Randy Cosby v. Autozone, Inc.

NOT FOR PUBLICATION
UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
FOR THE NINTH CIRCUIT
RANDY COSBY,
Plaintiff - Appellee,
v.
AUTOZONE, INC.,
Defendant - Appellant.
No. 12-17559
D.C. No. 2:08-cv-00505-LKK-DAD
MEMORANDUM*
Appeal from the United States District Court
for the Eastern District of California
Lawrence K. Karlton, Senior District Judge, Presiding
Argued and Submitted February 9, 2015
San Francisco, California
Before: HAWKINS, PAEZ, and BERZON, Circuit Judges.
Following AutoZone, Inc.’s successful first appeal to this court, Cosby v.
Autozone, Inc., No. 10-16189, 2011 WL 3267704 (9th Cir. June 15, 2011),1 the district
court entered an order of remittitur, reducing plaintiff Randy Cosby’s (“Cosby”)
economic damages award from $174,000 to $4,917.60 and reducing his non-economic
FILED
MAR 18 2015
MOLLY C. DWYER, CLERK
U.S. COURT OF APPEALS
* This disposition is not appropriate for publication and is not precedent except
as provided by Ninth Circuit Rule 36-3.
1 AutoZone’s Motion to Take Judicial Notice is granted.

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damages award for mental suffering from $1,326,000 to $250,000. AutoZone appeals
again, contending the non-economic award is still too large. We affirm.
We review the district court’s ruling on remittitur for an abuse of discretion.
See D&S Redi-Mix & Contracting Co., 692 F.2d 1245, 1249 (9th Cir. 1982). The
proper amount of a remittitur is the maximum amount sustainable by the evidence.
Id. We must view the evidence supporting the court’s ruling and all reasonable
inferences therefrom in favor of Cosby. Cf. Bains LLC v. Arco Prods. Co., 405 F.3d
764, 774 (9th Cir. 2005).
This court’s prior order held that the evidence did not sustain the exceptionally
large award of $1.326 million in non-compensatory damages. It did not, however,
rule out the possibility that a smaller award could be sustained, or hold that the district
court could not consider evidence of emotional harm both before and after Cosby’s
termination. On remand, the district court carefully considered all the evidence in the
case and concluded that it was proper to consider both pre- and post-termination
emotional harm as related to AutoZone’s failure to accommodate but that a substantial
reduction in the amount of the jury’s award was also required.
Under the abuse of discretion standard, a district court’s decision may fall
within a broad range of permissible conclusions, see Grant v. City of Long Beach, 315
F.3d 1081, 1091 (9th Cir. 2002), even if not the same conclusion that the appellate
2

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court would reach, see Kode v. Carlson, 596 F.3d 608, 613 (9th Cir. 2010) (per
curiam). Here, we cannot say that the court’s decision is illogical, implausible, or
wholly without support in the inferences drawn from the record. United States v.
Hinkson, 585 F.3d 1247, 1262 (9th Cir. 2009) (en banc).
AFFIRMED.
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