U.S. Court of Federal Claims Case Summaries: September 2, 2008

Daily Record (Rochester, NY), Sep 2, 2008

U.S. Court of Federal Claims

Fair Labor Standards Act

Overtime

Delpin Aponte v. U.S.

05-1043C

Judge Wolski

Background: The plaintiffs are a large number of current and former employees of the U.S. Postal Service residing in Puerto Rico. They allege USPS failed to properly compensate them when overtime was worked, and they seek to certify a class for purposes of obtaining back pay and other damages. Pending before the court is the plaintiffs' motion for leave to file a second amended complaint to include USPS employees system-wide. The proposed complain also would more generally describe the cause of their alleged injuries, no longer emphasizing how the Territorial Cost of Living Adjustment figures in the overtime pay calculations.

Ruling: The proposed amendments that more generally describe the alleged failures of the USPS do not fail the test disallowing only those amendments that obviously would be frivolous or without merit; however, "at this advanced stage of the proceedings, after one dispositive motion has been sidestepped under RCFC 56(f) and another one is imminent, it would unduly prejudice [the] defendant to allow such a dramatic expansion of this particular case." The motion to expand the class is denied.

Santiago F. Lampon-Gonzalez for the plaintiffs, and Michael Dierberg, U.S. Department of Justice, for the defendant.