Know Your Judge: Virginia A. Phillips

This week in Know Your Judge, we feature Chief Judge Virginia A. Phillips of the U.S. District Court for the Central District of California.

President Bill Clinton nominated Phillips, who joined the bench in 1999. She became chief judge two years ago.

Phillips is presiding over ahigh-profile caseinvolving the retirement plans of the University of Southern California. University employees alleged that USC breached its Employee Retirement Income Security Act fiduciary duties by allowing imprudent investments in its retirement plans. Last year, Phillipsrejected USC’s request to send those claims to arbitration. The university appealed Phillips’ ruling to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, which heard oral arguments May 14. Last week, Phillipsagreedwith USC’s request to stay proceedings pending a ruling from the Ninth Circuit.

Earlier this year, Phillips, who leads the largest federal court in the Ninth Circuit, joined a special groupcreatedto review judicial workplace environment policies. The Ninth Circuit group, in which four of its five members are women, seeks to develop better means of communication in judicial workplaces and assure a healthy and productive workplace for law clerks and staff.

Numbers & Statistics

Phillips tends to fully or partially grant requests of dismissal in employment discrimination disputes, according to Bloomberg Law Litigation Analytics. Her record shows that she has only denied one motion to dismiss involving an employee benefits case.

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As to Phillips’s appeal outcomes, the Ninth Circuit has affirmed or partially affirmed a majority of her benefits and employment discrimination rulings.

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Phillips usually takes longer to decide wage and hour disputes than other labor, employment, and benefits cases. On average, it took Phillips:

• 219 days to resolve 11 disability discrimination lawsuits;

• 254 days to close 201 employee benefits dispute;

• 277 days to dispose of 198 lawsuits involving age, race, and other types of discrimination;

• 322 days to resolve 80 labor disputes; and

• 532 days to dispose of 95 wage and hour cases.

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Looking for more analytics on judges? Check back each Wednesday for our Know Your Judge feature, or tryBloomberg Law’s Litigation Analytics. And contact us if there’s a judge you want us to feature.

To contact the reporter on this story: Carmen Castro-Pagan in Washington atccastro-pagan@bloomberglaw.com

To contact the editors responsible for this story: Jo-el J. Meyer atjmeyer@bloomberglaw.com; Martha Mueller Neff atmmuellerneff@bloomberglaw.com