Nathalie Thuy Van v. Language Line Services, Inc. et al

Filing 321

Preliminary Jury Instructions (Final). Signed by Judge Lucy H. Koh on 7/7/2016. (lhklc3, COURT STAFF) (Filed on 7/7/2016) (EMAILED TO PLTF ON 7/7/16) Modified on 7/7/2016 (sms, COURT STAFF).

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UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT

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NORTHERN DISTRICT OF CALIFORNIA

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SAN JOSE DIVISION

United States District Court
Northern District of California

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NATHALIE THUY VAN,
Plaintiff,

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Case No. 14-CV-03791-LHK
PRELIMINARY JURY INSTRUCTIONS

v.

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LANGUAGE LINE, LLC

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Defendant.

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PRELIMINARY JURY INSTRUCTIONS

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IT IS SO ORDERED.

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Dated: July 7, 2016

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______________________________________
LUCY H. KOH
United States District Judge

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1. DUTY OF JURY

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United States District Court
Northern District of California

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Members of the jury: You are now the jury in this case. It is my duty to instruct you on the law.
These instructions are preliminary instructions to help you understand the principles that apply to
civil trials and to help you understand the evidence as you listen to it. You will be allowed to keep
this set of instructions to refer to throughout the trial. These instructions are not to be taken home
and must remain in the jury room when you leave in the evenings. At the end of the trial, these
instructions will be collected and I will give you a final set of instructions. It is the final set of
instructions that will govern your deliberations.
It is your duty to find the facts from all the evidence in the case. To those facts you will apply the
law as I give it to you. You must follow the law as I give it to you whether you agree with it or
not. And you must not be influenced by any personal likes or dislikes, opinions, prejudices, or
sympathy. That means that you must decide the case solely on the evidence before you. You will
recall that you took an oath to do so.
Please do not read into these instructions or anything I may say or do that I have an opinion
regarding the evidence or what your verdict should be.

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2. CLAIMS AND DEFENSES

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To help you follow the evidence, I will give you a brief summary of the positions of the parties:
The plaintiff Nathalie Thuy Van asserts that Defendant Language Line, LLC did not pay
her for overtime she worked, did not provide her meal and rest breaks, and did not provide her
with accurate wage statements. The plaintiff has the burden of proving these claims.
The defendant denies these claims.

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United States District Court
Northern District of California

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3. BURDEN OF PROOF—PREPONDERANCE OF THE EVIDENCE

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When a party has the burden of proof on any claim by a preponderance of the evidence, it means
you must be persuaded by the evidence that the claim is more probably true than not true.

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You should base your decision on all of the evidence, regardless of which party presented it.

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4. WHAT IS EVIDENCE

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The evidence you are to consider in deciding what the facts are consists of:

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(1) the sworn testimony of any witness;

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(2) the exhibits which are received in evidence;

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(3) any facts to which the parties have agreed; and

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(4) any facts that I may instruct you to accept as proved.

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5. WHAT IS NOT EVIDENCE

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In reaching your verdict, you may consider only the testimony and exhibits received into evidence.
Certain things are not evidence, and you may not consider them in deciding what the facts are. I
will list them for you:

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(1) Arguments and statements by Mr. Kelly, Mr. Van der Heide, or by Ms. Van
when she is not testifying as a witness, are not evidence. What they may say in
their opening statements, closing arguments, and at other times is intended to help
you interpret the evidence, but it is not evidence. If the facts as you remember
them differ from the way the parties have stated them, your memory of them
controls.

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(2) Questions and objections by Mr. Kelly, Mr. Van der Heide, or Ms. Van are not
evidence. They have a right to object when they believe a question is improper
under the rules of evidence. You should not be influenced by the objection or by
the court’s ruling on it.
(3) Testimony that is excluded or stricken, or that you have been instructed to
disregard, is not evidence and must not be considered. In addition some evidence
may be received only for a limited purpose; when I instruct you to consider certain
evidence only for a limited purpose, you must do so and you may not consider that
evidence for any other purpose.
(4) Anything you may have seen or heard when the court was not in session is not
evidence. You are to decide the case solely on the evidence received at the trial.

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6. DIRECT AND CIRCUMSTANTIAL EVIDENCE
Evidence may be direct or circumstantial. Direct evidence is direct proof of a fact, such as
testimony by a witness about what that witness personally saw or heard or did. Circumstantial
evidence is proof of one or more facts from which you could find another fact. You should
consider both kinds of evidence. The law makes no distinction between the weight to be given to
either direct or circumstantial evidence. It is for you to decide how much weight to give to any
evidence.

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7. RULING ON OBJECTIONS

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There are rules of evidence that control what can be received into evidence. When one side asks a
question or offers an exhibit into evidence and the other side thinks that it is not permitted by the
rules of evidence, that side may object. If I overrule the objection, the question may be answered
or the exhibit received. If I sustain the objection, the question cannot be answered, and the exhibit
cannot be received. Whenever I sustain an objection to a question, you must ignore the question
and must not guess what the answer might have been.

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Sometimes I may order that evidence be stricken from the record and that you disregard or ignore
the evidence. That means that when you are deciding the case, you must not consider the stricken
evidence for any purpose.

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8. CREDIBILITY OF WITNESSES

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In deciding the facts in this case, you may have to decide which testimony to believe and which
testimony not to believe. You may believe everything a witness says, or part of it, or none of it.

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In considering the testimony of any witness, you may take into account:

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(1) the opportunity and ability of the witness to see or hear or know the things testified
to;
(2) the witness’s memory;
(3) the witness’s manner while testifying;
(4) the witness’s interest in the outcome of the case and any bias or prejudice;
(5) whether other evidence contradicted the witness’s testimony;
(6) the reasonableness of the witness’s testimony in light of all the evidence; and
(7) any other factors that bear on believability.
Sometimes a witness may say something that is not consistent with something else he or she said.
Sometimes different witnesses will give different versions of what happened. People often forget
things or make mistakes in what they remember. Also, two people may see the same event but
remember it differently. You may consider these differences, but do not decide that testimony is
untrue just because it differs from other testimony.
However, if you decide that a witness has deliberately testified untruthfully about something
important, you may choose not to believe anything that witness said. On the other hand, if you
think the witness testified untruthfully about some things but told the truth about others, you may
accept the part you think is true and ignore the rest.
The weight of the evidence as to a fact does not necessarily depend on the number of witnesses
who testify. What is important is how believable the witnesses were, and how much weight you
think their testimony deserves.

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9. CONDUCT OF THE JURY
I will now say a few words about your conduct as jurors.
First, keep an open mind throughout the trial, and do not decide what the verdict should be until
you and your fellow jurors have completed your deliberations at the end of the case.
Second, because you must decide this case based only on the evidence received in the case and on
my instructions as to the law that applies, you must not be exposed to any other information about
the case or to the issues it involves during the course of your jury duty. Thus, until the end of the
case or unless I tell you otherwise:
Do not communicate with anyone in any way and do not let anyone else
communicate with you in any way about the merits of the case or anything to do
with it. This includes discussing the case in person, in writing, by phone or
electronic means, via email, text messaging, or any internet chat room, blog,
website or other social media. This applies to communicating with your fellow
jurors until I give you the case for deliberation, and it applies to communicating
with everyone else including your family members, your employer, the media or
press, and the people involved in the trial, although you may notify your family and
your employer that you have been seated as a juror in the case. But, if you are
asked or approached in any way about your jury service or anything about this case,
you must respond that you have been ordered not to discuss the matter and to report
the contact to the court.
Because you will receive all the evidence and legal instruction you properly may
consider to return a verdict: do not read, watch, or listen to any news or media
accounts or commentary about the case or anything to do with it; do not do any
research, such as consulting dictionaries, searching the Internet or using other
reference materials; and do not make any investigation or in any other way try to
learn about the case on your own.
The law requires these restrictions to ensure the parties have a fair trial based on the same
evidence that each party has had an opportunity to address. A juror who violates these restrictions
jeopardizes the fairness of these proceedings, and a mistrial could result that would require the
entire process to start over. If any juror is exposed to any outside information, please notify the
court immediately.

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10. NO TRANSCRIPT AVAILABLE TO JURY

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I urge you to pay close attention to the trial testimony as it is given. During deliberations you will
not have a transcript of the trial testimony.

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11. TAKING NOTES

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If you wish, you may take notes to help you remember the evidence. If you do take notes, please
keep them to yourself until you go to the jury room to decide the case. Do not let notetaking
distract you. When you leave, your notes should be left in the jury room. No one will read your
notes.
Whether or not you take notes, you should rely on your own memory of the evidence. Notes are
only to assist your memory. You should not be overly influenced by your notes or those of your
fellow jurors.

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12. BENCH CONFERENCES AND RECESSES

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From time to time during the trial, it may become necessary for me to talk with the parties out of
the hearing of the jury, either by having a conference at the bench when the jury is present in the
courtroom, or by calling a recess. Please understand that while you are waiting, we are working.
The purpose of these conferences is not to keep relevant information from you, but to decide how
certain evidence is to be treated under the rules of evidence and to avoid confusion and error.

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Of course, we will do what we can to keep the number and length of these conferences to a
minimum. I may not always grant a request for a conference. Do not consider my granting or
denying a request for a conference as any indication of my opinion of the case or of what your
verdict should be.

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13. STIPULATIONS OF FACT
The parties have agreed to certain facts that will be read to you. You should therefore treat these
facts as having been proved.

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1. Between October 7, 2010 and October 17, 2012, Defendant failed to provide Plaintiff
with a meal or rest break as required by law on 136 instances.

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14. OUTLINE OF TRIAL
Trials proceed in the following way: First, each side may make an opening statement. An
opening statement is not evidence. It is simply an outline to help you understand what that party
expects the evidence will show. A party is not required to make an opening statement.
The plaintiff will then present evidence, and the defendant may cross-examine. Then the
defendant may present evidence, and the plaintiff may cross-examine.
After the evidence has been presented, I will instruct you on the law that applies to the case and
each side will make closing arguments.
After that, you will go to the jury room to deliberate on your verdict.

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