A person who won a racial discrimination case against the company will seek a new damages trial after rejecting a fifteen million dollar settlement.
A federal judge reduced a jury's award of $137 million to 15 million dollars. US District Judge William Orrick found that the jury had overreached in its calculation of damages, despite the fact that the judge rejected the claim that it was not liable for the racist abuse.
He rejected the lowerPayout in a court filing on Tuesday. The case is in the Northern District of California.
"In rejecting the court's excessive reduction by asking for a new trial, Mr. Diaz is again asking a jury of his peers to evaluate whatTesla did to him and to provide just compensation for the torrent of racist slurs that was directed at him." Mr.Diaz wants to restore a fair and just punitive damages award that will punish and deterTesla for the racist conduct to which he was subjected.
Orrick reduced the jury's award to $1.5 million in compensatory damages and $13.50 million in punitive damages. According to the judge, the highest award supported by the evidence is 1.5 million dollars, and that the punitive damages can be nine times that amount.
Orrick wrote that the evidence of racist abuse was "disturbing" and that the claim of only "garden variety" emotional distress that was "fortunately mild and short-lived" was not true.
The jury was told that the factory was filled with racists. There was a lot of racial abuse, including the n-word and other slurs. Employees harassed him. His supervisors did nothing to respond. The supervisors joined in on the abuse, one going so far as to threaten and draw a racist caricature near his workspace.
AdvertisementThe award was lowered in an order on June 7. Orrick wrote that Diaz had not identified a controlling question of law appropriate for immediate appellate review, even though he had filed a motion for certification of the post- trial order.
The judge said that his analysis zeroed in on the specific facts elicited at trial. The lack of evidence at trial was the focus of the future damages analysis. Past and future damages were included in the jury's award of $6 million.
An appeal would delay the resolution of the case without much chance of changing it.
I am firmly convinced that the damages award (compensatory and punitive) was excessive. If I saw substantial grounds for a difference of opinion, I would not have issued the remittitur [that reduced damages]. And I have no doubt that certifying this issue would further delay resolution of a case that is already five years old. No factor suggests that interlocutory appeal is appropriate.
His other options are time consuming and risky, as pointed out in his motion for certification for an interlocutory appeal. If there is no certification by this Court and the Ninth Circuit, there is only one way for him to appeal the Court's damages award.
Women are accusing the company of failing to stop rampant sexual harassment at its facilities in California and the LA area. The first of those cases was ruled in May by an Alameda County Superior Court judge.
In a lawsuit filed on Sunday, laid-off workers accused the company of violating US law by not giving them enough notice. The WARN Act requires former employees to get 60 days of pay and benefits.
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