Law Firm Assistant Denied Collective Status in Overtime Suit

Moore Ingram Johnson & Steele LLP convinced a federal judge in Tennessee to deny conditional certification of a Fair Labor Standards Act collective action alleging it cheated its legal assistants out of overtime pay.

Plaintiff Julia Russo failed to present sufficient evidence she and similarly situated employees were subjected to a single firmwide policy or practice that violated the FLSA, Judge Aleta A. Trauger of the U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Tennessee said Wednesday.

Russo, who worked at Moore Ingram’s office in Brentwood, Tenn., for about two years, alleged the firm scheduled its assistants to work 37.5 hours per week but only paid them according to that schedule regardless of whether they worked overtime.

Although Russo demonstrated that she personally worked more than 40 hours per week without receiving overtime pay, she didn’t put forth any specific facts about the “working conditions” of assistants employed at other offices, the court said.

It’s not enough for Russo to allege that she witnessed other assistants in the Brentwood office working before and after their shifts and during lunch breaks, the court said. She doesn’t claim to have had conversations with employees who told her they worked unpaid overtime, and she didn’t track their hours.

The firm employs more than 60 attorneys, plus support staff, and has offices in Georgia, Tennessee, Kentucky, Florida, and Pennsylvania.

Mark N. Foster of Rockwood, Tenn. represents Russo. Stites & Harbison PLLC represents the firm.

The case is Russo v. Moore Ingram Johnson & Steele, LLP, 2021 BL 283947, M.D. Tenn., No. 3:20-cv-00820, 7/28/21.