked up passengers from the Orlando International Airport once every five or six months. Docket No. 66-3 at 10. Garcia never drove outside of Florida on behalf of Fleetwood; never transported passengers outside Florida; and never heard of any Fleetwood driver transporting passengers out of Florida. Docket Nos. 62-3 at 1-2, ¶¶ 12, 4-5. In his deposition, Garcia testified that he could refuse assignments from the Fleetwood driver if he wished. Docket No. 66-3 at 26.

Chammas also worked as a bus driver for Fleetwood from September 1999 through April 2006. In his deposition on August 14, 2006, Chammas testified that he drove the airport route more than a dozen times, but not more than two dozen times. Docket No. 66-2 at 14-15. In his affidavit dated October 11, 2006 (submitted in support of his memorandum in opposition to the summary judgment motion), Chammas states that he made approximately four trips to the airport during the six-year period he worked for Fleetwood. Docket No. 62-4 at 2, ¶ 6. Chammas never drove outside of Florida on behalf of Fleetwood, and he never heard of other Fleetwood drivers transporting passengers outside of Florida. Id. at 1, ¶¶ 2-3. Chammas also testified that he could refuse assignments from the dispatcher. Docket No. 66-2 at 16.

In support of their motion for summary judgment, Defendants submitted an affidavit from Defendant Samyh Aburish ["Aburish"],² "Operations Manager" for Fleetwood. Docket No. 59. According to Aburish, Fleetwood regularly transports passengers across state lines and from the Orlando International Airport to various hotels in Florida. Id. at 4, ¶ 4. Further, travel agents, some of whom are from outside Florida, offer Fleetwood transportation as part of travel packages. Id. Aburish also' states that bus drivers are "randomly assigned to intrastate and interstate routes indiscriminately," and that Plaintiffs could "reasonably be expected" to drive to the airport or to drive across state lines. Id. at 4-5, ¶ 5. Aburish states that twenty-five to thirty percent of Fleetwood's regular business involves providing transportation from Central Florida to locations outside of Florida, including Atlanta and Washington, D.C. Id. at 5, ¶ 6. According to Aburish, more than fifty percent of Fleetwood's bits routes are the airport routes, which involve picking up passengers arriving at Orlando International Airport. Id.

In response to Defendants' motion, Plaintiffs submitted the transcript from Aburish's August 14, 2006 deposition. Docket No. 62-2. Aburish testified that he is the "managing director," but not an officer or director of Fleetwood. Id. at 3, 4. He did not know the duties of the vice president of Fleetwood, his brother Ghaleb Aburish (who is also a defendant in this case). He did not know the definition of "intrastate." Id. at 4, 7. Aburish also testified that Fleetwood had sent its drivers on trips outside of Florida within the last two years, but that he did not know the number of trips or the names of the drivers who made these trips. Id. at 8.

At the hearing on the summary judgment motion, Defendants, through counsel, could point to no evidence in the record showing what percentage of Fleetwood's overall business involves transportation of passengers out of state, or to and from the airport. Furthermore, Defendants could point to no evidence in the record explaining the method by which Fleetwood's dispatcher assigns out of state and airport trips to Fleetwood drivers.

II. THE LAW

A. Standard of Review on Summary Judgment

Summary judgment is appropriate "if the pleadings, depositions, answers to interrogatories and admissions on file, together with the affidavits, if any, show that there is no genuine issue as to any material fact and that the moving party is entitled to judgment as a matter of law." Fed.R.Civ.P. 56(c). The moving party bears the initial burden of showing the Court, by reference to materials on file, that there are no genuine issues of material fact that should be decided at trial. Celotex Corp. v. Catrett, 477 U.S. 317, 106 S.Ct. 2548, 91 L.E d.2d 265 (1986); Jeffery v. Sarasota White Sox, 64 F.3d 590, 593-94 (11th Cir.1995); Clark v. Coats & Clark, Inc., 929 F.2d 604 (11th Cir.1991). A moving party discharges its burden on a motion for summary judgment by showing that there is an absence of evidence to support the non-moving party's case.³ Celotex, 477 U.S. at 325, 106 S.Ct. 2548. Rule 56 permits the moving party to discharge its burden with or without supporting affidavits, and to move for summary judgment on the case as a whole or on any claim. Id. When a moving party has discharged its burden, the non-moving party must then "go beyond the pleadings," and by its own affidavits or by "depositions, answers to interrogatories, and admissions on file," designate specific facts showing that there is a genuine issue for trial. Id. at 324, 106 S.Ct. 2548.

In determining whether the moving party has met its burden of establishing that there is no genuine issue as to any material fact and that it is entitled to judgment as a matter of law, the Court must draw inferences from the evidence in the light most favorable to the non-movant, and resolve all reasonable doubts in that party's favor. Spence v. Zimmerman, 873 F2d 256 (11th Cir.1989); Samples on behalf of Samples v. City of Atlanta, 846 F.2d 1328, 1330 (11th Cir.1988). The United States Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit has explained the reasonableness standard:

in deciding whether an inference is reasonable, the Court must "cull the universe of possible inferences from the facts established by weighing each against the abstract standard of reasonableness." [citation omitted]. The opposing party's inferences need not be more probable than those inferences in favor of the movant to create a factual dispute, so long as they reasonably may be drawn from the facts. When more than one inference reasonably can be drawn, it is for the trier of fact to determine the proper one.

Jeffery, 64 F.3d at 594, quoting WSB-TV v. Lee, 842 F.2d 1266, 1270 (11th Cir.1988).

Thus, if a reasonable fact finder evaluating the evidence could draw more than one inference from the facts, and if that inference introduces a genuine issue of material fact, then the court should not grant the summary judgment motion. Augusta Iron and Steel Works v. Employers Ins. of Wausau, 835 F2d 855, 856 (11th Cir.1988). A dispute about a material fact is "genuine" if the "evidence is such that a reasonable jury could return a verdict for the nonmoving party." Anderson v. Liberty Lobby, Inc., 477 U.S. 242, 248, 106 S.Ct. 2505, 91 L.Ed.2d 202 (1986). The inquiry is "whether the evidence presents a sufficient disagreement to require submission to a jury or whether it is so one-sided that one party must prevail as a matter of law." Id. at 251-52, 106 S.Ct. 2505. On a summary judgment motion the Court may not weigh the credibility of the parties. See Rollins v. TechSouth, Inc., 833 F2d 1525, 1531 (11th Cir.1987). If the determination of the case rests on which competing version of the facts or events is true, the case should be' presented to the trier of fact. Id.

B. The Motor Carrier Exemption

The FLSA requires that employers compensate their employees not less than one and one-half times their regular rate for hours worked in excess of forty hours per week. 29 U.S.C. § 207(a)(1). Defendants argue that Plaintiffs are exempt from the payment of overtime wages pursuant to 29 U.S.C. § 213(b)(1), the "motor carrier exemption." This exemption provides that the FLSA's overtime provisions "shall not apply with respect to any employee with respect to...