Susan C. Zennan v. United States

NOTE: This order is nonprecedential.

# United States Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit

2009-5123

SUSAN C. ZENNAN,

Plaintiff-Appellant,
V.
UNITED STATES,

Defendant-Appellee.

Appeal from the United States Court of Federal Claims
in 08-CV-290, Chief Judge Emily C. Hewitt.

ON MOTION

Before NEWMAN, FRIEDMAN, and LOURIE, Circuit Judges.
LOURIE, Circuit Judge.

## ORDER

The United States moves to affirm the judgment of the United States Court of
Federal Claims in this case. Susan C. Zennan opposes and moves to continue the stay
of the briefing schedule and consolidate this case with several other cases. The United
States replies.

The briefing schedules in this case and several other cases were stayed pending
this court's disposition of Easter v. United States, 2008-5187. This court recently issued
a decision in Easter, affirming the judgment of the Court of Federal Claims that federal
employees who are required to use government vehicles when driving between their
homes and their places of work are not entitled to compensation for such travel time

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under the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA), 29 U.S.C. § 201 et seq. Easter v. United
States, 575 F.3d 1332 (Fed. Cir. 2009).

In Easter, we noted that the dispute in that case was "identical in all material
respects to the dispute that was before this court less than three years ago in Adams v.
United States, 471 F.3d 1321 (Fed. Cir. 2006) and is similar to the dispute that was
previously before this court in Bobo v. United States, 136 F.3d 1465 (Fed. Cir. 1998)."
Easter, 575 F.3d at 1333. We stated that "[t]he task in [Easter] is therefore mainly to
determine whether there is any reason for us to distinguish or depart from the Adams
and Bobo decisions. We conclude that there is not, and we therefore affirm the decision
of the Court of Federal Claims granting summary judgment in favor of the government."
Id.

Similarly, in this case, the Court of Federal Claims noted that Adams and Bobo
controlled its disposition of the case, notwithstanding the plaintiff's disagreement with
the holdings of those cases. Factually, this case is very similar to Easter. On appeal,
counsel for the appellant makes the same arguments that he made in Easter. This
case, like Easter, Adams, and Bobo, involves a federal employee seeking overtime pay
for the time spent driving to and from work in a government-owned vehicle. The Court
of Federal Claims in this case properly relied on Adams and held that overtime pay is
not permitted for such an activity in this case.

Under the circumstances, we determine that affirmance of the judgment of the
Court of Federal Claims is required by our precedent. See Joshua v. United States, 178
F.3d 378, 380 (Fed. Cir. 1994) ("summary disposition is appropriate, inter alia, when the

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position of one party is so clearly correct as a matter of law that no substantial question
regarding the outcome of the appeal exists").

Accordingly,

IT IS ORDERED THAT:

(1)
The motion for affirmance is granted. The stay of the briefing schedule is
lifted and the judgment of the Court of Federal Claims is affirmed.

(2)
The motion to continue the stay of the briefing schedule and consolidate is
denied.

(3)
Each side shall bear its own costs.

FOR THE COURT

DEC 1 0 2009

Date

/s/ Jan Horbaly
Jan Horbaly
Clerk

cc:
Jules Bernstein, Esq.
Shalom Brilliant, Esq.

s8

FILED
U.S. COURT OF APPEALS FOR
THE FEDERAL CIRCUIT

DEC 10 2009

JAN HORBALY
CLERK

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