2019.2.28 Transcript

Case 18-04171-elm Doc 29 Filed 02/28/19 Entered 02/28/19 07:47:21 Page 1 of 132
IN THE UNITED STATES BANKRUPTCY COURT

1 FOR THE NORTHERN DISTRICT OF TEXAS
FORT WORTH DIVISION
2
In Re: ) Case No. 18-40270-elm-11
3 )
TENET CONCEPTS, LLC, )
4 ) Fort Worth, Texas
Debtor. ) February 26, 2019
5 ) 1:00 p.m.
)
6 ) - OBJECTIONS TO CLAIMS
) [95, 145, 146, 147, 175]
7 ) - MOTION TO ESTIMATE CLAIMS
) FOR PURPOSES OF CONFIRMATION
8 ) [185]
) - MOTION TO EXTEND DEADLINE
9 ) TO CONFIRM PLAN [187]
)
10 )
LINES, et al., ) Adversary Proceeding 18-4171-elm
11 )
Plaintiffs, )
12 ) - MOTION FOR JUDGMENT ON THE
v. ) PLEADINGS [13]
13 ) - STATUS CONFERENCE [1]
AMAZON.COM, INC., et al., ) - MOTION FOR JOINDER [15]
14 )
Defendants. ) Excerpt: Testimony of
15 ) Jeffrey Lines
)
16
TRANSCRIPT OF PROCEEDINGS
17 BEFORE THE HONORABLE EDWARD L. MORRIS,
UNITED STATES BANKRUPTCY JUDGE.
18
APPEARANCES:
19
For Jeffrey Lines and Holt Major Lackey
20 Willie Mukes: David Henderson
ELLWANGER LAW, LLP
21 8310-1 N. Capital of Texas
Highway, Suite 190
22 Austin, TX 78731
(737) 808-2238
23
For Amazon Logistics, Inc.: Darren Glen Gibson
24 LITTLER MENDELSON, P.C.
100 Congress Avenue, Suite 1400
25 Austin, TX 78701
(412) 782-7250
1 APPEARANCES, cont'd.:
2 For Tenet Concepts, LLC: Laurie D. Rea
J. Robert Forshey (Telephonic)
3 FORSHEY & PROSTOK, LLP
777 Main Street, Suite 1290
4 Fort Worth, TX 76102
(817) 877-4224
5
For Tenet Concepts, Rory Divin
6 Special Counsel: Russell A. Devenport
MCDONALD SANDERS, P.C.
7 777 Main Street, Suite 1300
Fort Worth, TX 76102
8 (817) 336-8651
9 Court Recorder: Tandi Levario
UNITED STATES BANKRUPTCY COURT
10 501 W. 10th Street
Fort Worth, TX 76102
11 (817) 333-6038
12 Transcription Service: Kathy Rehling
311 Paradise Cove
13 Shady Shores, TX 76208
(972) 786-3014
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
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24
Proceedings recorded by digital sound recording;
25 transcript produced by transcription service.
1 FORT WORTH, TEXAS - FEBRUARY 26, 2019 - 1:01 P.M.
2 THE COURT: Good afternoon. Please be seated. All
3 right. We're on the February 26, 2019 1:00 p.m. docket. We
4 have the Tenet Concepts matter, Case 18-40270, and the
5 related Lines versus Amazon.com adversary, Adversary 18-4171.
6 It looks like we might have one telephonic appearances, but
7 let me take appearances in the courtroom first.
8 MR. LACKEY: Holt Lackey and David Henderson
9 representing Jeffery Lines and Willie Mukes and the
10 collective claimants.
11 THE CLERK: I can't hear you.
12 MR. LACKEY: Oh. Holt Lackey and David Henderson
13 representing Jeffrey Lines, Willie Mukes, and the collective
14 claimants.
15 MS. REA: Laurie Rea, and on the phone, Bobby
16 Forshey, for the Debtor.
17 MR. DIVIN: And I'm Rory Divin, Your Honor, on behalf
18 of the Debtor, along with Russell Davenport on behalf of the
19 Debtor.
20 MR. GIBSON: Darren Gibson on behalf of Amazon.
21 THE COURT: You might want to come up to the
22 microphone?
23 MR. GIBSON: Darren Gibson on behalf of Amazon.
24 THE COURT: All right. Very good. Good afternoon to
25 all of you. And Mr. Forshey obviously was announced by Ms.

Lines - Direct 4
1 Rea. Is there anyone else on the phone? All right. Mr.
2 Lackey, I think that where we left off was we had just
3 concluded with Ms. Miller, --
4 MR. LACKEY: Yes.
5 THE COURT: -- correct?
6 MR. LACKEY: Yes, Your Honor.
7 THE COURT: All right. So are we prepared to
8 proceed?
9 MR. LACKEY: Yes, Your Honor. We'd call Jeffrey
10 Lines to the stand.
11 THE COURT: Okay. Mr. Lines, if you'll just come up
12 on the other end close to the microphone, I'll swear you in
13 real quick before you sit down.
14 JEFFREY LINES, PLAINTIFFS' WITNESS, SWORN
15 THE COURT: Okay. Please be seated.
16 DIRECT EXAMINATION
17 BY MR. LACKEY:
18 Q Good afternoon. I know that you and I know each other,
19 but could you please state your name and spell your name for
20 the record?
21 A Jeffrey Lines. J-E-F-F-R-E-Y L-I-N-E-S.
22 Q And what is your date of birth?
23 A 12/22/1969.
24 Q And did you previously work for the Debtor, Tenet
25 Concepts?
Lines - Direct 5
1 A Yes, I did.
2 Q When did you work for Tenet?
3 A I think it was on October 6th, 2015.
4 Q And when did you stop working for Tenet?
5 A January 2nd of 2016.
6 Q And what did you do for Tenet?
7 A I was a driver.
8 Q And what did being a driver involve?
9 A We had to deliver packages, an amount of different
10 packages. It can -- we had a two-hour window frame. So we
11 had -- say, for instance, the windows go from 8:00 to 10:00,
12 10:00 to 12:00, 12:00 to 2:00. And then when I come on at
13 3:00 o'clock, 3:00 to 10:00 at first, I have to prepare
14 myself and get stuff together and they'll put stuff on your
15 phone, which is an S5 phone, Samsung, and we'd get the orders
16 on the phone.
17 Q And so you said they would put stuff on your phone. Who
18 is they?
19 A It would come through Amazon, and Tenet Concepts will
20 send it to us, and it can be from around five to ten orders
21 for different customers. And we have to drive to that
22 location, which everything is built into GPS through the toll
23 roads.
24 Q Uh-huh.
25 A Then it's mandatory that we drive through the toll roads

Lines - Direct 6
1 on the GPS that they have programmed.
2 Q And who would program the GPS route for you?
3 A Amazon does.
4 Q Okay. And so Amazon would send an order to Tenet
5 Concepts with the order in which you had to make the
6 deliveries?
7 A Yes. The phones were through Tenet but the app they had
8 was through Amazon. All our stuff was coming through there.
9 Q And would you have to talk to any Tenet person in order
10 to get a route from Amazon?
11 A Yeah. They'll give us a -- like, for instance, we have
12 the warehouse.
13 Q Uh-huh.
14 A The warehouse is connected with the area that we're in
15 it. You walk through the door and there's racks. There's
16 four racks on the front, four in the back middle, and four in
17 the back. There's twelve altogether. Each rack will have a
18 location. It will be like Fort Worth, Arlington, Plano,
19 Frisco, all the way down. The app that you get, the
20 information you get on the app will show the location you're
21 going to, if it's Plano, Frisco. It might have five or ten
22 different orders for ten different customers. You have a
23 two-hour span to go down there and come back, because the
24 time you get back from your delivery, you have another order
25 to pick up, because the orders that they have is already pre-
Lines - Direct 7
1 ordered the day before. So they're getting everything all
2 ready on the shelves. When they're -- everybody's out
3 running, they -- all the other shelves are being filled up
4 again. So you come back and you get another order from a
5 different county and you have to go and deliver that.
6 Q Okay. What would you wear when you worked for Tenet?
7 A When I first started, I had a badge, an Amazon badge,
8 with a -- what do they call that -- a Tenet thing you wrap
9 around your neck with the badge hooked on it. And that was
10 it. And your regular, you know, khaki pants or jeans and a
11 nice shirt. And that was it.
12 Q And did that ever change?
13 A At -- yeah. About the third day I was there, they gave
14 me a vest and I'll have an Amazon vest on the back with the
15 Amazon logo with like a construction vest type, --
16 Q Uh-huh.
17 A -- the neon yellow, or a Tenet one on the back. We had
18 to wear that in and out of our car at all times, even going
19 to the customer's house.
20 Q All right.
21 A And when we go in the warehouse, we had to have that on,
22 and we had to have the badge on to get in there because they
23 have securities and we can't get past that.
24 Q And when you were making deliveries, did you wear any
25 Amazon logos on your person?

Lines - Direct 8
1 A They gave us a shirt. They gave -- the people that are
2 already there had shirts. They were making us some. But at
3 the time, we didn't get -- I didn't get mine at the time.
4 But they were supposed to hand out, because they asked
5 everybody what their sizes were, they were supposed to give
6 us Amazon shirts and hats. But we didn't get them at the
7 time.
8 Q At what time? Did you eventually get them?
9 A No. I was supposed to get mine but they took me off the
10 schedule for the second half of December.
11 Q Okay. Did you have any logos on your car?
12 A No.
13 Q No? Who owned the warehouse where you --
14 A Amazon did.
15 Q And how were all of the deliveries placed?
16 A The warehouse people who work for Amazon will bag
17 everything up, individual pieces, and put them in a -- like a
18 carrying bag, like a -- what you call, like a hot bag type,
19 but it wasn't. And they put them on the shelves. They'll
20 put so many, so many items in a bag, and that will be for
21 like one customer. And they'll have them lined up like that.
22 And then you take your phone and you have to scan each one of
23 them items that you have, and if you're missing an item it
24 won't let you go through because you're not completed that
25 whole customer there. So you have to go and ask the

Lines - Direct 9
1 warehouse employee or manager who's working back there that
2 you're missing an item and they have the -- the item will
3 have a number on it, and they have to go get the item,
4 retrieve it, and then bring it to you and put it on the
5 shelf.
6 Q How were these items ordered?
7 A Through customers online.
8 Q And where would the customers go to order them online?
9 A They could be at home, they could be on their phone.
10 It's always a pre -- it's -- these orders were the day
11 before.
12 Q Did the customers order them through a website?
13 A Yes.
14 Q What website?
15 A Amazon Prime Now, I think it was.
16 Q Okay. And so all of the deliveries you made were from
17 Amazon Prime Now customers?
18 A Yes.
19 Q And did you ever make a delivery for anybody other than
20 Amazon --
21 A No.
22 Q -- while working at Tenet?
23 A Huh-uh.
24 Q If you could please turn to Lines Exhibit 1. I believe
25 it's the bottom of the stack on your right.

Lines - Direct 10
1 A This right here? You said the bottom? Okay. You said
2 exhibit what?
3 Q 1.
4 A Okay.
5 THE COURT: Sorry to ask. Lines Exhibit 1 or
6 Debtor's Exhibit 1?
7 MR. LACKEY: Lines Exhibit 1.
8 THE WITNESS: Okay.
9 BY MR. LACKEY:
10 Q And have you seen this document before?
11 A The handbook?
12 Q Yes.
13 A I think I have. Yeah.
14 Q Was this the handbook that you were given when you
15 started work at Tenet?
16 A Yeah. I think so, yeah.
17 Q And if you would turn to Bates 26, Page 3 of the
18 handbook.
19 A Page--?
20 Q Page 3 of the handbook, Bates #26 at the bottom. At the
21 bottom of that page, do you see where it says Amazon
22 Regulations?
23 A Yeah.
24 Q And were you instructed that there were certain standards
25 and parts of the job that you had to perform a certain way
Lines - Direct 11
1 based on Amazon regulations?
2 A Yeah.
3 Q And what did those include?
4 A Not -- making sure that you were on the route that you
5 were on and that you were following the GPS navigation that
6 required the toll roads. That if you didn't take the toll
7 road, the toll roads as required, that you can be terminated,
8 because that toll road is programmed for your deliveries to
9 be on time to the customer --
10 Q Okay.
11 A -- when you leave the warehouse. That you can't take
12 bathroom breaks while you're on the road going to and from
13 the customer's house. That you only can take bathroom breaks
14 when you come back, if there's no deliveries at that time.
15 That you can't go into the warehouse area unless you're
16 authorized to where you have it on your phone to get the
17 orders.
18 Q And so the routes that you were required to run, who
19 ultimately made those routes up?
20 A Amazon does.
21 Q And was it among Amazon's regulations that you had to
22 show up or get a substitute?
23 A Yeah.
24 Q And was it an Amazon requirement that you kept the
25 dispatcher apprised of your progress on the route?

Lines - Direct 12
1 A Yes. We're supposed to keep in touch with Tenet Concepts
2 at all time, or Amazon, whoever answers the phone.
3 Q Okay. And which phone number? Was there a phone number
4 that was the dispatch?
5 A Yeah. We had one of each.
6 Q Okay.
7 A And sometimes, if Tenet Concepts is monitoring the roads,
8 Amazon will answer the phone, because everybody's monitoring
9 the roads. They know -- they have -- they have their laptops
10 and there's two Amazon -- there's two managers and then
11 there's two Tenet Concept employees and then they call it --
12 I think it's OSL, which is something like overnight delivery
13 thing. It comes --
14 Q Uh-huh.
15 A And they were on one side. And they monitor all -- every
16 -- all of our locations, so they know everywhere where we're
17 at.
18 Q And both Amazon and Tenet managers knew everywhere you
19 were at?
20 A Yes.
21 Q And were there personal appearance and dress codes that
22 you had to follow?
23 A Yeah. They -- we didn't have -- at the time, people that
24 were hired, we didn't have shirts or anything, so they wanted
25 us to wear something nice, like a polo type of shirt, and

Lines - Direct 13
1 some khaki pants or some nice jeans and some clean tennis
2 shoes.
3 Q And do you know whether those requirements came from
4 Amazon or Tenet?
5 A That was their policy.
6 Q Who's they?
7 A That was Amazon and Tenet's both policies.
8 Q Okay. It says on the bottom of Page 27 or Page 4 of
9 Exhibit 1 that Amazon badges must be worn at all times in the
10 building and on your route. They must be displayed above
11 your waist. Was that policy enforced?
12 A Yes.
13 Q And how was that policy enforced?
14 A When we come in, the only way we can get in the
15 warehouse, we have to wear that. The -- I forget the name of
16 it.
17 Q The lariat?
18 A Yeah. It's the thing that you wrap around -- you carry
19 around your neck. It has a little clip on it to hook the
20 badge on it. And that thing had Amazon -- Tenet around it,
21 and then the badge was Amazon, with my name and information.
22 Q Okay.
23 A And we had to wear that to the customer's house. We can
24 never take that off. And we can never take the vest off,
25 either.
Lines - Direct 14
1 Q And when you arrived at a customer's house, would you
2 identify yourself as delivering -- how would you identify
3 yourself?
4 A Well, if the customer is not there, then we don't. But
5 if the customer is there, we have to let them know we're
6 there for Amazon. And plus the customers already know who we
7 are when we get there because they have all our information
8 on the app. So they track us on the app. The customers know
9 everywhere we're at, every location we're at.
10 Q And which app is that the customers use?
11 A The app that we download when we go scan all the
12 customer's items, --
13 Q Uh-huh.
14 A -- once we scan their items and it goes through, the
15 customer now knows that their stuff is already in the system
16 and they're going to be delivered. Once that last option of
17 that last customer is into the system, then the customers
18 know that we're going from Point A to Point B, Point B to
19 Point C. That's how they know where we're at at all times.
20 Q And on your side, when you're scanning the items, are you
21 using an Amazon app?
22 A We're using their stuff, yes.
23 Q Their being Amazon?
24 A Yes.
25 Q And the customers, when they're tracking when you're

Lines - Direct 15
1 going to arrive, is that an Amazon app as well?
2 A Yes.
3 Q You testified at the May 8, 2018 hearing that Amazon had
4 the authority to fire Tenet employees. How do you know that?
5 A Simple fact because it came from their -- one of their
6 managers in there, because --
7 Q One of whose managers?
8 A Amazon's managers that was working the laptop where it
9 tracks us on the -- where we're located at. I was late on a
10 delivery like my third day, second, third day there, and they
11 were going to fire me because I was past-due. It was
12 supposed to be delivered before 10:00.
13 Q Who was going to fire you?
14 A Amazon had told -- one of the managers had told one of
15 their -- their -- what do they call them people that work the
16 laptop? The employees of Tenet. And then they went to tell
17 Gerard. Well, see, Gerard was a manager there besides Steve.
18 Steve was the GM. But told them that, you know, he can't be
19 late. If he did, he going to be fired, because we have a
20 time frame, a two-hour window.
21 And it's all in the system, so they can -- they will see
22 that. And that will like -- they have a -- a, what do they
23 call it, a quota. And they have to meet that quota of that
24 two-hour window.
25 Q And was that two-hour window part of it being Amazon

Lines - Direct 16
1 Prime Now --
2 A Yes.
3 Q -- as opposed to other Amazon delivery services?
4 A Yes, it was.
5 Q And how is Amazon Prime Now different from other Amazon
6 delivery services?
7 A Prime Now is a two-hour delivery and a one-hour delivery.
8 If you get a one-hour delivery, you have to deliver that item
9 first before you deliver the two hours. You have meet that.
10 You have to be there in that one hour. That customer is
11 waiting for that. They can track that. It doesn't matter if
12 they're not home or not; they have it on their phone. So
13 they know where we're at at all times.
14 The two-hour delivery, it's mandatory. You have to be
15 there and back in two hours. And then when you get back,
16 you've got to pick up the other orders. So you don't have
17 time, because when you come back everything is already loaded
18 up and they already programmed. When you come back, once you
19 delete the last orders that you did on your phone, when
20 you're coming down the highway your other orders are coming
21 up on your phone for the next area that you're going to, if
22 it's Fort Worth, Arlington, Frisco, Plano. Everything is
23 already in your phone. So when you get there, you go right
24 up the ramp, get your stuff. You don't have to go in the
25 warehouse part where -- where we sit at. We go straight in

Lines - Direct 17
1 there, grab our stuff, and we'll go load it up on the cart
2 and we log everything out, scan it all. And then once we
3 scan everything, we go back out the door and put it in our
4 car and go drop it off at the customers'.
5 Q Was there any break time built in there when you were
6 trying to --
7 A You don't get a break. You can't get a break. Because
8 if you take a break, you delay the orders, we get fired. Not
9 the employees that are working the desk where the computer is
10 at. We get in trouble for it. So we're required and they
11 tell us when we get hired that you cannot be late on these
12 orders. When you come back, if there's no orders, that's one
13 thing. But if there's orders up there, you have to. It's
14 mandatory to get that order. Because when you're coming down
15 the highway, them orders are coming up on your phone, so you
16 have to get them.
17 Q When you say they tell us when we're hired, who told you
18 that you cannot --
19 A Mike, which was the HR guy, and Steve, which is the GM
20 over there.
21 Q Okay. And did any Amazon employees ever tell you that
22 you can't be late on orders?
23 A Yeah. They always tell you that.
24 Q Okay.
25 A The dispatch. Always. That's what they are.

Lines - Direct 18
1 Dispatchers. They always tell you that.
2 Q Okay. So they were Amazon dispatchers?
3 A Oh, yeah.
4 Q Were you ever required to come into work before your
5 first dispatch?
6 A Yeah. They required you at first 30 minutes, but a lot
7 of people come in at 15 minutes early. They'd tell you that.
8 They might want you to fold bags. People throw bags, like
9 the frozen bags for like cold foods and frozen foods, some
10 people just throw them on top of the counter, don't even fold
11 them up, put them in the cooler or anything. But they'll ask
12 you to fold them up, you know, stuff like that, or clean up
13 the tables, because people throw their trash on the tables,
14 and stuff like that.
15 Q And had you already clocked in when you were doing that
16 work?
17 A No.
18 Q When did you first clock in?
19 A I clocked in as soon as my time hits at -- if it says
20 3:00 o'clock, then I clock in at 3:00.
21 Q What do you mean, as soon as your time hits?
22 A Like, for instance, if it's 3:00 o'clock, my phone will
23 go off. I have a -- I have it programmed in my phone, with
24 my timer, my alarm. If it's 3:00 o'clock, when my noise go
25 off on my phone, that means I go in there, go fill out

Lines - Direct 19
1 timesheet and put my -- I have to put my name, you know,
2 information, the phone that I'm taking out, which you'll have
3 a number on the back of the phone, and then you put the phone
4 on there, the mileage of your car, start and then end
5 mileage.
6 Q Okay.
7 A And then the manager has to sign at the end of the night
8 when you clock out.
9 Q And so let's distinguish between clocking in and clocking
10 out. When -- would you clock in after you got your first
11 dispatch?
12 A I'd clock in at exactly 3:00 o'clock. If I'm scheduled
13 for 3:00, I clock in at 3:00 o'clock. I have to write my
14 time in. No matter if I have a dispatch or not, I have to
15 clock in.
16 Q And so, sticking with the 3:00 o'clock hypothetical, your
17 testimony that you were required to come in 15 or 30 minutes
18 early, when would you show up for a shift that was supposed
19 to start at 3:00?
20 A If -- sometimes I'll get there at 2:30, at 2:45, 2:40.
21 Because I'm right there in the Dallas area so I'm not far
22 from Irving.
23 Q Okay.
24 A So I always leave early because I'm ready to go to work.
25 Q And then you would, as you testified, do work folding,

Lines - Direct 20
1 sorting bags, et cetera until your shift actually started at
2 3:00 o'clock?
3 A Yeah.
4 Q Okay.
5 A I help out.
6 Q Now, were you aware that you were being deducted a meal
7 hour every day that you worked?
8 A No. I didn't find that out until I'm saying right after
9 Thanksgiving, towards the end of November, beginning of
10 December. The GM came over and said that everybody has to
11 take a hour break for lunch and we're going to deduct it.
12 And we were like, well, how are we going to take a hour lunch
13 and you got two-hour deliveries and you're going to have a
14 order sitting here and nobody to take them and you're going
15 to have a pissed-off Amazon. And the manager for Amazon was
16 like, that is not happening, because if it happens someone is
17 going to get in trouble because we have a quota to meet. If
18 we have 60 employees and 60 deliveries plus, we got to get
19 them orders out there. And that's mandatory. So, no, we
20 couldn't take a lunch.
21 Q Now, were there some days where you had time to take a
22 lunch?
23 A Yeah. I've taken it in my car. Like, I come back.
24 There's sometimes I might never -- stop and get gas if I need
25 it and, you know, grab something to eat at the gas station.

Lines - Direct 21
1 But most of the time I can't because I've always filled up my
2 gas for the day when I get there, because they require you to
3 fill up your gas every day before you get there, because
4 you're going to put over 200 miles easy.
5 Q Uh-huh. So about how many days would you estimate you
6 had lunch deducted but were unable to take lunch?
7 A I'm going to say they probably just took two out of me.
8 That was starting like I think like around the November, end
9 of November, beginning of December, and that was it.
10 Q So they only deducted two lunch hours?
11 A Yeah. That was it.
12 Q Okay.
13 A Because we -- beginning, when I started, we couldn't --
14 we couldn't take a lunch, we couldn't do anything, because
15 we're moving nonstop. I mean, they were really busy.
16 Q Uh-huh.
17 A So you just can't just say, oh, hold on, let me go take a
18 lunch for an hour. You just can't do that or you won't be
19 having a job there.
20 Q So are you saying it's two days that you actually were
21 able to take a lunch?
22 A No. They -- they made us take a lunch, and then -- but
23 there's some days that they'll say that we took a lunch and
24 we didn't take a lunch, because we're in our car driving.
25 Q How many of those days would you guess that there were?
Lines - Direct 22
1 A Gerard started it I think probably like beginning of
2 November and did it for like three weeks, and then I started
3 noticing that when I got off work, why are you marking my
4 lunch hour and I didn't take a lunch? Well, we're -- Steve
5 said that we have to give you -- take off the lunch. I said,
6 how you going to take a lunch when we can't -- we can't take
7 a lunch? So you going -- and you going to take the monies
8 from the customers, too? Because that means we can't do the
9 two-hour delivery. So you pretty much forged my signature,
10 forged a signature on a document. He was like, well, man, I
11 ain't -- I had nothing to do with it. Man, Steve told me to
12 do it. I said, okay.
13 Q And did you ever have to work after you clocked out at
14 the end of the day?
15 A Yeah. They -- we have to clean up the bags. We have to
16 pick up the bags. Like I said, it's full messy back there.
17 The guys don't -- they don't organize nothing. They just
18 throw the bags around. And, you know, I go and clean up the
19 bags, I clean up the tables before I walk out, because I
20 ain't got nothing to do after that so I just go home.
21 Q And so when would you physically clock out? How would
22 you -- how would you physically clock out?
23 A I was supposed to clock out at 10:00 o'clock every night,
24 but you can't, especially when you get the long-distance
25 deliveries. So sometimes I won't clock out until like 10:30,

Lines - Direct 23
1 and then I'll stick around until like 10:45, 10:50, 10:40 and
2 pick up the bags or clean up the tables or whatever Gerard
3 asks me to do or the other young lady who was a manager there
4 asked me to do.
5 Q What would you actually physically do to clock out? Was
6 that returning the phone? Writing something down on a sheet?
7 A Yeah. You have to return the phone. You have to put the
8 number that you have on the phone, document that. And then
9 you put your mileage, end of the mileage. Then you initial,
10 and then they have to initial their name at the end.
11 Q Okay. And about how many of the days that you worked
12 would you say that you had to work some after you had clocked
13 out?
14 A A majority of the time I did that. Probably about 98
15 percent of the time I did that.
16 Q Okay.
17 A I -- about -- there was a couple of us that did that.
18 Q Could you please turn to Debtor's Exhibit 27 that's in
19 the binder?
20 A Debit? Okay. What is it?
21 Q 27.
22 A Exhibit 27. Okay. 27. Okay. 27, here. Okay. 27.
23 27. All right. Oh.
24 Q And have you seen this document before?
25 A Yeah. My -- my schedule that I clock in, clock out, with

Lines - Direct 24
1 all my phone and mileage.
2 Q And so are these the time cards that we've been
3 discussing?
4 A Yeah.
5 (Pause.)
6 Q Is that a yes?
7 A Uh-huh. Hold on. (Pause.) Yeah.
8 Q And do these appear to be true and accurate copies of the
9 time cards that you filled out?
10 A Uh-huh. Yes, it is.
11 Q But you've testified that to the extent that you had to
12 work before and after work, these don't accurately reflect
13 the hours that you worked?
14 A No.
15 Q And to the extent that they indicate that you took a
16 lunch break beginning in November and December, is it also
17 your testimony that they do not accurately represent the
18 hours that you worked?
19 A No.
20 Q And the time cards are divided by pay period, correct?
21 A Say that again?
22 Q Well, so, for example, at the top where it says the time
23 period that's covered by the time card on -- let's start with
24 Page 5, Bates 5.
25 A Hold on. Are you still in the 27 section?

Lines - Direct 25
1 Q Yes.
2 A Okay. And you said the timesheet on Page -- okay. Okay.
3 Which one is it, the December or November?
4 Q Well, it's the one Page 005 at the bottom.
5 A Okay.
6 Q And you see the dates that this time card purports to
7 represent at the top?
8 A Yeah.
9 Q And what are those?
10 A These are the dates that I was working, the time I
11 clocked in, time I clocked out.
12 Q And are those November 16th through November 30th, 2015?
13 A Yeah.
14 Q And how were you paid by your employers?
15 A Every two weeks.
16 Q And does this time card represent one two-week pay
17 period?
18 A Hold on. (Pause.) It goes through Sunday through
19 Saturday. Sunday through Saturday. And then another Sunday
20 through Monday. But we go, we -- the pay period goes Sunday
21 through Saturday, Sunday through Saturday, and get paid.
22 Q I guess would that have been termed a workweek, --
23 A Yeah.
24 Q -- Sunday through Saturday?
25 A Yeah.
Lines - Direct 26
1 Q And then a pay period ran from the 1st to the 15th of the
2 month?
3 A Yeah. Forgot exactly how it went. I know we got paid,
4 if it was on the 5th of the month or the 25th of the month or
5 something like that. But the pay period did go Sunday
6 through Saturday as one week.
7 Q The workweek?
8 A Right.
9 Q And --
10 A That was the beginning of the week.
11 Q And so on Page 5 --
12 THE COURT: Hang on. Just, --
13 MR. LACKEY: Yes.
14 THE COURT: I just want to make sure that I'm square
15 on this. I think what he's trying to get at, and I just want
16 to make sure I understand, too: Did you get paid twice a
17 month?
18 THE WITNESS: Yes, we did.
19 THE COURT: Okay.
20 THE WITNESS: Yeah.
21 THE COURT: So you had a workweek therefore as Sunday
22 through Saturday, but then for purposes of actually getting
23 paid you got a paycheck twice a month? So that if you look
24 at that Page 5 of Debtor's Exhibit 27 that we were on, that
25 would reflect essentially three separate workweeks, but for

Lines - Direct 27
1 purposes of the pay period, which would be one-half of a
2 month, essentially, that's why we've got two workweeks plus
3 two additional days? Is that --
4 THE WITNESS: Right.
5 THE COURT: Is that the way that it worked?
6 THE WITNESS: Not from my understanding. From what I
7 was told when we got hired on, because I started in the 6th,
8 which was I think around a Wednesday, of October, I was
9 already in the middle of the pay period, the pay week. And
10 then I do finish out that week, and then I had the following
11 week, Sunday through the following Saturday, and then we got
12 paid like a week after that. On a Friday, I think it was.
13 And it was -- our understanding was it was Sunday through
14 Saturday and then Sunday through Saturday and get paid that
15 following Friday. So it was like every two weeks you get
16 paid that following Friday. You understand what I'm saying?
17 That's how we did it. That's how they did it with us.
18 THE COURT: Okay.
19 THE WITNESS: And that's for my understanding that
20 we've been doing it that way from when they hired me on.
21 BY MR. LACKEY:
22 Q Well, if you could turn to Debtor's Exhibit 30.
23 A Debit 30. Okay. All right.
24 Q Would you agree that these are copies of your earnings
25 statements?
Lines - Direct 28
1 A What? You said 30? Oh, I'm on the wrong one. Okay.
2 I'm sorry. Yes. (Pause.) Yeah.
3 Q And do these indicate that the pay periods began and
4 ended either on the 1st and 15th or the 16th and end of the
5 month?
6 A Yeah.
7 Q Okay. And so just for terminology purposes, was there a
8 difference in a workweek, which ran from Sunday through
9 Saturday, and a pay period, which ran twice a month?
10 A Yeah. I think so, yeah.
11 Q Okay.
12 A Yeah.
13 Q And the timesheets were kept by pay period, correct?
14 A Yeah. It was like they had us down for about -- for the
15 whole two weeks, down the schedule, like they'll put a post
16 -- they'll put a schedule up and it'll show on there this
17 week, and then down here will show another week for that week
18 there. So you're already ahead of yourself.
19 Q Okay. What do you mean by that? It would show your time
20 before you had worked at the time?
21 A Like, for instance, they'll write the schedule out.
22 They'll have me down, say, Sunday through Saturday, they'll
23 have down off Sunday, Monday, and then work Tuesday through
24 Saturday, and it'll have 3:00 to 10:00. And then that will
25 be for that week. And they'll have everybody listed. And

Lines - Direct 29
1 then they'll do the same thing. At the bottom, they'll do
2 the same thing. So maybe a second week will have 3:00 to
3 10:00 for -- Thursday and Friday off, but I work these days.
4 Q And so that's your schedule, correct?
5 A That's my schedule, yeah.
6 Q And is your schedule different from your timesheet?
7 A Some of it is, yeah.
8 Q Okay. But the timesheets -- so, for example, moving from
9 Page 5 to Page 6 in Exhibit 27, the workweek that ran from
10 11/29 through 12/5, --
11 A Okay. You said what page?
12 Q Pages 5 and 6 of --
13 A Okay.
14 Q -- Exhibit 27.
15 A All right. And you said -- that's this right here,
16 right? Oh, that's on Exhibit --
17 Q Exhibit 27. Debtor's Exhibit 27. It's in the binder.
18 A Oh, Exhibit 27. Yeah. I'm sorry. This is confusing.
19 All right. Now, what page?
20 Q Pages 5 and 6.
21 A Okay. All right. I got you.
22 Q So, at the bottom of Page 5 and the top of Page 6, the
23 Sunday through Saturday that was November 29th through
24 December 5th, 2015 is broken over two timesheets. Correct?
25 A Hold on. You said -- you said November what?

Lines - Direct 30
1 Q 29th. At the bottom of Page 5. Through December 5th, at
2 the top of Page 6.
3 A Yeah. They had -- they -- they have November 29th and
4 the 30th on one -- on one thing here.
5 Q Uh-huh.
6 A I think that's what they did. They added it up. They
7 try to multiply it by -- instead of giving me the -- I think
8 the overtime for it, they -- they accumulated as the pay
9 period type, where they make it straight pay. Do you know
10 what I mean? Instead of saying it's -- I don't know how you
11 say it. Instead of saying the 16th through the 21st and the
12 22nd through the 27th as one pay period, they added the last
13 two to make it combined together.
14 Q And is that something that you ever complained to
15 management about?
16 A Yeah. That's one of the first things I said to them.
17 Q And what was that?
18 A Me and Steve, on Thanksgiving Day, because I saw my
19 schedule. Like I said, we know our schedule ahead of time.
20 Q Uh-huh.
21 A And I pulled him and I said, well, why are we going into
22 a third week? And --
23 Q Going to a what week?
24 A I call it a third week.
25 Q I'm sorry?
Lines - Direct 31
1 A A third week as in a pay period.
2 Q Okay.
3 A Because the pay period starts on a Sunday and ends on a
4 Saturday. So the 29th and the 30th is Sunday and Monday. So
5 why are we going into another pay period and you're adding it
6 in regular pay and it shouldn't be that way. And a lot of
7 people were complaining about it on Thanksgiving because I'm
8 about -- I think we had about 60, 60, 50-60 people there.
9 They were about to walk off because they knew something
10 wasn't right, all these people working and they're getting
11 straight pay. And I had to get Steve to come back from
12 leaving home, leave, because a lot of people were about to
13 quit because they felt something wasn't right. So it looked
14 suspicious.
15 Q And similarly, on Pages 1 and 2 of that exhibit, --
16 A Uh-huh.
17 Q -- Page 1 shows that, for -- through Sunday, October
18 11th, through Thursday, October 15th, you worked 36.5 hours.
19 Correct?
20 A October 11th through -- yeah.
21 Q And then on the next page, Page 2, it shows that on
22 October 16th and October 17th, you worked an additional 18
23 hours, correct?
24 A Yeah.
25 Q And because those were one workweek, you should have been
Lines - Direct 32
1 paid 14-1/2 hours of overtime for that workweek, correct?
2 A Yes.
3 Q Even though they fell in two different pay periods?
4 A Yes.
5 Q Okay. And what did Steve say when you complained about
6 that practice?
7 A Oh, man. We -- I was trying to be really respectful
8 about it because there was other people there that I was
9 speaking for because people were really getting angry about
10 it. I tried to discuss it with him, to fix the matter or
11 find out what's going on here. And all he can tell us is
12 that, you know, he's only been here a few months -- before I
13 started, he started -- and that he will find out what's going
14 on. And that's all we ever hear, is what he will do and he
15 will do, but he never does anything.
16 Q Uh-huh.
17 A And it just escalated 'til where he got really -- he got
18 mad at me. And I went to HR, which is Mike, and Mike said
19 that he'll find out what's going on and fix the problem. And
20 the problem was never fixed because they got on Mike about it
21 because Mike had called me and told me that the company is
22 after it and Mike have called me and said, hey, look, man,
23 there's an issue that I just want to warn you ahead of time
24 that I talked to Steve and I talked to the office down in
25 Austin and that it's not going to be -- it's not going to be

Lines - Direct 33
1 resolved.
2 Q And could you please turn to Debtor's Exhibit 37?
3 A Okay. Okay.
4 Q And when did you first hear about or see this document?
5 A Which one? The tip thing? The Tenet Concepts?
6 Q Yes.
7 A Are you talking about the Page 1001? Exhibit --
8 Q Well, the whole of Exhibit 37. Had you ever seen that
9 before --
10 A Actually, no.
11 Q -- last week's hearing?
12 A We -- I just found out about it today.
13 Q Okay.
14 A I had no idea about it.
15 Q Okay.
16 A Because if we had anything like this, I would have had
17 copies. Because everything I do, I take a snapshot of on my
18 phone. Just like you have my timesheet. That's all
19 snapshots on my phone. My time card. Snapshots. Everything
20 I have is snapshots. So I don't have any of this. And this
21 is one thing we were asking about. Tenet Concepts. We were
22 saying that we were supposed to get this. We were supposed
23 to get a pay -- a sheet every two weeks, for each week. It
24 was supposed to show like, for instance, it'll have each
25 block. It'll have Monday through Sunday. It'll have the

Lines - Direct 34
1 days we deliver, will say how many tips we made, this and
2 this and that, for each -- for the whole day. We never got
3 any of that. And that's one thing we asked about and we
4 never got it.
5 Q And who did you ask?
6 A We asked Tenet and Amazon both. The manager who worked
7 the computer.
8 Q Okay.
9 A And -- because we don't see a big dog in Amazon. We just
10 see the managers there. And we never got anything. And the
11 manager and Steve, they get in it a whole lot, because
12 there's a conflict there, because one has authority and one
13 has authority. So they're just like -- they'll bump heads a
14 lot.
15 So we go to them because we know that we're trying to get
16 things done. Amazon. But Tenet Concepts becomes an issue
17 because they keep saying what they're going to do and never
18 do it. So we never received one of these. We were supposed
19 to get these, but we never did.
20 Q Okay. And was it your understanding that you were
21 supposed to receive every penny that a customer tipped?
22 A Yes. Every penny of it. A lot of customers ask us. Not
23 just me, but almost everybody on Tenet Concepts that delivers
24 when we did Amazon Prime. I delivered to a lot of football
25 players, which was like Troy Aikman, Deion Sanders, you know,
Lines - Direct 35
1 Larry Allen, and places. And they always ask, do you get the
2 money or does Amazon get the tips? And they always say, we
3 know there's a --
4 MR. DIVIN: Objection, hearsay, --
5 THE WITNESS: -- computer default --
6 MR. DIVIN: -- Your Honor.
7 THE WITNESS: -- to where --
8 MR. DIVIN: Objection, hearsay.
9 THE COURT: Hang on. I'm going to sustain the
10 objection.
11 MR. LACKEY: Okay.
12 BY MR. LACKEY:
13 Q So, you never received an itemization of what tips you
14 were supposed to receive?
15 A No, we did not.
16 Q And based on -- if you could just take a minute and
17 review Exhibit 37, does this look like a full and complete
18 list of the tips that you believe you received?
19 A No. There's a lot of deliveries that I don't have on
20 there that I do. I usually average around ten, between
21 eight, ten, twelve deliveries. And that's like about the
22 second, third week I started, I was hitting a lot of
23 deliveries. And that's in a two-hour span. So I was
24 averaging around eight to ten deliveries easy in a two-hour
25 span.
Lines - Direct 36
1 Q And so --
2 A That's eight different customers.
3 Q And these don't really show the time. They show the
4 date. So how many deliveries do you think you averaged on an
5 average day?
6 A Oh, I can average easy 30 deliveries in a six-hour span.
7 Q And about how many -- what percentage of your customers
8 would you estimate tipped?
9 MR. DIVIN: Objection, Your Honor. No predicate.
10 It'd be guessing.
11 MR. LACKEY: He was there with the app, Your Honor.
12 THE COURT: I'm going to overrule the objection.
13 THE WITNESS: I'm going to say it like this. About
14 95 percent, 93 to 95 percent of my customers.
15 BY MR. LACKEY:
16 Q Okay. So when did you first suspect that you were not
17 receiving all of your tips?
18 A I noticed it on my paycheck, and then a lot of the
19 customers had asked me, did I receive -- did I get their
20 tips, and I say, I have no idea because we don't get the
21 tips, it goes through Amazon, the app that you go through.
22 And that's when some of the customers say that they're going
23 to start paying cash instead of through the online app.
24 Q And how were the -- how did a customer physically tip
25 through the app?

Lines - Direct 37
1 A They go on the -- I guess the website they go on, the app
2 that they go through to Amazon Prime. I don't know exactly
3 how it is because I never seen it. But they have a thing, I
4 think it's called, where they can --
5 MR. DIVIN: Your Honor, I object.
6 THE WITNESS: -- take the money back.
7 MR. DIVIN: There's been no predicate. He just said
8 he's never seen it.
9 THE COURT: Hang on. Hang on.
10 THE WITNESS: They can --
11 THE COURT: Hang on.
12 THE WITNESS: Oh.
13 MR. DIVIN: So the objection is there's no predicate
14 for him to testify about what's on it if he's never seen it.
15 THE COURT: I'm going to sustain the objection. If
16 you want to --
17 MR. LACKEY: I'll rephrase.
18 THE COURT: All right.
19 BY MR. LACKEY:
20 Q Do you know whether the customers tipped through any
21 Tenet Concepts software?
22 A Not their software.
23 Q Whose software were the tips processed through?
24 A Amazon.
25 Q Okay. And what did you do, did you talk to anybody when
Lines - Direct 38
1 you first suspected that your tips were not being fully
2 remitted?
3 A Yeah. Steve.
4 Q And what did Steve say?
5 A We got in a conflict over it.
6 Q And how is that?
7 A Steve gets -- got very angry because I was asking him
8 about my money, and, you know, I don't work for free. And if
9 a customer tips, you know, I want to know exactly who, you
10 know, where it's coming from. I don't care if he doesn't
11 tip. I just want to know who I'm getting the tips from and
12 why I'm being short on my tips. You waited -- I waited like
13 30 days to get my first tips. And it was like, it was
14 nothing. You know, $400-something one week, you know, for
15 the two weeks I work. And the hours you put in and the
16 orders you do, a lot of -- like I said, 93-95 percent of my
17 customers always ask, do you get your tips?
18 Q Okay. And you said you made about 30 deliveries a day?
19 A When I worked from 3:00 to 10:00, yeah.
20 Q And what is your best estimate of what the average tip
21 that a customer left was?
22 MR. DIVIN: Same objection, Your Honor. It's just
23 speculation.
24 THE COURT: I think on this one I am going to sustain
25 the objection unless you can lay a better predicate.

Lines - Direct 39
1 MR. LACKEY: Uh-huh.
2 BY MR. LACKEY:
3 Q Do you know whether there was a default tip amount in the
4 app for a delivery?
5 A Yeah. A customer had told me there was like I think $5.
6 MR. DIVIN: Same objection, Your Honor. Hearsay.
7 And he's already said that he's never seen that app, so
8 there's no predicate for him to testify about this.
9 THE COURT: Sustained. If you can get there with a
10 better foundation.
11 MR. LACKEY: Yeah.
12 BY MR. LACKEY:
13 Q Looking at Exhibit 37, would you agree that a plurality
14 of the tip amounts are in --
15 A What?
16 A -- increments of $5.01?
17 A That is awful strange. I got about -- there's probably
18 about -- on Page 4, there's probably like 25 on that one.
19 Probably about eight on this one, Page 5. And I can't even
20 count how many on Page 07. That is awful strange, when you
21 got a $5.02 exactly on a three-day span, four-day, five-day
22 span. And it don't even add up. Now, there is some here at
23 the very end --
24 Q At the bottom of Page 5?
25 A -- that's different. Yeah. It's big -- it's higher

Lines - Direct 40
1 numbers. That's like my last -- I think my last checks. But
2 when you see $5.02, $5.02, all the way and down, $3.01, two,
3 that just -- it's kind of odd.
4 Q And do you have any knowledge of why these are not round
5 numbers?
6 A Unless everybody's a relative to each other and calling
7 on the phone, leave five dollar and two dollar tip, I don't
8 know.
9 Q Okay.
10 A Strange.
11 Q Did you ever talk to anybody from Amazon about not
12 receiving all of your tips?
13 A Yeah. They -- like I said, I have -- they have -- I have
14 to go through Tenet.
15 Q Okay. That's --
16 A Yeah.
17 Q That's what you --
18 A Yeah. That's what the managers always tell us, go
19 through Tenet first and then you can proceed after that.
20 Q Okay. So you raised the complaint to the Amazon manager
21 --
22 A Yeah.
23 Q -- and he referred you back to Steve?
24 A Yeah.
25 Q And when you raised it with Steve, you had a conflict?

Lines - Direct 41
1 A Yeah.
2 Q Okay. Did you ever submit any request for reimbursement
3 of tolls?
4 A Yeah. I gave them two toll bills. And neither one of
5 them -- pretty much got flushed down the toilet.
6 Q Do you know how much those reimbursement requests were
7 for?
8 A I think one of them was around I think $300 and
9 something, and the other one were like less than a hundred.
10 Q Okay.
11 A And then I stopped taking the tolls because of that.
12 Q And why have you taken the tollways?
13 A Because it's built in the app.
14 Q And what do you mean by built in the app?
15 A It's -- everything is programmed. When you pull up --
16 when you got their S phone, their S5, it's already programmed
17 in the app. When you hit it, it's already showing you have
18 to go through the tolls. Anything going to Plano is all
19 tolls. There's only certain areas where you don't have
20 tolls, which is Irving. You don't have no tolls. You ain't
21 got to worry about it. But everything else is like all
22 tolls. If you bear off and get off of that toll road, like I
23 almost got fired for that because I jumped off the service
24 road going to Plano and didn't take the tolls, when I came
25 back I got reamed out for it.

Lines - Direct 42
1 Q By whom?
2 A By Amazon, because Amazon is monitoring us. And they say
3 that anything in that app, you got to follow. If it shows
4 you have to take the tolls, because we have a time limit, and
5 if you're not there that means you're not doing your job.
6 And the customer sees that you're not there driving on the
7 highway like you're supposed to. Because it's built in. So
8 the customer sees everything. And they're monitoring us.
9 Q And did you ever submit any requests for reimbursement
10 for parking?
11 A Yes, I did.
12 Q And --
13 A Downtown Dallas.
14 Q And about what amount?
15 A Probably about $12. $10-$12.
16 Q And were you ever reimbursed for that?
17 A No.
18 Q And then during your time driving for Tenet, you put
19 about 14,000 miles on your car, correct?
20 A Whew, yeah.
21 Q And by the IRS rate, that would be --
22 A Fifty cents a mile.
23 Q So approximately $7,000 to $8,000 in reimbursement?
24 A Yeah.
25 Q And in total, you were paid about $2,000, correct?

Lines - Direct 43
1 A Um, --
2 Q In reimbursement miles?
3 A I think so, yeah. I think.
4 Q Was it ever explained to you that there was a policy
5 where you were paid reimbursements at an hourly rate rather
6 than the mileage rate?
7 A What do you mean?
8 Q Was it ever explained to you that there was a policy of
9 giving drivers $3.25 per hour as reimbursement instead of --
10 A Uh-huh.
11 Q -- reimbursing based on miles?
12 A No. We get -- we just got the $3.25 an hour, and then
13 their hourly rate, which was $7.25, and then the tolls and
14 the parking were separate, that we had to sign a sheet that
15 we were given I think the end of November, beginning in
16 December, showing that they're, you know, all the tolls will
17 be through them, Tenet Concepts, that we had to turn in a
18 bill, which we -- a lot of people already did and never got
19 reimbursed. But that was it on that one.
20 Q Okay. And what was your hourly rate of pay?
21 A $7.25.
22 Q And was that the minimum wage?
23 A Yeah.
24 Q So, to the extent that you were forced to pay for
25 reimbursements beyond your hourly pay, did that take your net
Lines - Direct 44
1 hourly wage below the minimum wage?
2 A Yes, it did.
3 Q Now, you've testified before that around November 26th,
4 2015 you complained to Steve regarding these pay issues.
5 Correct?
6 A Yes, I did.
7 Q And what issues did you raise at that time?
8 A The tips, the mileage, the toll roads, the parking.
9 Pretty much I was speaking for everybody because everybody
10 was coming to me.
11 Q Did you mention the off-the-clock hours being worked?
12 A Yes, we did.
13 Q And not being paid the full overtime for hours over 40?
14 A Yes.
15 Q Did you -- you said just now that everyone was coming to
16 you. Who was that?
17 A Probably about 90 percent of the employees that was on
18 the clock, because I'm pretty good at talking to people and
19 pretty good at handling the situations, resolving situations.
20 And they see what I was doing, how I talk, interact with
21 people, and including the Amazon management. So, but a lot
22 of people were following my footsteps and taking snapshots of
23 their timesheets and stuff like that, because they saw that
24 -- me doing that. And it kind of seemed something was kind
25 of shady. But I'm very good with interaction and that's one
Lines - Direct 45
1 thing that they come to me for.
2 Q Did any changes get made coming out of that November
3 26th, 2015 meeting?
4 A No. Only thing I did was I tried to get all the
5 employees from walking down that ramp. Everybody started
6 walking down the ramp. And I ran after Steve and told Steve,
7 because Steve stopped and saw everybody coming down the ramp.
8 And I told them -- they was, you know, the girls and stuff --
9 hold on, let me talk to Steve first, see what we can do. A
10 lot of it was over the issues of that stuff, and then Amazon
11 Flex took over everything and was taking all our deliveries,
12 and people were very -- kind of disappointed in that, too.
13 Q Can you clarify what you mean by walking down that ramp?
14 A There's a ramp that you walk down from the warehouse, the
15 main warehouse --
16 Q Uh-huh.
17 A -- where we get our items that have to be loaded up, and
18 we scan everything, we put it on a cart like a dolly cart and
19 we roll it down to the vehicles. And everybody started
20 walking down from the warehouse that we sit in. Everybody
21 was -- started coming out, coming through the warehouse,
22 coming down that ramp and just leaving because Steve wasn't
23 doing anything. He refused to do anything. He said he was
24 leaving and going home. And that's why everybody said, you
25 know, I'm done.

Lines - Direct 46
1 And that's when I ran out there and was trying to talk to
2 Steve, and Steve saw everybody coming down the ramp so he
3 stopped and he got out and he said, what's going on? And I
4 said, this is what's going to happen. Everybody is going to
5 walk out. You're going to get stuck. You said you have a
6 quota to meet. You don't meet that quota, you don't get --
7 you guys don't get your own money. Because they have to meet
8 a quota to get paid for all the deliveries they do. But they
9 were refusing to do it. Because why? Because all the stuff
10 that's going on. The toll roads.
11 There was a couple guys there that gave him the bill
12 prior and told him, hey, look, I got a $900 toll bill and
13 they're sending warrants out for arrests because the toll
14 bills are not being paid and I can't get it paid, so I don't
15 have a choice but to quit to get my bills paid. You know,
16 because at the time they were doing that, they were sending
17 the warrants out for arresting people for not having toll
18 bills paid, and people were quitting because of that.
19 So I was trying to stop the rest of these guys from
20 walking out because we know we had all these deliveries
21 there. So I was trying to compromise and work with the
22 people there and talk to Steve at the same time to try to
23 resolve this so we can get everybody's -- their stuff done
24 and paid so they don't leave.
25 Q Okay. And I think you've also testified that you made

Lines - Direct 47
1 similar complaints again on December 10th, 2015, correct?
2 A Yes.
3 Q And what happened then?
4 A Pretty much after that I didn't see no more work. He
5 took me off the schedule. He took me off the remaining of
6 the 15th through the end of the month of December. I didn't
7 have no more, how do you say that, work. Mike, Mike sent --
8 Mike sends out the -- HR guy, Mike, sends out the form of --
9 or schedule. And I told you guys has all of the -- the whole
10 two weeks up. But I was up there. And then when I showed up
11 to go to work and come in, I go check the schedule for my
12 next day -- because, you know, they rotate your days, the
13 days you're off -- and I'm not up there.
14 And I called Mike on the phone and asked Mike, hey, what
15 happened? Why am I not on the schedule? You just had me up
16 here, and I come in the next day, I'm not on the schedule.
17 What's going on? He goes, what do you mean, you are on the
18 schedule, I have it right here. And I say, well, I don't --
19 that's not up on the board. I'm not on the schedule. I'm
20 Jeff Lines. He goes, no, you're up there. He goes, what do
21 you mean? He says, take a snapshot, and he says, send it to
22 me. I send it to him. He goes, Steve did that. I said,
23 what do you mean, Steve did that? Steve's the GM. He took
24 you off the whole schedule. Let me find out what's going on.
25 So Mike calls Steve, and then that's when they got in a

Lines - Direct 48
1 conflict. And then I didn't come back to work because he
2 told me I wasn't coming back, that, yeah, I was off the
3 schedule, and then I find out Steve got -- Mike got fired
4 right after that. Right after I didn't come back, Mike got
5 fired.
6 Q And if you could turn to Exhibit 27, Page 7.
7 A 27. You said 27, 7?
8 Q Yes. And does this refresh your memory as to whether
9 that final conflict you just discussed when you were taken
10 off the schedule, was that December 10th, 2015 or December
11 22nd, 2016 [sic]?
12 A My last day was actually supposed to be on the 22nd,
13 because the 10th is when we got into the conflict. He said
14 he won't put me on the schedule no more. The 20th, 22nd, and
15 21st, I was off, they had took me off the schedule. This is
16 what I took a snapshot of.
17 Q Uh-huh.
18 A That I was on the schedule to work all the way up to the
19 end of the month. And I was not -- Steve had took me off of
20 it, off their schedule. But I took a snapshot of what I have
21 here.
22 Q And so between December 22nd and January 2nd, you were
23 only -- you only were --
24 A Correct.
25 Q -- put on one shift, on the 26th, correct?

Lines - Direct 49
1 A Yeah.
2 Q And what had Steve told you about whether that was going
3 to continue?
4 A That it wasn't. I was done. Because he fired Mike.
5 Q And -- and --
6 A Mike in HR. He got fired over it.
7 Q And so did Steve tell you why he was taking you off the
8 schedule?
9 A The simple fact that we have a conflict of interest, of
10 communication. And there was some other stuff that he -- he
11 said that was not appropriate and happened on my birthday.
12 We got in a issue, he made some inappropriate comments, so I
13 didn't take it too lightly.
14 Q First off, what is your birthday?
15 A December 22nd.
16 Q And could you, I mean, just maybe, if there are curse
17 words, just use initials for what the inappropriate comments
18 were?
19 A It was homophobic comments that I didn't take too kindly.
20 Q Okay. And --
21 A And I did file a complaint to their -- their office in
22 Austin. I did send an email to them, through my computer to
23 them, that I was pursuing that for the comments he had made
24 and for my -- my overtime and tolls. It was everything.
25 That's why I contacted you guys.

Lines - Direct 50
1 Q Okay. And so he was -- part of his motive for coming
2 after you like that was these discussions, these ongoing
3 discussions you'd had about --
4 MR. DIVIN: Objection, calls for speculation.
5 THE COURT: Sustained.
6 MR. LACKEY: I can rephrase.
7 BY MR. LACKEY:
8 Q Was the context of that argument on your birthday another
9 complaint you had made about the pay practices?
10 A Yeah.
11 Q And after you were not put on the schedule any more, did
12 you -- what did you do then?
13 A Pretty much by January 2nd I know I have no more work,
14 because Mike was no longer there. So I called Steve, but
15 Steve didn't answer his phone because Mike wasn't there, so I
16 texted him and told him that I was no longer -- I won't be
17 working there no more.
18 Q And how long were you unemployed after that?
19 A Two and half -- about two months, two and a half months.
20 Q And what work did you find after that?
21 A I worked for Metroplex Distribution.
22 Q And how much did that pay?
23 A I started off about $10 an hour.
24 Q And was it full-time work?
25 A Yeah, I -- yeah, I have to, because they only work so

Lines - Direct 51
1 many hours a day. So I had to work seven days a week to make
2 ends meet.
3 Q Okay. Did you make more or less at Metroplex than you
4 made at Tenet?
5 A I made way less.
6 Q Okay.
7 A Yeah. I made about maybe -- maybe $1,500 a month.
8 Q Okay. How long did you do that before finding a job that
9 paid similar to when you were delivering for Amazon?
10 A I stayed there until I went to Virginia, and then I
11 created and saved up money little by little and started my
12 own business detailing cars.
13 Q Okay. And how does that pay?
14 A I make out good.
15 Q Okay. Do you make as much as you did at --
16 A Oh, yeah.
17 Q -- Tenet?
18 A Yeah.
19 Q Okay. Do you have reason to believe that other drivers
20 were similarly underpaid?
21 A Yeah.
22 MR. DIVIN: Objection, --
23 THE WITNESS: I talked to --
24 MR. DIVIN: -- calls for speculation.
25 MR. LACKEY: It's simply asking if he has reason --

Lines - Direct 52
1 THE COURT: Sustained.
2 MR. LACKEY: -- to believe. Okay.
3 BY MR. LACKEY:
4 Q Did you ever have conversations with other drivers about
5 the payment policies?
6 A Yeah. A lot of us talked. We all --
7 MR. DIVIN: Objection, hearsay.
8 MR. LACKEY: It's simply the contents of the
9 conversation, Your Honor.
10 THE COURT: So, the question is simply whether or not
11 you had conversations, without --
12 THE WITNESS: Yes.
13 THE COURT: -- telling us what they were.
14 THE WITNESS: Yeah.
15 THE COURT: Okay. And he said yes.
16 MR. LACKEY: Yes.
17 BY MR. LACKEY:
18 Q Did anyone from Tenet or Amazon ever tell you why the
19 policies were this way?
20 A No. That's just pretty much they said -- well, I'll put
21 it this way. When we got hired on, they gave us a handbook,
22 and when we get in the warehouse, they always told us, Mike
23 told us, and Steve, that Amazon was going to talk to us. And
24 when we get in there, because we're new, they're going to let
25 us know what we can do, what we can't do, and what is their
Lines - Direct 53
1 policies, because that's their warehouse and we have to abide
2 what they say.
3 Q Okay. Did anyone from Tenet ever tell you when Amazon's
4 role at the warehouse was?
5 A Not really. Like I say, it mainly came down from when we
6 got hired on. Mike just gave us pretty much a little run-
7 through because he had other people he had to do an
8 orientation, but mainly when we got to the warehouse the
9 Amazon manager would pretty much run us down. We have to go
10 over to the desk and they tell us everything that's going on,
11 what we can do, what we can't do, the badge, the vest,
12 everything. You know, the ins and outs.
13 Q Were you told anything about how you were supposed to
14 respond or interact with the Amazon manager on-site?
15 A Yeah. He did explain to us that if the manager is not
16 around or if there is an issue, that if we don't address it
17 to them, we can come to them and they'll go to Steve or
18 Gerard or the other girl that was a manager. Sometime, they
19 wasn't there. Sometimes, they were in the back with --
20 trying to get the stock put on the shelves. But the managers
21 pretty much let us come to them if we need to.
22 Q And by the managers, coming to them, you mean the Amazon
23 managers would let you come to them?
24 A Yes.
25 Q Okay. Were you told that Amazon had the power to fire
Lines - Direct 54
1 employees who violated its policies?
2 A Yes.
3 Q And by whom?
4 A Amazon. The managers there. Like I said, they already
5 threatened to get me because I was late on delivering and not
6 taking a toll road.
7 Q And are your allegations in this lawsuit every bit as
8 much against Amazon as against Tenet?
9 A Yeah.
10 MR. LACKEY: We'll pass the witness.
11 THE WITNESS: Can I get some water?
12 THE COURT: Okay.
13 THE WITNESS: So, --
14 THE COURT: Cross-examination?
15 THE WITNESS: I can get some? Okay. Thank you,
16 ma'am.
17 CROSS-EXAMINATION
18 BY MR. DIVIN:
19 Q Mr. Lines, could you please go to Debtor's Exhibit 27? I
20 think you said this was your timesheets.
21 A Yes.
22 Q And could you please go to the one that has Page 5 at the
23 bottom?
24 A Yes.
25 Q And I believe you'd said that your workweek was Sunday

Lines - Cross 55
1 through Saturday, correct?
2 A Yes, sir.
3 Q And so if we look on this sheet, then you've got one
4 Sunday through Saturday, which it was November 15th through
5 the 21st. Correct?
6 A Yes.
7 Q And then there's, beneath that, another workweek,
8 November 22nd through the 28th, correct?
9 A Yes.
10 Q And then I guess Tenet put on this same timesheet some
11 additional days, which would be November 29th and 30th,
12 correct?
13 A Yes.
14 Q And so before you got to November 29th and 30th, you'd
15 already worked overtime, correct? Some of these prior
16 workweeks we've gone over?
17 A Yes.
18 Q And so is it your testimony, then, that Tenet was going
19 to pay you at the regular rate and not the overtime rate for
20 the days November 29th and 30th?
21 A I'm not for sure how that calculated. But the way I
22 thought it was broken down, the way it looked, I was supposed
23 to get paid overtime for that.
24 Q But that's my question, is you understood, because of the
25 way this is laid out and because you'd worked some overtime
Lines - Cross 56
1 before that, that you were entitled to overtime for all the
2 hours you worked on November 29th and November 30th?
3 A Right.
4 Q And in fact, in your lawsuit, that's one of your
5 allegations you're bringing, right?
6 A Right.
7 Q That it's a law violation for Tenet to pay people that
8 way, correct?
9 A Yes.
10 Q And in fact, when you went to Steve, the boss, that's one
11 of the complaints you brought to his attention, that they
12 were paying in the way that we just described?
13 A Yes.
14 Q And in fact, you mentioned that was -- was it November
15 26th that you talked to him?
16 A It was on, yeah, around -- it was on Thanksgiving Day.
17 Q That was going to be my question. It was Thanksgiving
18 Day that you brought this up with him, right?
19 A Uh-huh. Yeah. Yes.
20 Q And I think that you said that they called Steve at home;
21 he was at home on Thanksgiving and he came back up?
22 A No. He was leaving.
23 Q About to leave to go home --
24 A Right.
25 Q -- and have his Thanksgiving turkey, right?

Lines - Cross 57
1 A Right.
2 Q And then you were there and you were bringing up with him
3 the fact that here were these days that you felt like you
4 were entitled to overtime like we just went over and people
5 were not getting paid for them. Correct?
6 A The issue was that we were talking about that issue there
7 and the tolls.
8 Q Okay.
9 A And I was talking for everybody. On all the meetings I
10 do, I speak for everybody that was there.
11 Q And in fact, when you brought up about this way that
12 they're paying and it -- so, did you understand they were
13 paying you but for, say, half a month on one paycheck?
14 A What do you mean?
15 Q Sure. In other words, you understand that you get a
16 paycheck, right?
17 A Right.
18 Q And so on one of those paychecks is there an issue over
19 how many days are covered by that paycheck?
20 A No, we wasn't -- we wasn't told that.
21 Q Oh, okay.
22 A We was -- my understanding when we got hired on, the pay
23 period was Sunday through Saturday, Sunday through Saturday,
24 and get paid that following Friday.
25 Q I see. I see. So if you flip over to Exhibit 30 --

Lines - Cross 58
1 could you do that with me, please?
2 A What is it?
3 Q Exhibit -- Defendant -- Debtor's Exhibit 30.
4 A Okay.
5 Q And do you see right there on your first earnings
6 statement where it says Period Beginning? Do you see that at
7 the upper right?
8 A Yeah.
9 Q And it's got October 1st?
10 A Yeah.
11 Q And then at the -- beneath that, it's got Period Ending?
12 You see that?
13 A Yeah.
14 Q And then it's got October 15th?
15 A Right.
16 Q Which would be, if you add that up, that's 15 days,
17 correct?
18 A Yeah.
19 Q So that's more than two workweeks, right?
20 A Two, no, two weeks and one day. Fifteen day, yeah.
21 Q Yeah. And that was -- and if we go down each and every
22 one of your paychecks, they've got similar calculations on
23 them to tell you what pay periods it covers, right?
24 A Right. Right.
25 Q And so that's my point when we get back to Exhibit 27,

Lines - Cross 59
1 when you look at that Page 5, I mean, it looks like that --
2 do you know whether this was covered by just one paycheck?
3 A Well, I don't know if it was covered in one paycheck or
4 if it was two. I don't -- I don't recall offhand because I
5 didn't -- actually, I haven't looked at it right now. But --
6 Q Well, if we look over at Debtor's Exhibit 30, Page 4, if
7 we flip over there -- can we do that?
8 A Page what?
9 Q 4, of Debtor's Exhibit 30. Do you -- and at the top of
10 that, it says the pay period begins November 16th, right?
11 A Yeah.
12 Q And that it goes --
13 A And when it gets to that.
14 Q And that it goes through November 30th?
15 A Right.
16 Q And so as we go back to the Debtor's Exhibit 27, Page 5,
17 you've basically got those days that we just covered,
18 November 16th through the 30th, on one sheet. Right?
19 (Pause.)
20 A Okay. Say that again?
21 Q Sure. If we look at Debtor's Exhibit 30, Page --
22 A 4.
23 Q -- 4, --
24 A Right.
25 Q -- which purports to cover November 16th through 30th pay

Lines - Cross 60
1 period, --
2 A Uh-huh.
3 Q -- and then if we look over at this timesheet --
4 A Uh-huh.
5 Q -- which is Debtor's Exhibit 27, Page 5, these cover the
6 same time period, right? 16th through the 30th of November
7 of 2015?
8 A Okay.
9 Q And so what you were telling me before, I believe, is the
10 fact that Tenet was paying you at straight time for November
11 29th and 30 you believe to be unlawful because it should have
12 been at overtime rate?
13 A Yes.
14 Q And so basically the fact that these various time -- or
15 paychecks which are in Exhibit 30, that they cover, you know,
16 15 or 16 days each, you're basically saying that that leads
17 to this illegal pay practice. It's all tied in together.
18 Right?
19 A Right. Yeah. The quote -- you want to talk about how --
20 you want to talk about the overtime, right? The holiday pay.
21 We're supposed to get double time on the holiday.
22 Q Okay. And I want to get to holiday, but I'm asking you
23 about the overtime right now. And I'm asking you whether,
24 when you look at Exhibit 30, is the fact that they're paying
25 you like this -- in other words, it looks like the 1st

Lines - Cross 61
1 through the 15th of the month in one check, and then the 16th
2 through the end of the month -- that that's basically this
3 illegal pay practice which is part of your lawsuit? Right?
4 A Yes.
5 Q So I want to talk to you about holidays, as you brought
6 that up. Have you ever looked at the Tenet employee handbook
7 to see what the rule was about holidays?
8 A Well, yeah.
9 Q Okay.
10 A I did.
11 Q And so if we go over to Exhibit 47 -- could you look at
12 that, please, sir? And if we look at Page 30 of Exhibit 47,
13 do you see where it says, under Eligibility, under Benefits,
14 --
15 A Uh-huh. Yeah. Yeah.
16 Q -- and do you see where it says, To qualify for benefits,
17 an employee must be considered full time and have completed a
18 minimum of 60 days of continuous employment with TCL? Do you
19 see that?
20 A Yes.
21 Q So did you know that was the rule, the 60-day rule?
22 A No. And the reason why is because when we got hired on
23 Mike and Steve was already letting everybody know that the
24 holidays were coming up, that's why we were real busy; and
25 second, that anybody that -- we had to volunteer. It wasn't

Lines - Cross 62
1 something that it was mandatory. If you volunteer to work on
2 the holiday, you get double time, which is double what you
3 make. Instead of getting $7, you're getting $14.50.
4 Q So, had you --
5 A Plus your $3.25.
6 Q So, my question is, had you ever looked at this handbook
7 to confirm that was the rule?
8 A No, I did not look at it.
9 Q So with your hire date being I think you said October
10 6th, correct?
11 A Uh-huh.
12 Q That's a yes?
13 A Yes.
14 Q And if we go 60 days out, Thanksgiving of 2015 would have
15 happened before you had your 60 days in.
16 A Yes. And that will include everybody else there almost.
17 Q And so if we look at least the written policy as
18 reflected in Exhibit 47, you would not have been entitled to
19 the holiday pay, correct?
20 A Correct. Oh, I wouldn't work.
21 Q And so have you looked at the Tenet exhibit which shows
22 what you were actually -- whether you were actually paid for
23 that holiday?
24 A Yes. It was like -- I think they only gave us like $6.00
25 for the hours that we worked.

Lines - Cross 63
1 Q Well, so why don't we flip over to Exhibit 29, Page 10?
2 THE COURT: Of what exhibit?
3 MR. DIVIN: Exhibit -- the Debtor's Exhibit 29, Bates
4 Page 10.
5 BY MR. DIVIN:
6 Q And are you there, sir?
7 A This has to be 29, right? Yeah.
8 Q And it starts at the top of the page, Beginning of Week
9 date November 22nd of 2015?
10 A Yeah.
11 Q And so if we look down at the bottom of that page,
12 towards the bottom, we see that there is the day of Thursday,
13 November 26, 2015. Do you see that?
14 A Thursday, November 16th, 2015 [sic]? Yeah.
15 Q And do you see where it says Regular, it's got 6.75 next
16 to it?
17 A Uh-huh. Yep.
18 Q And you understand that's hours, not dollars, right?
19 A Okay.
20 Q And so when you look next to that on November 26th, it
21 says Holiday Pay, 6.63. Do you see that?
22 A Yep.
23 Q And that so the total hours for that day that Tenet paid
24 you was in excess of 13? In fact, 13.38, according to this?
25 A Paid me how much?

Lines - Cross 64
1 Q Well, according to this exhibit, which is Debtor's
2 Exhibit 29, Bates Page 10, for November 26th it says you
3 additionally had 6.63 hours of holiday pay. Do you see that?
4 A Right.
5 Q And then that totaled, with your 6.75 of regular pay, for
6 13.38 hours of actual pay, correct?
7 A Thirteen point what?
8 Q 38. Do you see it right there under Total?
9 A (Pause.) I don't see where you're at.
10 Q Okay.
11 A I'm trying to -- I'm looking at the paycheck stub.
12 Q Got it. I'll just move on from there, sir.
13 A Because I'm just looking at holiday pay, it says $48 at
14 $7.25 an hour.
15 Q Okay. And -- okay. Thank you, sir.
16 A And it's supposed to be double. We're supposed to get
17 double. That's the reason why I work. That's why everybody
18 works on Thanksgiving, because they say it's double. If you
19 come in voluntary, you get double your money, so that's why
20 everybody showed up, not knowing that Amazon Flex was going
21 to be there.
22 Q And so when we say double your money, you worked
23 approximately 6-1/2 hours that day, right?
24 A Yeah.
25 Q And do you understand that you got over 13-1/2 hours'

Lines - Cross 65
1 pay?
2 A What, for working that day?
3 Q Yes, sir. We just went over that.
4 A Well, I don't think I'm showing here 13-1/2 hours.
5 That's what I'm trying to see where you're talking about.
6 Because my timesheet only -- the timesheet on here only has
7 hours worked. Rate, $7.25. Hours, 6.63. Total that I made
8 was $48.07.
9 Q So if you were paid 13.38 hours for Thanksgiving, would
10 you be paid double the number of hours that you actually
11 worked?
12 A All I know is that if I worked 6 hours and 63 minutes, I
13 want to be paid what I was supposed to be paid, which was
14 double. If it's $7.25 and we're supposed to get double that,
15 that's $14.50 times 6.63.
16 Q Okay.
17 A That's what I'm looking at. I'm -- all the other stuff
18 that you're talking about, I don't know. I'm just looking at
19 what I see right here and what's on my timesheet.
20 Q Yes, sir. So, your last day you actually showed up for
21 work was December 26th of 2015?
22 A Yes.
23 Q And did you have any discussions with Steve after that?
24 A After that day?
25 Q Yes, sir.
Lines - Cross 66
1 A Yeah. I tried to call him on the phone.
2 Q Okay. Did you -- after you sent your text saying I quit,
3 did you talk to him after the -- after that?
4 A I don't recall now. I tried to call him. That's the
5 reason I sent the text. But I did call their office, Austin,
6 and then I sent them an email when I filed the complaint.
7 Q So your last communication with Steve was somewhere
8 around, what, January 1st of 2016?
9 A Yeah. January 2nd. Around that time.
10 Q Okay. And have you previously sworn that you had a
11 complaint talk with Steve on January 22nd of 2016?
12 A Yeah. On my birthday. Oh, you said 22nd of '16?
13 Q Yes, sir.
14 A I don't recall if I talked to him on that day. I might
15 have, but I don't recall. I'd have to check.
16 Q Well, what reason would you have to have talked to Steve
17 21 days after your text when you quit?
18 A Because I was trying to get a hold of them at their
19 corporate office because nobody would call me back on my
20 email. I sent the email out, I'm filing a complaint. In
21 fact, I was supposed to do it by procedures. When I filed
22 the complaint by email, they were supposed to contact me. I
23 know I spoke to a guy in there. I don't think it was Scott.
24 MR. DIVIN: Objection, nonresponsive.

Lines - Cross 67
1 THE COURT: Why don't you restate the question?
2 MR. DIVIN: Let me go at it a different way.
3 BY MR. DIVIN:
4 Q What's the last day that you actually communicated with
5 Steve?
6 A It was probably in -- like I guess in January sometime.
7 Q Well, --
8 A I don't know exactly the date.
9 Q Well, was it -- you told him you quit as of January 2nd.
10 A 2nd. Right.
11 Q Okay.
12 A I sent him an email. I sent him a text.
13 Q So did you talk to him after that?
14 A I probably did.
15 Q Okay. And what was your actual termination date with
16 Tenet?
17 A When I wasn't on the schedule no more.
18 Q Okay. So help me with that. When did --
19 A That was in December, like right after the 26th.
20 Q Okay. And that's the day you understand you were
21 terminated?
22 A Well, when I -- when I saw myself off the schedule and I
23 went back to Mike and Mike said that -- he wasn't there, he
24 wasn't answering the phone, and I found out he had got fired,
25 so, yeah.
Lines - Cross 68
1 Q And that's in December of 2015?
2 A Yeah.
3 Q So, have you filed a sworn declaration that you were not
4 terminated until February of 2016?
5 A Did I file a what?
6 Q Did you sign a sworn declaration in this case under
7 penalty of perjury that your actual termination date was in
8 February of 2016?
9 A I guess I did. I don't know. I don't recall. I don't
10 recall.
11 Q Well, why don't we look at --
12 A That was --
13 Q -- Debtor's Exhibit 13? Could you flip over there?
14 A Debit Exhibit 13?
15 Q Yes, sir.
16 A Okay. And --
17 Q Can you flip to Debtor's Exhibit 13, Page 23?
18 A Page 13.
19 Q And so can you look at Paragraph 17 on Page --
20 A You said -- you said Debit?
21 Q Debtor's Exhibit 13. The big binder.
22 A Okay. And this is -- this is 13. You said Page 13?
23 Q I said Page 23.
24 A Oh. 23. Okay.
25 Q And Paragraph 17. Do you see that, sir?

Lines - Cross 69
1 A Yeah.
2 Q And if we look at the page prior to that, it says
3 Declaration of Jeffrey Lines. That's you, right?
4 A (Pause.) Yeah.
5 Q And you signed it on Page 24?
6 A You said I signed it on what?
7 Q Page 24 of Debtor's Exhibit 13.
8 A Yeah.
9 Q Okay. So if we go to the prior page of that exhibit,
10 Page 23, and we look at Paragraph 17, it says -- and I'm
11 reading down in the middle -- After I complained again on or
12 around January 22nd of 2016. Do you see that?
13 A Uh-huh.
14 Q And is that something you swore to?
15 A Uh-huh. Yes.
16 Q And then we read on to the next sentence, it says,
17 Approximately 30 days after this complaint, I was terminated.
18 Do you see that?
19 A Yes.
20 Q And that's -- that would be in February of 2016, correct?
21 A Yes.
22 Q And that's, according to what you're telling us today,
23 that is inaccurate, right?
24 A Incorrect.
25 Q So if we go over to Exhibit -- Debtor's Exhibit 35, could

Lines - Cross 70
1 you please look at that?
2 A You said 35?
3 Q Yes, sir. So this is your text that you sent to -- you
4 said General Manager Steve, correct?
5 A Uh-huh.
6 Q That's a yes?
7 A Yes.
8 Q And you said in there, I quit as of January 2nd, 2016.
9 Do you see that?
10 A Yes.
11 Q And down at the bottom, it got cut off, right?
12 A I guess.
13 Q It says, I already have another. Do you see that?
14 A Yes.
15 Q The next word on that text message is job, right? I
16 already have another job?
17 A Yes.
18 Q Can you tell us about that? When did you first get the
19 other job that you referred to you in your January
20 approximately 1st, 2016 text to Steve?
21 A I got the job probably around March.
22 Q Okay. Help me with this. This text that we're looking
23 at, Debtor's Exhibit 35, was sent prior to January 2nd of
24 2016. Right?
25 A What day does the text say on there?

Lines - Cross 71
1 Q Well, it says, I quit as of January 2nd, 2016.
2 A Okay.
3 Q Right?
4 A Right.
5 Q So you sent that either on or prior to January 2nd of
6 2016, right?
7 A You can't send a text prior and have -- and have the date
8 on the text for January 2nd.
9 Q Well, if we look at the text, it doesn't have the date
10 that it was sent on there, correct?
11 A Right.
12 Q What it has is your words that said, I quit as of January
13 2nd, 2016.
14 A Right. And that's the day I sent the text.
15 Q Okay. So we got that pinned down.
16 And in that same text, you're telling Steve, I already
17 have another job, right? We just went over that.
18 A I -- when I didn't get on the timesheet, when he took me
19 off that clock, that timesheet, I already knew that I wasn't
20 coming back for all the conflicts we were having with the
21 communication skills. And when I found out Mike wasn't
22 working there no more and I couldn't get back on the
23 schedule, --
24 Q Uh-huh.
25 A -- so I went ahead and started looking for another job.

Lines - Cross 72
1 Q Well, but you did more --
2 A I had no choice.
3 Q But you did more than just look, right? You're telling
4 Steve, I already have another job?
5 A I did have another job lined up because I knew I wasn't
6 coming back.
7 Q Well, that gets to my point, which is --
8 A That's when I --
9 Q -- when did you have the other job lined up?
10 A I had -- I got the other job on Friday, the 1st, when I
11 knew I wasn't coming back.
12 Q Okay.
13 A So I went ahead -- because I had to pay my bills.
14 Q Uh-huh.
15 A I got bills I got to pay. I've got a car note and
16 everything.
17 Q Right.
18 A So I got a schedule with another guy, Metroplex. Right.
19 He had an opening coming up in March. So I went ahead and
20 got on with him. I used to work with the guy before.
21 Q And you're saying as of January 1st you could not start
22 there until March?
23 A Right.
24 Q And why?
25 A Because Metroplex Distribution is -- they pass out

Lines - Cross 73
1 flyers. They're slow in the wintertime, February and March.
2 I mean, February -- in January and February, they're slow.
3 They don't have a lot of business. So they slow down. Them
4 are the main two months. So when March come around, they
5 pick up. They get a lot of business from you have 7-Elevens
6 and companies. So that's when I got hired, put on.
7 Q Did Steve ever tell you you were fired?
8 A He told me that I wasn't coming back. And that's when --
9 that's when I knew I wasn't coming back, I wasn't coming
10 back. And that was because of conflicts.
11 Q And when did he say that?
12 A That was like on -- the last one, like I said, was around
13 my birthday time or on my birthday when that mis --
14 inappropriate stuff started happening.
15 Q So were you initially paid for working through lunch at
16 Tenet?
17 A Tenet started off with we didn't take a lunch break.
18 There was no such thing as lunch breaks. You could not take
19 a lunch. They didn't start -- they said they were going to
20 start taking a lunch and Gerard started saying that we had to
21 take one in like the beginning of November, so -- but nobody
22 was taking it but he was marking timesheets that you had to
23 take an hour.
24 Q So my question was, were you, prior to that, prior to
25 November 1, were you getting -- you were not being docked for
Lines - Cross 74
1 lunch, correct?
2 A No. You could not be.
3 Q You were working through lunch and you were getting paid
4 for that time prior to November?
5 A Yes.
6 Q And then someone -- in fact, did you complain about that,
7 the fact that you were not getting to actually take a lunch?
8 A Did I complain about it? I don't recall ever
9 complaining. I might have, but I don't -- my lunch is like,
10 if I don't have anything to do and I'm coming back, I'll take
11 a lunch in my car if I have to stop at the gas station or
12 something like that to get gas, but that's very --
13 Q So you may have --
14 A That's very rare.
15 Q So you may have complained to Gerard or somebody else
16 prior to November 1 that you were not getting a lunch?
17 A No, not prior to. I don't think so. I think it was
18 after we got notification that somebody was talking about not
19 getting lunch breaks but Amazon has told us -- the manager
20 has let us know that we can't take it because they're -- they
21 have a high volume and that, by having a high volume, we
22 cannot miss these orders or you can just walk out the door,
23 because we can't have somebody working here and not -- that
24 would have these orders taken out.
25 Q Who did Gerard work for?

Lines - Cross 75
1 A Tenet Concepts.
2 Q What was his job title?
3 A He was a manager. First he wasn't a manager. He was --
4 first he started off with, what do they call it, dispatch,
5 and then he went to management when I got on there.
6 Q Okay. And was he management when he told everyone that
7 they should begin taking a lunch?
8 A At the time, no, he was dispatch. I think he became
9 management around maybe the week before Thanksgiving, he
10 became management, him and another girl. He was telling
11 people that they have to take a lunch, but if you take a
12 lunch -- people are saying, if we take a lunch, --
13 Q No, I get what people are saying. I'm just asking you,
14 was he a manager when he said that?
15 A Not at the time, no. He was in dispatch.
16 Q Was he passing on, as you understood it, the direction of
17 Tenet management when he said it?
18 A He never mentioned that.
19 Q Well, didn't the dispatchers at Tenet sometimes pass on
20 to the drivers things that Tenet management wanted --
21 A No.
22 Q They never did that?
23 A No. The -- the only time the dispatchers get on the
24 phone with us, if we're in a wrong location, if they're --
25 they miss a street and we're five minutes away, they'll say,
Lines - Cross 76
1 hey, they'll call us on the phone and say, you missed your
2 turn, you're going to have to go this way or go that way. Or
3 if we have to get to a customer's house and nobody's
4 answering the phone, nobody's answering the door, we have to
5 call that in and ask them, hey, do you want us to leave the
6 package here, leave the bag there with the customers and the
7 customer give it back to the next delivery?
8 Q So, basically, the dispatcher typically gave you
9 directions on how to get there?
10 A If we were -- if they seen us on the GPS and we were
11 lost, yeah. But other than that, they don't call us. They
12 don't -- they don't tie up the lines for anything.
13 Q So it was out of the ordinary for Gerard to come to you
14 and the others and to say you need to start taking a lunch.
15 Right?
16 A Yeah. It was awful strange. Because nobody has taken
17 lunch since I've been there.
18 Q And given that it was strange, you never -- did you ask
19 him, is it what management wants us to do?
20 A No, nobody said anything.
21 Q Did he do it face to face or did he do it on the phone?
22 A No, he did it when people were there. Like when people
23 were coming off their delivery and when they have to go back
24 out, he'll say, hey, look, I got to take a lunch from you
25 guys. You can stay or I'll just mark it off your -- or I'll
Lines - Cross 77
1 mark it on your -- your timesheet that I took a lunch from
2 you guys. So when they come back at the end of the night,
3 they took it off their timesheet.
4 Q He told you in advance that he was going to be deducting
5 a lunch from your timesheet?
6 A Yeah. Knowing that we don't take lunch. We can't take a
7 lunch.
8 Q And did you think that they were deducting one hour for
9 lunch?
10 A Yeah. They put that on there. One hour.
11 Q One hour?
12 A Yeah. They would take one hour.
13 Q Have you studied on your payroll sheets to see how much
14 was actually deducted for the lunch?
15 A I haven't checked it. It's been a while. It's been a
16 couple years since I looked it. But --
17 Q Would it surprise you that the amount was only a half-
18 hour that was deducted?
19 A A half-hour?
20 Q Yes.
21 A Probably. I don't know. I didn't pay attention. It's
22 been a while. But they make us take an hour.
23 Q They make you take an hour?
24 A They're -- yeah. The -- you have to, you have to. But
25 the majority of the people there, they can't. So, you know,
Lines - Cross 78
1 if you don't have no deliveries, that's one thing. But
2 you're never going to find a day you don't have no
3 deliveries. That's the whole problem.
4 Q So how did you pay these tolls that you referred to?
5 A I had to pay the toll bill to Dallas Tollway in Plano.
6 Q North Texas --
7 A Yeah.
8 Q -- Tollway Authority?
9 A Yeah. I had to go to --
10 Q Did you pay it via credit card?
11 A Yeah. I always pay through my credit card.
12 Q Okay. And so you would have a credit card receipt,
13 correct, that you did that?
14 A Yeah. Under Chase Bank.
15 Q And if you --
16 A But I've left them.
17 Q And if you needed to get an extra copy of it, for
18 example, for this hearing, that would have been available for
19 you to do, right?
20 A No. I don't have an account with Chase no more. It's
21 been years. So --
22 Q Well, did --
23 A -- I don't know if I will have -- if they will have a
24 document of it. But the toll road will have it.
25 Q Well, you had the account back when you filed your
Lines - Cross 79
1 lawsuit, right?
2 A Yeah.
3 Q Okay. So why do we not have that record in front of us
4 of these tolls you claim that you took and that you were not
5 reimbursed for?
6 A Because I gave my copy to them. I gave Steve a copy.
7 Just like everybody else there.
8 Q Although you could have obtained another copy --
9 A Well, you know, --
10 Q -- back when you were with Chase, right?
11 A Okay. Yeah. You're right. But --
12 Q So why didn't you do that?
13 A But in the right sense of mind, when you're working for a
14 billion-dollar industry like Amazon and you're working for a
15 third-party company, when you're working for someone, you
16 trust them. You assume you would trust that you were going
17 to get your stuff taken care of. That's like me working for
18 your firm. If I asked you to -- I give you a document and
19 you -- I expect you to follow through with the document.
20 Q But your trust became breached such that --
21 THE COURT: I need for you all to stop talking over
22 each other.
23 THE WITNESS: Yes, sir.
24 THE COURT: Okay? We need to have a clean record.
25 BY MR. DIVIN:
Lines - Cross 80
1 Q So your trust became breached, though, enough that you
2 called an attorney?
3 A Yeah.
4 Q And so at that point apparently you were thinking that
5 you had expenses that had not been reimbursed?
6 A That's right.
7 Q So wouldn't it have behooved you at that point to get a
8 copy of those so that we'd have them in front of us?
9 A At the time I didn't think about it because I already
10 gave the copy to them. But if I needed it, I probably could
11 have -- I probably can go to the toll roads and get a copy.
12 Q Were you promised expense reimbursement?
13 A Yes. We also signed a document by Gerard, the manager
14 there.
15 Q Did you sign a document which said that you would be paid
16 $3.25 an hour for expense reimbursement?
17 A That's for gas mileage.
18 Q Was it called expense reimbursement?
19 A My understanding, that was -- it might have on the
20 paycheck stub, but that, when we got hired on, they said it
21 was for gas and mileage. And the tolls and the parking and
22 the meters were something totally different, that they
23 reimbursed us, as long as we gave them a receipt of the
24 invoice of it.
25 Q I think you had -- have you ever talked to anybody at

Lines - Cross 81
1 Tenet in Austin?
2 A Yeah. That's who I spoke to. It's not him, but it was
3 another gentleman there, and I spoke to guy that was here on
4 Thursday.
5 Q Okay.
6 A And I didn't get nowhere.
7 Q So is the thing that you signed off on when you went to
8 work for Tenet, did it call the $3.25 an hour expense
9 reimbursement?
10 A Yes. That's for the gas and mileage. And then Mike and
11 Steve said they had another form coming out that we -- we
12 signed, I think it was after Thanksgiving, between
13 Thanksgiving and the first week of December, we signed a form
14 that Gerard gave us that everybody had to sign, and that was
15 for the tolls and everything.
16 Q So I'm going to switch gears to your timesheets. When
17 did you actually -- how did the initial clock-in time get put
18 on your timesheets?
19 A We sign in every day we come in. We have to sign in.
20 Then we put down the hours that we clock out when we leave,
21 the hours that we worked, the mileage, the start, the end
22 mileage, the name of the phone, if it's a WZ or whatever it
23 is. You just, and that phone's -- it's an Android. And then
24 we initial and then they initial, they're supposed to
25 initial.
Lines - Cross 82
1 Q So if we go to exhibit -- Debtor's Exhibit 27, your
2 timesheets, and we look at where it says Time In, do you see
3 those entries?
4 A Which ones? The two blank ones?
5 Q For example, October 6th has --
6 A That was training day.
7 Q Okay. My question, sir, is whether -- where it says 3:00
8 o'clock p.m., --
9 A Right.
10 Q -- is that something you wrote in?
11 A Yeah, I wrote that in.
12 Q Okay. And the 10:00 o'clock p.m.?
13 A Yes.
14 Q And is that true as we look down this sheet, that where
15 there is time in and time out, those are things that you
16 wrote?
17 A It was an accident. I didn't know what I was -- and I
18 had just started and I didn't realize -- are you talking
19 about where it says No and the 7? N-O and 7? It was the
20 line going through? Which one are you talking about?
21 Q No, sir. I'm just asking you, on the first page of
22 Debtor's Exhibit 27, we have a timesheet in front of us,
23 correct?
24 A Right. It says Clock In, Clock Out.
25 Q It has Time In and Time Out. And I'm asking you, are
Lines - Cross 83
1 those times that you wrote in?
2 A Yes. That's what I did.
3 Q Is that true throughout the rest of Debtor's Exhibit 27?
4 A Yes.
5 Q And you -- and in addition to writing those in, you put
6 your initials on this, right?
7 A Yes.
8 Q And did you understand when you were doing that that
9 people at Tenet down in Austin would be using that in order
10 to cut you paychecks?
11 A Yeah.
12 Q So what you're telling us today, where there's this 3:00
13 o'clock time for your time in, that is inaccurate, right?
14 A What do you mean, when you're -- I don't understand what
15 you're saying.
16 Q Well, you're saying that you actually started work prior
17 to 3:00 p.m. on some of these days, right?
18 A (chuckles)
19 Q Please answer my question. Aren't you saying that you
20 started work prior to 3:00 p.m. sometimes?
21 A That's the time we clock in, that we're scheduled to
22 clock in. But before --
23 Q Well, why would you write in a --
24 A We get there before --
25 Q Why would you write a time in --

Lines - Cross 84
1 A Because --
2 Q -- different than the time that you actually started work
3 --
4 A Because --
5 Q -- when you knew that the --
6 A -- we can't -- we are not allowed to do anything that's
7 on the -- whatever's on your timesheet, the clock in sheet
8 for the week that you're scheduled for, that's the time you
9 have to clock in. You don't clock in --
10 Q Who told you that?
11 A That's come from management.
12 Q What management?
13 A Steve and Mike. HR. Mike's manager. HR.
14 Q What about --
15 A That came from them.
16 Q What about the time out? You have different time outs on
17 here, correct?
18 A Right. That's because -- 10:30 is probably when I was in
19 a further part of Fort Worth and I had to deliver, make
20 deliveries. When I'd come in after 10:00 o'clock, that's
21 because the deliveries took me further distance and that
22 takes longer to come back. So that's the reason why that's
23 clocked out at that time. Anything after 10:00 o'clock is
24 for further deliveries.
25 Q But you knew clock out meant that's the time when you
Lines - Cross 85
1 were supposed to cease work, right?
2 A Yes.
3 Q And so you're now telling us, though, that these clock
4 out times, time outs, are false?
5 A No. What I'm saying is that when I come in to work
6 early, if they ask us to do something, we do it. We're going
7 to do it. Everybody is doing it. It ain't just me.
8 Q Okay. I'm asking a different question, sir, which is, on
9 your time outs on Exhibit 27, you're now telling us that
10 these times that you wrote in are not accurate.
11 A No, they are accurate. We have to clock in -- if we get
12 back from a delivery from a long distance, then that's
13 something different. We have to clock in at that time, when
14 we get back. If we have something like in Plano, Frisco,
15 that's closer by instead of further distance that's only
16 going to take less than two hours to get back, that's
17 different.
18 Q But you knew when you filled out these time outs -- for
19 example, 10:30 or 5:39 p.m. -- that people in Austin who did
20 the payroll would understand that that was the time that you
21 ceased work, correct?
22 A I know what you're saying and I understand what you're
23 saying about ceasing the work, about the time you clock out.
24 I understand that part.
25 Q Well, what do you mean when you say you understand it?
Lines - Cross 86
1 What do you understand that I'm saying?
2 A What you're saying is that pretty much it's coming down
3 to just working after the clock. That's what you're coming
4 down to. Working after the clock. What I'm saying is at
5 night-time, when we get clocked in, when we clock in after
6 10:00 o'clock, that's because we're coming from a distant
7 long-distance delivery.
8 Q I get it, but I'm asking --
9 A We're not going to get back at exactly -- not everybody
10 is going to get back at 10:00 o'clock exactly. So what we do
11 is we have to clock in the time we come back in. When we
12 come back in at 10:00 o'clock, I don't always leave at 10:30
13 or 10:15 or 10:20 when I clock in. I'll -- because they ask
14 me to help out, because I might be the last one or two or
15 three of us might be the last ones there. They'll ask us,
16 can we help out, fold the box -- fold the bags, or can you
17 guys clean up the table and stuff before we leave, that type
18 of stuff.
19 Q So was there a shift before you if you started at 3:00
20 p.m.?
21 A Yeah. There's always other shifts. There's -- they
22 break them down in shifts. They got --
23 Q Okay.
24 A They got 8:00 to 10:00, 10:00 to 2:00, 2:00 to -- you
25 know, all the way up to 10:00 o'clock at night.

Lines - Cross 87
1 Q So are you saying that the people on the shift that ended
2 at 3:00 p.m., those guys never ever cleaned up after
3 themselves and they left the table a mess?
4 A A lot of them don't leave at 3:00. That shift, the
5 morning shift, sometimes they don't leave until 5:00 o'clock,
6 6:00 o'clock. The morning shifts have a lot of shifts. They
7 don't -- they don't work just what we work in the evening. I
8 just started. So the people that were starting there had the
9 shifts from 3:00 to 10:00, but then I started working normal
10 shifts and the night shifts, 14-hour days.
11 Q My question is, did they at 3:00 p.m. leave things in a
12 mess for you?
13 A What I'm saying is that people that come back from
14 deliveries, they're always leaving messes. I don't care --
15 it doesn't matter if it's a 2:00 o'clock, a 1:00 o'clock. If
16 they're coming back and they have bags in their hand, usually
17 that's what's going to carry groceries, frozen stuff, they're
18 throwing the bags. They don't have time. They don't have
19 time to go fold that bag up. They've got to run over there
20 and get that delivery, because they know they've got a time
21 frame and they've got to scan everything. And scanning
22 everything takes time because you -- like I said, some people
23 have ten deliveries, ten different customers. So you might
24 have 500 items in your car because you have to scan each one
25 of these items. So it takes a minute. So when you do that,

Lines - Cross 88
1 you don't have time to sit there and fold the bags, set it in
2 there neatly. They just throw them. And when -- oh, excuse
3 me. When they throw them, it just lands wherever. And when
4 people come in behind, they clean it up. People that come on
5 the shift, they go in there and pick it up before they go to
6 work. That's how it is.
7 Q But you're saying at the end of your shift you went ahead
8 and cleaned everything up for the next day's.
9 A Because there's nobody else there. There's only --
10 there's only maybe two of us, three of us there at night, so
11 we'd help clean up everything after we clock out.
12 Q But you're saying the morning guys, they didn't do that?
13 A Morning shift? I don't know what the morning shift does.
14 I wasn't working with them all the time.
15 Q Was there a thing called the bullpen area of the
16 warehouse?
17 A We didn't have a bullpen. We had a -- when you walk
18 through the door, we have a -- okay. You have two different
19 parts. You have a part that has a ramp that like a truck can
20 go up in. Okay. That's where you bring the dollies in.
21 That's where the warehouse is at.
22 Right next door is a big old opening, like the size of
23 this wall here, that has like a ceiling over it. You can
24 walk straight on through. To your left when you go in
25 through the double door, through the single door, there's a

Lines - Cross 89
1 security guy sitting right there at the desk. You can't go
2 past him until you show him your badge and you have your vest
3 on. You go to your left. There's a table here, table here,
4 two tables over here, two vending machines, a candy machine
5 and a soda machine. There's a bathroom right next to where
6 the soda machine is at.
7 Q Was there a fence around the area for the drivers?
8 A There's no fences over there. No fences.
9 Q Have you ever heard the term bullpen before?
10 A No. The only thing I've heard is the breakroom, and
11 that's the area that we were at. Everything is opened.
12 Q What area were you prohibited from going in in the Amazon
13 warehouse?
14 A The very, very back, where all the stuff is lined up on
15 the shelves, where they keep all the products at.
16 Q And you --
17 A We can go -- we can go in to where they have the four
18 racks at, where there's twelve of them at. We can go over
19 there to see if our orders are up. But outside of that, we
20 can't go past that.
21 Q Are you saying that the work you performed was in those
22 four racks?
23 A Yeah. There's a camera. There's cameras in Amazon
24 warehouses, so they have it all on film.
25 Q So do you think your timesheets are accurate or

Lines - Cross 90
1 inaccurate?
2 A Inaccurate. I mean, I noticed that -- the other day, he
3 had mentioned that the $3.25 mileage that we get on overtime
4 is $4.88. Am I correct? The mileage on the overtime is
5 $4.88; that's correct?
6 Q Uh-huh. Sorry. You don't get to ask me questions.
7 A I mean, I'm -- that's my understanding, that he had
8 mentioned that anything over -- on overtime at $3.25 is
9 $4.88. Well, that doesn't show up on my timesheet.
10 Q So your testimony is you initialed inaccurate timesheets?
11 A Yeah.
12 Q And was Tenet fine with you taking your cell phone and
13 taking pictures of them?
14 A Of my timesheet back then?
15 Q Yes. Yeah.
16 A Yeah. Yeah. They didn't really -- they didn't pay
17 attention, so --
18 Q When you say you organized bags of ice --
19 A The ice bag, like the -- it's like ice bag. It's a --
20 they put the frozen food in to keep it cold.
21 Q So what does a disorganized bag of ice look like?
22 A The ice bag? Thrown on the ground, not folded up and put
23 in there, stacked on top neatly, so you can put like 50 of
24 them inside. Instead, they're just thrown around the top and
25 laying on the ground and -- you know what I'm saying? On the
Lines - Cross 91
1 floor wise.
2 Q So did you basically volunteer to do that?
3 A No. They asked us that.
4 Q And was the amount of time --
5 A I don't volunteer.
6 Q -- that you spent, was it -- you said you would never
7 volunteer?
8 A If I'm not -- I don't -- I usually don't volunteer, man.
9 If I'm not supposed to work, I don't -- I don't -- not going
10 to work.
11 Q I see.
12 A But if they ask me and I'm not on the clock, yeah, I
13 don't -- I ain't going to say no to the management --
14 Q Was it a --
15 A -- because they're management.
16 Q Was it a period of minutes that you spent organizing the
17 bags of ice and the other bags?
18 A If I'm by myself, it might take me five, ten minutes,
19 maybe. And I might go clean up something, the tables and
20 stuff.
21 Q How about after your shift? Was it the same? Was it
22 five or ten minutes?
23 A Well, I mean, sometimes it may take no more than 15
24 minutes to do everything. I don't have a problem staying
25 late and helping.

Lines - Cross 92
1 Q Do you know whether Tenet had a location in any other
2 state?
3 A I know they had Austin, or they -- I guess that's the
4 Austin area. I don't know if the Houston was running at the
5 time. I know that they had one -- yeah, somebody -- we were
6 talking about there's one in California.
7 Q Have you ever been there?
8 A Where? California?
9 Q To the Amazon warehouse in California.
10 A Oh, no. No.
11 Q Have you ever talked -- have you ever -- do you have the
12 name of any driver who worked there?
13 A No.
14 Q Did they have a warehouse in Illinois?
15 A Oh, I don't know. I don't know.
16 Q Did you ever talk to any driver who worked there?
17 A I don't know.
18 Q Did you ever see the timesheets of any driver who worked
19 in California?
20 A No.
21 Q Or the payroll?
22 A No.
23 Q Same question for Illinois.
24 A No.
25 Q Have you ever seen the timesheets or the payroll?

Lines - Cross 93
1 A I didn't know they had anything out there.
2 Q Okay. In Austin, do you know the name of any driver of
3 Tenet who worked in Austin?
4 A No.
5 Q Have you ever seen any of their timesheets or payroll
6 records?
7 A No, but I did see our employees' up there where we're at.
8 Q How about in Houston, other than the two drivers who
9 testified? Did you know the names of any of the Houston
10 drivers?
11 A I don't know what that delivery is. I just worked for
12 Amazon Prime Now.
13 Q Have you ever seen any of their timesheets or payroll
14 records?
15 A Where? At Houston?
16 Q Yes, sir.
17 A No. I don't know anything about that.
18 Q Let's talk about Dallas. Did you ever see the timesheets
19 of any of your fellow workers?
20 A Yeah.
21 Q Okay.
22 A Yeah. They did a lot of complaining.
23 Q So you actually reviewed their timesheets?
24 A I actually looked at a couple of them there, because
25 there was one female there that --

Lines - Cross 94
1 Q Well, that's my question, is who is the couple that you
2 actually looked at?
3 A I don't know her name offhand, but --
4 Q Do you remember anybody other than her that you looked --
5 actually looked at her timesheets?
6 A There was a guy that got fired there, known, a gentleman
7 there.
8 Q Do you know his name?
9 A No, I don't know his name, either.
10 Q Did you ever look at his timesheets?
11 THE COURT: I need for you all to quit talking over
12 each other.
13 MR. DIVIN: I apologize.
14 THE COURT: I'm not going to ask again.
15 MR. DIVIN: Yes, sir.
16 THE WITNESS: Yes. I mean, he showed it to me, how
17 the tips and everything were working and how he was
18 railroaded on the tips and --
19 BY MR. DIVIN:
20 Q Did he show you his --
21 A Yeah, he told me --
22 Q -- payroll records?
23 A What do you mean, payroll records? Are you talking about
24 the time -- are you talking about his --
25 Q Checks.
Lines - Cross 95
1 A That's what he was showing me, his check.
2 Q He showed you his checks?
3 A Right.
4 Q How about the lady? Did she show you her checks?
5 A Yeah, because I'm the one that went to Steve on that
6 Sunday when that gentleman --
7 MR. DIVIN: Objection. Nonresponsive, Your Honor.
8 THE WITNESS: Yeah, I seen it.
9 BY MR. DIVIN:
10 Q Did you look at any timesheets or payroll records of
11 anybody other than the one male driver and the one female
12 driver?
13 A No.
14 Q And in terms of all the drivers who have worked for
15 Tenet, other than your own timesheets and time records, other
16 than those two, that's all you've seen?
17 A Yeah.
18 Q Did you know in your lawsuit that you brought a suit on
19 behalf of yourself and others similarly situated?
20 A Uh-huh. Yes.
21 Q And in that regard, when Mr. Mukes was here, did you
22 consider his situation to be similar to yours?
23 MR. LACKEY: Objection, Your Honor. Calls for a
24 legal conclusion.
25 THE COURT: Well, I think you kind of opened that

Lines - Cross 96
1 door with the complaint, don't you? I'm going to overrule
2 the objection.
3 THE WITNESS: Mine and his is two different ones.
4 I'm Amazon Prime Now and I don't know how his operates, they
5 doing something different.
6 BY MR. DIVIN:
7 Q Were you similar to Mr. Mukes when he -- or, you heard
8 him testify, right?
9 A Yeah. I don't -- I don't -- try not to pay attention too
10 much of what he said.
11 Q Well, to the extent you were paying attention, were you
12 similar to him in that he said he got a majority of his
13 lunches? Was it similar to you or not?
14 A Are we talking about me getting my lunches?
15 Q Yes, sir.
16 A No. No.
17 Q Okay.
18 A He's on a different schedule than I am. I'm on a split
19 two-hour delivery thing.
20 Q Were you convicted in 2003 in Collin County for
21 aggravated felony first degree for --
22 MR. LACKEY: Objection, relevance, Your Honor.
23 MR. DIVIN: -- aggravated robbery?
24 THE COURT: What's the objection?
25 MR. LACKEY: It's the same 609 issue we had the

Lines - Cross 97
1 other day. I mean, it's not relevant to any issue in the
2 case, more prejudicial then probative, and not within the
3 category of prior convictions that is proper subject of
4 impeachment.
5 MR. DIVIN: Could I be heard, Your Honor?
6 THE COURT: Certainly.
7 MR. DIVIN: Yeah. Mr. Lines is claiming to be a lead
8 class action representative, and we believe it is probative
9 if he indeed has been convicted of a first-degree felony of
10 aggravated robbery, that that's something that the Court
11 could consider in determining whether he's an appropriate
12 class action representative, especially to the extent
13 someone's arguing that Rule 23 applies in this case.
14 MR. LACKEY: And Your Honor, I don't think we're here
15 on the Rule 23 adequacy of representativeness issues. That
16 may or may not become an issue. I mean, the issues in this
17 hearing at least are limited to validity of claims and I
18 don't know see --
19 THE COURT: So let me make sure that I understand on
20 that, because one of your -- well, two of your proofs of
21 claim in this case on behalf of your clients are purportedly
22 collective class claims. Are you now walking away from that?
23 MR. LACKEY: No. No, Your Honor.
24 THE COURT: All right. Am I correct in understanding
25 that the release -- I think, based on our last hearing, that

Lines - Cross 98
1 the release has occurred within ten years?
2 MR. LACKEY: The release was within ten years, yes,
3 Your Honor.
4 THE COURT: All right. Then I'll overrule the
5 objection. If you'll restate the question.
7 BY MR. DIVIN:
8 Q Were you convicted in the year 2003 in a court in Collin
9 County, Texas of the first-degree felony of aggravated
10 robbery?
11 THE WITNESS: Your Honor, can I explain real quick?
12 THE COURT: You just need to answer the question yes
13 or no.
14 THE WITNESS: All right. Yes.
15 BY MR. DIVIN:
16 Q Did you plead guilty to using a deadly weapon -- namely,
17 a firearm -- during the commission of that felony?
18 A Yes.
19 Q Following up on your testimony about how often you were
20 gone from the warehouse during the day, do you remember that
21 testimony?
22 A Yes.
23 Q Were you gone more than 90 percent of the time from when
24 you took your first delivery until you returned at night?
25 A When I take my -- when I do my deliveries and we scan

Lines - Cross 99
1 everything out, it's two hours. We're there and we come
2 back. From 4:00 to 6:00. When we get back at 6:00 or a
3 little after 6:00, we load up again, scan everything, go back
4 out. Do the same thing until end of our shifts. We're just
5 steady moving. And that's the way, that's the way it's
6 operated.
7 Q So the overwhelming bulk of your day was spent away from
8 the Amazon warehouse, correct?
9 A Yes.
10 Q And away from the presence of the dispatchers?
11 A Yes.
12 Q And the nature of the phones that you used, you could not
13 hear, when you're out driving around, what a dispatcher might
14 be telling another driver?
15 A Everything that we have, everybody has separate phones.
16 We don't all have the same. We all have S5s, but they
17 communicate by calling the number to the, you know, to the
18 dispatch, or the dispatch will call that individual on that
19 phone number.
20 Q So, in other words, if a dispatcher was hypothetically
21 telling one of your fellow drivers, John, to take a lunch,
22 you would not be able to hear that on your phone?
23 A No, we would not.
24 Q And you would not have heard that due to being in the
25 warehouse because of the fact you were constantly away from

Lines - Cross 100
1 the warehouse, correct?
2 A That is correct.
3 Q In other words, you did not have -- you don't have
4 knowledge of specifically what the dispatchers were telling
5 the other drivers during the time that you were away from the
6 warehouse? You don't have personal knowledge?
7 A No, I do not have personal knowledge.
8 Q Have you ever talked to Ira Williams, the man who
9 testified here?
10 A Yes, I did.
11 Q And how many times?
12 A I spoke to him that one time that he showed up and when
13 Steve was there on a -- it was on a Sunday. And that was
14 that girl's paycheck stub. She was short $500 on her check,
15 and we helped her out. Me and another gentleman helped her
16 out. And that -- the regional manager and Steve went to the
17 bank that day and got the money for her because she was
18 verbally threatening to pursue what I'm doing right now and
19 because of her stuff, situation, and that she was going to
20 quit.
21 Q So the one time that you had direct dealings with Ira
22 Williams, someone complained about their paycheck and that
23 matter was taken care of?
24 A Yeah. It was taken care of afterwards.
25 Q And has he ever said anything that you did not like other
Lines - Cross 101
1 than here in the courtroom?
2 A We did not -- we never spoke.
3 Q Okay. And so did you ever hear any of the directions
4 that Mr. Williams gave to Steve, the GM?
5 A No, I never heard them. They talk separate. They don't
6 talk around us.
7 Q To the extent that what you're saying is true in this
8 case --
9 A Uh-huh.
10 Q -- in other words, that Steve Williams let some things go
11 on that shouldn't have at that Amazon warehouse in Dallas --
12 but you don't have any evidence that that was contrary or
13 inconsistent with something that Ira told him, correct?
14 A I don't know what they go -- I don't hear anything what
15 they do.
16 MR. DIVIN: I'll pass the witness, Your Honor.
17 THE COURT: Okay. Mr. Gibson?
18 CROSS-EXAMINATION
19 BY MR. GIBSON:
20 Q Good afternoon, Mr. Lines. My name is Darren Gibson and
21 I represent Amazon. Other than meeting yesterday or last
22 Thursday in the courtroom, have you and I met before?
23 A No, sir.
24 Q Okay.
25 A No, sir.
Lines - Cross 102
1 Q I want to start off, you talked about getting to work
2 early sometimes, correct?
3 A Yes, sir.
4 Q And I think you said you didn't have anything -- place
5 else to be, you would -- were close by and you would get to
6 work early?
7 A Yeah.
8 Q Did -- were you one of the few who got to work early?
9 A I always -- 99 percent of the time I always come in early
10 and always leave later.
11 Q Were you a model employee in that way?
12 A I try to be.
13 Q Were other people getting there as early as you were?
14 A There was some there, yeah.
15 Q Was everybody getting there as early as you were?
16 A No.
17 Q Did most people get there right before their shift
18 started?
19 A Some people got there 15 minutes before, yeah.
20 Q What about most people?
21 A The people that are on the shift.
22 Q Most people getting there on -- at the time that their
23 shift started?
24 A Yeah. Around there.
25 Q Okay. Did -- so most people weren't doing what you were

Lines - Cross 103
1 doing, in terms of folding boxes or cleaning up prior --
2 before the prior shift?
3 A I would say probably around -- if there is 40 people
4 working, I'm going to say around 24, maybe 23 people that
5 were doing what I was doing.
6 Q So maybe somewhere around half would get there early --
7 A Yeah.
8 Q -- and the other half wouldn't?
9 A Well, some -- yeah, pretty much.
10 Q Do you know who? Can you provide -- and I know you've
11 sort of answered this question earlier. Can you provide any
12 names of who got there early versus who didn't?
13 A No.
14 Q Was it always the same people?
15 A The majority of the time, yeah.
16 Q You also testified that you would stay late sometimes?
17 A Yeah.
18 Q And help out and clean up and fold bags?
19 A Yeah.
20 Q And you said that the time you were there only a couple
21 of people would stay late?
22 A That was only because I was the only one that was left
23 there at night.
24 Q Do you know whether or not they worked past what they put
25 on their timesheets?
Lines - Cross 104
1 A Yeah. They worked the same thing I did. They -- you
2 know, if they'd get there a couple of minutes before, they'll
3 clock out and then they'll ask -- be -- by management to help
4 clean up and stuff. We're required to clock out before we do
5 anything. They have us clock out. I mean, you've got video
6 cameras in that warehouse. You can see it yourself.
7 Q So my question is, what portion of people would stay
8 after they clocked out to do any additional work?
9 A It would be between one to three people. Depends how
10 many people was there late after 10:00 o'clock.
11 Q Okay. But you wouldn't know if any of the other people
12 stayed after their shift if you were still out delivering
13 boxes, right?
14 A Usually, if I was there. If I wasn't there, no, I
15 wouldn't know.
16 Q You received your paychecks from Tenet, right?
17 A Yes.
18 Q And you filled out timesheets with Tenet, right?
19 A Yes.
20 Q And you were hired by Tenet?
21 A Yes.
22 Q And you were managed by Scott Hoeppner, a Tenet employee?
23 A Yes.
24 Q And you discussed your overtime with Tenet?
25 A Tenet and the Amazon management if we didn't get --

Lines - Cross 105
1 couldn't go through Tenet.
2 Q And they told you to go to Tenet?
3 A Right.
4 Q So when you went to Amazon to talk about your pay and
5 your overtime, they said go to Tenet?
6 A Right. If it can't get it resolved, then go to the next
7 level.
8 Q I'm sorry. I thought that you testified that the Amazon
9 managers told you, when you went to them about your pay and
10 overtime, they told you to talk to Tenet.
11 A No, they did.
12 Q Okay. So I'm talking about -- I want to talk about the
13 hours that you worked and the pay you received for the hours
14 that you worked.
15 A Uh-huh.
16 Q Do you have any reason to believe that Amazon had any
17 control over the pay you received for the hours that you
18 worked?
19 A The pay I received and the hours I worked?
20 Q So you --
21 A Yeah, because they have the control of the -- they have
22 -- Amazon has control of the window-frame, the two-hour
23 window, and we're mandatory to work the windows.
24 Q So, I'm sorry, I think we might be misunderstanding each
25 other. I understand that you're saying that Amazon -- your

Lines - Cross 106
1 testimony is Amazon controlled how many hours you worked. Is
2 that what you're saying?
3 A No. They don't control how many hours I work, no.
4 Q Okay. Who controlled how many hours you worked?
5 A Tenet Concepts, when they had us on the timesheet.
6 Q Okay. So you worked some -- some number of hours?
7 A Yeah.
8 Q Do you have any reason to believe that Amazon controlled
9 or had any influence on what you got paid for the hours that
10 you worked? The amount that your paycheck was for the hours
11 that you worked?
12 A From my understanding, that Amazon, they call -- they
13 call it the grandfather clause, the grandfather clock, that
14 they had control of getting the money to Tenet Concepts and
15 then Tenet Concepts passes it down to us. Now, the reason
16 why that happens is because they said they need a quota.
17 Like, I mean, the quota is that they have to have so many
18 deliveries that they have to meet to get paid for the
19 deliveries. And that comes from Amazon, and then Tenet
20 passes it -- gets it and then we get our check from it.
21 Q So I want to make sure I understand. Your testimony is
22 about the fact that Amazon pays Tenet for the fact that Tenet
23 provides delivery drivers to Amazon? Is that what you're
24 saying? Yes or no?
25 A Amazon pays Tenet and then Tenet pays us.

Lines - Cross 107
1 Q Is Tenet -- yes, that's the nature of this agreement, --
2 A Right.
3 Q -- that Amazon is paying Tenet for Tenet providing
4 delivery services.
5 A Right.
6 Q Did Amazon have any control over how much you were paid
7 for the hours you worked?
8 A For the hours we were worked?
9 Q I mean, --
10 A It goes by -- it goes by how much they get. It depends
11 on how many deliveries -- it goes -- I understand what you're
12 saying on the pay-wise, but if you break it down, the
13 category of the deliveries that we have to do, we have to
14 meet a -- Amazon gives them a -- I guess Steve said they get
15 a flat rate of how much deliveries they get and we have to
16 meet that. If we don't meet that, they don't get that. They
17 get a minus on that. They -- I guess that's some type of
18 reduction or something if they don't meet that quota.
19 Q I'm not asking you to speculate.
20 A Right.
21 Q You turned in hours to Tenet?
22 A Yes.
23 Q You then got paid by Tenet?
24 A Yes.
25 Q Okay. Do you have any reason -- who determined how much

Lines - Cross 108
1 you were paid? Well, you signed a document with Tenet that
2 said you were going to make $7.25 an hour?
3 A Yes.
4 Q Plus $3.25 in addition?
5 A Yes.
6 Q You got a paycheck from Tenet?
7 A Yes.
8 Q Based on the hours that were on your timesheet?
9 A Yes.
10 Q Do you have any reason to believe Amazon controlled how
11 much that paycheck was?
12 A Again, --
13 Q Or did Tenet control how much that paycheck was?
14 A -- Amazon gives them the money.
15 Q The money for what?
16 A Amazon gives them so much money per month to take care of
17 the employees for Tenet. Whatever the money they give them
18 is passed down to us for our pay.
19 Q And your understanding of that is based on what? You
20 referenced Scott Cass's testimony yesterday.
21 A What about testimony?
22 Q I'm sorry. So you're telling us that you have some
23 understanding that Amazon pays money to Tenet?
24 A That's how Tenet gets paid, that's how we get paid, is
25 through Amazon. Doesn't Amazon pay Tenet and then Tenet pays
Lines - Cross 109
1 us --
2 Q I'm asking you how --
3 A -- for the hours that we work, for the hours we work?
4 Q You were -- I'm asking --
5 A Okay. Go ahead.
6 Q I'm trying not to talk over you.
7 A I'm sorry. Go ahead. I'm sorry. Go ahead. Go ahead.
8 I'm sorry.
9 Q Do you have any reason to believe that Amazon pays Tenet
10 based on how many hours you work, or is it paid based on how
11 many packages are delivered?
12 A Based on the packages that are delivered.
13 Q My question to you is, what is your under -- why do you
14 think that? Where does your source of your testimony come
15 from?
16 A Because that's what we were told by management, Steve,
17 the general manager.
18 Q Amazon is not making payments to Tenet based on the
19 number of hours you worked, is it?
20 A The hours we work? I don't know. I don't know what the
21 deal is on that. I just know that we get paid by Tenet for
22 the hours that we put in.
23 Q So you don't -- I'm really confused. So your testimony
24 now is you don't know what the deal is between Amazon and
25 Tenet?
Lines - Cross 110
1 A All I know is that we get paid by Tenet for the hours we
2 work. Amazon pays Tenet and then we get paid.
3 Q And do you have any reason to believe that Amazon pays
4 Tenet based on the number of hours you worked? Or versus
5 packages?
6 A I know by the quota of the packages from what Steve has
7 told us that they have to meet a quota to get paid.
8 Q Okay.
9 A And if you don't meet the quota, we don't get paid.
10 Q Did you ever not get paid for the hours that you worked
11 based on missing quotas?
12 A Based on missing quotas? I don't know. No.
13 Q Okay. So you were -- you never didn't get paid because
14 of this understanding that you have that if quotas were
15 missed you wouldn't get paid?
16 A I didn't get -- I didn't miss no payment on that but we
17 was told that.
18 Q Have you ever estimated the number of -- the amount of
19 tips you allege you have not been paid?
20 A Actually, no, because I never -- I've never seen a sheet
21 that we're supposed to get from Tenet that Amazon was
22 supposed to hand down that we were supposed to get for each
23 day that we work for how many tips we got. But if you want
24 to get -- if you want to ask, on that one sheet that it
25 looked kind of strange that have $5.02 about almost 50-60

Lines - Cross 111
1 times in like a four-days, five-days. That's kind of
2 strange.
3 Q I apologize. That wasn't my question.
4 A Okay.
5 Q My question was, have you ever estimated how many tips
6 you allege you were not paid?
7 A I'm not sure the amount of it.
8 Q Okay. I believe you testified at some point you stopped
9 taking tolls because you weren't -- your toll bills weren't
10 being paid.
11 A Yeah. I -- I did not --
12 Q Is that correct or not?
13 A Yes.
14 Q Okay. So, at some point -- when in your employment did
15 you stop taking toll roads?
16 A I actually stopped taking them and then I went back to
17 taking them. I kind of switched. But around the end of
18 November.
19 Q Okay. Do you remember when you started taking them
20 again?
21 A First off, when I first started I took them, but when I
22 heard that the other guys wasn't getting, wasn't getting
23 their toll bills paid, $900, $600 bills, I kind of got
24 freaked out. So like on my fourth day I kind of like --
25 third or fourth day, I kind of like got off on the service

Lines - Cross 112
1 road. And then when I got back I got reamed out by Amazon
2 management. And then Tenet Concepts called me over there,
3 got on me about it, talking about, oh, you're going to get
4 fired if you don't take the toll roads because it's built
5 into GPS.
6 Q Who from Amazon got mad at you?
7 A My management who was on the computer tracking, who was
8 tracking us. They have trackers on us --
9 Q Are you talking about --
10 A -- everywhere. Huh?
11 Q Are you talking about the dispatcher?
12 A Yeah, the dispatch is management. One of them is a
13 manager.
14 Q All right. So you're saying the Amazon dispatcher?
15 A Yes.
16 Q Do you know who that was?
17 A No. There was two young black guys.
18 Q And then you say you talked to the Tenet person?
19 A Yeah.
20 Q Who was that?
21 A A female. I don't know her name offhand.
22 Q Okay.
23 A It was a female. And she told me that management there
24 at Amazon -- because he was listening -- and they explained
25 to me that, you know, you're new and everything, but you

Lines - Cross 113
1 cannot bypass the toll roads. You have to take them.
2 Q And I'm just going to try to speed this along.
3 A Uh-huh.
4 Q Just try to answer the question I'm asking.
5 A Okay.
6 Q Okay. I asked you who that was, and then you talked a
7 lot more.
8 A Okay.
9 Q So I'm just trying to speed it along. When did you start
10 -- when did you stop taking -- so you said you took tolls
11 initially. Then you got concerned you weren't going to get
12 paid. Like your third or fourth day, you didn't take the
13 toll and got talked to. Is that correct?
14 A Uh-huh.
15 Q Is that correct? Yes?
16 A Uh-huh. Yeah.
17 Q I'm sorry. You --
18 A Yes. Yes.
19 Q Thank you. And then sometime late November, mid-
20 November, you stopped taking tolls again?
21 A Right.
22 Q Did you get talked to again?
23 A No. They kind of let me -- let me go, because I was
24 doing a lot of deliveries for them real fast. So they pretty
25 much gave me a little leniency.

Lines - Cross 114
1 Q Okay. So approximately mid-November you stopped taking
2 tolls and you were not required to take tolls from that point
3 forward?
4 A Uh-huh. Yes.
5 Q Is that --
6 A Yes.
7 Q You mentioned a lot of issues were about Amazon Flex and
8 people were upset about that; is that correct?
9 A Yeah. That happened on Thanksgiving Day.
10 Q What's Amazon Flex?
11 A Amazon Flex is a -- same thing we were doing, but it was
12 -- they were self-employed contractors. 1099. They were
13 getting paid $25 an hour. And the day of Thanksgiving, we
14 all showed up, because they told us if we come in on
15 Thanksgiving, volunteer, then we'd get double time. So we
16 all showed -- everybody -- well, the majority of everybody
17 showed up. And when we showed up, Amazon Flex was there.
18 And I'm telling you, there was probably around 100 of them
19 there. I mean, there was a whole rack of them. And we were
20 sitting there and they had all these tables added in there
21 with Flex.
22 And we were wondering who the more people were. It was
23 like 100 people. Like, who are they? Well, they found out
24 they're Amazon Flex. Well, they were getting to drive, they
25 were getting their stuff, and we were stuck.

Lines - Cross 115
1 Q What do you mean, stuck? Do you mean without deliveries?
2 A We didn't get no deliveries. Yeah. We weren't getting
3 no deliveries. And they were getting it on Amazon Flex. So
4 Steve was there and Steve was talking to the manager for --
5 who was on the dispatch for Amazon, and they were getting
6 into a head-to-head because we -- he -- that's where we got
7 the quota from, that, you know, we have to meet a quota. We
8 got -- we're required to get these many deliveries in this
9 whole day in these two-hour frames. And what happened was it
10 went and bumped the heads.
11 Well, Steve was leaving for Thanksgiving. When he left,
12 he get on the highway, we -- nobody for Tenet was working.
13 They had no deliveries. Amazon Flex was all going out the
14 doors. So we went over there. We waited a couple of hours.
15 We went by. Four hours went by. We said, oh, no. We call
16 Steve up and said, Steve, man, you need to come back here.
17 He said, why? And he said, because I got no deliveries, man.
18 And people were upset because they're not making no money,
19 they're not getting no tips, no nothing. And these people
20 here at Amazon Flex is taking over everything.
21 So Steve came all the way back down from where he's at,
22 come all the way back down and came in there and told them,
23 the management, hey, look, man, we got to have these guys
24 work. They came in. We're required to make sure they get
25 these quotas made because we have so many deliveries. And

Lines - Cross 116
1 you can't give them all that. You have to split it.
2 So it took them some time to do that. So the time we did
3 get it, everybody started walking out and leaving and wasn't
4 here no more. They were getting tired of it. Because that
5 day on, that's when Amazon Flex came in the picture. And
6 every day we come to work, Amazon Flex is there. So people
7 started going from Tenet over to Amazon Flex. They started
8 switching.
9 Q And that was Thanksgiving Day, you said?
10 A That started on Thanksgiving Day.
11 Q So, as of Thanksgiving, people started switching to
12 Amazon Flex?
13 A No. People really found out that they're -- Amazon Flex
14 was in the picture. A couple of days later, people were
15 trying to leave and come over to Amazon Flex because they
16 would find out how much they were getting paid. $25 an hour.
17 So people wanted to switch out.
18 Q And so once Amazon Flex started, did that reduce -- did
19 you have some times when you weren't necessarily delivering
20 because Amazon Flex was taking the deliveries?
21 A No. We still had our quota. We still got on there. We
22 still got all our deliveries. We still were busy. I mean,
23 we were really busy.
24 Q Okay.
25 A So that was one of the busiest areas.

Lines - Cross 117
1 Q But you said Thanksgiving Day you had sat there for four
2 hours and didn't do anything.
3 A Right. That's because of that situation with Amazon Flex
4 because the management was giving it all to their people
5 instead of giving it to the Tenet Concepts --
6 Q Did that --
7 A -- that was in there.
8 Q Did that concern continue after Thanksgiving in terms of
9 sitting there and not having deliveries?
10 A No. That -- Steve took care of it when he had to come
11 all the way back down.
12 Q Okay. You said you were paid $10 an hour at your new
13 job?
14 A Yeah. When I started in March.
15 Q Uh-huh. And you said that was a lot less than what you
16 made at Tenet?
17 A Yeah, because I didn't work that many hours. And this is
18 only requiring like maybe four or five, maybe not even that,
19 a day.
20 Q And --
21 A I had to do something for income.
22 Q And you would agree that, once you include your tips, you
23 made substantially more than $10 an hour at Tenet, right?
24 A Yeah. Yeah. But I worked a lot.
25 MR. GIBSON: Pass the witness.

Lines - Redirect 118
1 THE COURT: Mr. Lackey, any redirect?
2 MR. LACKEY: Five to ten minutes.
3 THE COURT: Okay.
4 REDIRECT EXAMINATION
5 BY MR. LACKEY:
6 Q Had you ever seen any documentation that itemized your
7 tips before this week?
8 A What do you mean? Did I see anything showing that how
9 much tips I made on the documents?
10 Q Yes.
11 A Not. No, not to this day.
12 Q So how would you find out? You would just have an amount
13 for tips on your paychecks?
14 A Yeah. That's how we'd know.
15 Q You were asked some questions about Debtor's Exhibit 29.
16 Have you ever seen that document before today?
17 A No. This is the first time I've seen it.
18 Q And so the documents that you interacted with for your
19 hours looked more like Debtor's Exhibits 27 and 30, correct?
20 A Exhibits 27 and 30 is my paycheck stubs, I think. Isn't
21 that what 30 is? Yeah. Yep.
22 Q And you were asked some questions about a declaration you
23 filed, Debtor's Exhibit 13, Page 23?
24 A Yeah.
25 Q Now, you testified earlier today that you'd had a

1 conversation with Steve on your birthday, correct?
2 A Right.
3 Q And what is your birthday?
4 A December 22nd.
5 Q And so is it possible that the January 22nd was a --
6 A Typo?
7 Q -- a typo or a mistake?
8 A I was about to ask that, I was about to say that, but I
9 didn't want to because I didn't know if I could or not. But
10 I know that when I spoke to them, I think they did a typo on
11 it.
12 Q And it is your testimony that, after your December 22,
13 2015 conversation with Steve, you were taken off of the
14 schedule?
15 A Yeah. I was taken off of the schedule. And then I went
16 -- I got back on and went to work, but they took me off.
17 Steve took me off of it. Mike helped me out and then Mike
18 was terminated after that.
19 Q And so there wasn't one day that you were terminated; you
20 sort of were taken off the schedule. Is that fair?
21 A I was complete -- yeah. He just did that out --
22 Q And that happened within 30 days of the December 22, 2016
23 conversation?
24 A Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah.
25 Q And had you ever seen the copy of the text message that's
1 been used in this --
2 A No, that was the first time I've seen it.
3 Q -- hearing? Since -- presumably, since you sent it?
4 A Yeah. The first time.
5 Q Did -- have Tenet or Amazon ever asked for copies of your
6 toll bill in this or any related litigation?
7 A Since we've been doing this? Since we've filed this?
8 Q Yes.
9 A No, they haven't asked anything. I gave them -- I just
10 gave them that one copy to Steve and that was it.
11 Q Now, on your timecards, if you can turn to Exhibit 27, --
12 A Uh-huh.
13 Q -- your supervisors would initial the timecard as well,
14 correct?
15 A Yeah. JG is Gerard. I think his last -- I'm not sure
16 his last name is Grey or not, Gerard.
17 Q And your supervisors were there when you clocked in; is
18 that correct?
19 A Yeah.
20 Q And they were aware if you were there early or working
21 the bags, et cetera?
22 A Yeah. They're the ones that ask us.
23 Q And they would have known that you'd been doing that
24 before you signed the timesheet, correct?
25 A Yeah.
1 Q And was the timesheet based on when you were dispatched
2 and only when you were driving on routes?
3 A When we clocked in?
4 Q Yes.
5 A No. The clock in is we have to go by what's on that
6 schedule. If that schedule says 3:00 o'clock, we got to
7 clock in at 3:00 o'clock no matter what, and not a minute
8 early, not a minute late. We clock in at 3:00 o'clock. Now,
9 we have to write it in.
10 Q And were you ever told that you were supposed to show up
11 early for a shift?
12 A Yeah. They always tell us to show up early.
13 Q Okay. And was it a supervisor who would ask you to help
14 out after you clocked out?
15 A Yeah.
16 Q And that supervisor knew you had already clocked out?
17 A Yeah. When we get back, he automatically tells us, no,
18 we have to clock out, and then if you can help out, clean,
19 pick up the bags, fold the bags, stick them in there, stack
20 them up neatly, clean up the tables and everything before
21 everybody leaves. You know, that's about it. There was only
22 a couple of people that stayed, that's there.
23 Q And you testified that you have --
24 THE COURT: Hang on. Before you get off of that, --
25 MR. LACKEY: Oh.

1 THE COURT: -- I just want to make sure that I
2 understand. Can you take a look at Exhibit 27?
3 THE WITNESS: Yes, sir.
4 THE COURT: So, and on the first page, if you just,
5 for simplicity, look at the bottom there where you have the
6 time outs. You know, you've got 10:30 in the first box,
7 10:00, and then another 10:30, and then 10:15. Is that --
8 did that tie to the schedule or was that the time whenever
9 you actually came back into the warehouse from your last
10 delivery?
11 THE WITNESS: From the last delivery.
12 THE COURT: Okay.
13 BY MR. LACKEY:
14 Q And just quickly turning back to Debtor's Exhibit 37. Do
15 you want to turn to 37, please?
16 A Yeah.
17 Q You testified on cross-examination that you had not
18 estimated the amount by which your tips were underpaid
19 previously, correct?
20 A Say that again?
21 Q You testified on cross-examination that you had not
22 previously estimated the amount by which you were underpaid
23 for tips?
24 A Right.
25 Q But did you estimate that the amount that you had been
1 paid was less than you had been tipped?
2 A Yes.
3 Q And what was the basis for that?
4 A Because the deliveries you do, the amount of deliveries
5 I've done, when you average around, say, a six-hour window,
6 or two-hour windows, six hours, I average around just say
7 eight, eight deliveries per two-hour period. That's 24
8 deliveries. Or even up to 40, because I've done -- or ten.
9 You -- I took an average of around $5 a delivery, just say
10 for instance. That's going to be quite a bit for that one
11 day, okay? You do that four days, five days a week, that
12 adds up in a two-week span. That's if you calculate it at
13 $5.
14 Now I sit back, and I didn't know about this. Now I look
15 at this. They don't even have all my deliveries down. They
16 don't even have half. At least I see on here some days only
17 ten deliveries on that one day, and I worked six hours. So
18 you're telling me I only did three deliveries? Because that
19 phone has everything that we deliver. That phone keeps track
20 of everything that we put -- that we clock in on every order
21 that we do.
22 And that's the reason why -- and I do the -- I'm really
23 fast. That's why they gave me the most deliveries, because I
24 was real quick and fast. I had the knowledge of getting to
25 where I needed to go. But when you see on here ten

1 deliveries on one day, in a six-hour day or a 14-hour day,
2 that don't add up. So there's some -- there's stuff here
3 missing.
4 Q Okay.
5 A There's quite a bit missing.
6 Q And then in discussing your prior conviction, you asked
7 for an opportunity to explain, and I'm not sure you had one.
8 What would you like to say about that?
9 A I took my brother in. My brother was a heroin addict and
10 a methamphetamine. None of my families would take him in
11 because he was a lie, he was a thief, he was in trouble in
12 the past. I helped him out. I had a good heart. I was the
13 only one. My other brother wouldn't do it. He lived in
14 Austin. My father was a retired doctor so he didn't want to
15 do it.
16 So I did it. I let him come stay with me, not knowing
17 that he was going to be in the same situation again. I was
18 trying to help him get out of it. I had a good job. I had
19 my life going on the right track. I was going up.
20 He did some stuff that he wasn't supposed to do. He got
21 involved with the methamphetamines. And there was a sting
22 operation by the FBI in Collin County. And my brother found
23 out through some friends of him, drug addict friends, and
24 they went to buy some dope, some methamphetamines and heroin.
25 And I, at the time, I didn't know. I was working. And then

1 he got over there. He took some weapons with him and his
2 friends and they went and did some -- bought some dope. And
3 the FBI was watching them because they was watching the
4 house. And he had called me up and said, hey, man, come pick
5 me up? And I said, well, I can't right now. You have to
6 give me 30 minutes. When I get off, I'll come by and get
7 you. Just let me know where you're at.
8 So I went by and picked him up, not knowing that he had
9 just did what he had did to the guy, robbed the guy for his
10 drugs, and he had weapons on him. When they get in my car,
11 I, not knowing that he had the weapons on him, I saw
12 something in his holster right here, because he had a trench
13 coat on, and it was the month of January. So I said, now,
14 what's that you got on you? And he told me what it was. I
15 said, get out of my car. Get that stuff out of my vehicle
16 right now.
17 So he took it out of his -- took it out of my vehicle and
18 dropped it and got rid of it. I drove him back home and I
19 told him, pack your stuff, you and your girlfriend, and you
20 leave. Don't ever come back to my house.
21 I got arrested because of that. I went to jail. I beat
22 the charge, the robbery in the federal. Federal had me.
23 Federal charged me with robbery and a gun charge because he
24 was in my car. I beat the federal charge, the robbery,
25 because, you know, you can take a lie detector in federal

1 custody and -- to beat it, to drop the charges. So I dropped
2 that.
3 They handed it -- the State picked it up. Collin County
4 picked it up because I had beat it on the Federal. So they
5 gave it to -- they gave it to Collin County. They picked it
6 up. Because they can't get you for double jeopardy. Both of
7 them can't charge you for the same thing. So the Feds
8 charged me with unregistered firearm, because he was in my
9 car with that possession. So I got charged, I pleaded for
10 that, because I had no way around, because he was in my car
11 with a gun. So I ain't going to lie about it, and so I told,
12 okay, no problem.
13 But the robbery, he was going to testify against me so he
14 doesn't get no time, and let -- the drug addict, and let me
15 go down for his crime, which he did. So I ended up taking a
16 plea so I don't get a lot of time. So I just pleaded to get
17 it over with. My mom had asked me, my dad asked me to plea
18 it, so I did. And did the running consecutive, and did the
19 prison -- federal prison time and got out, and that was it.
20 And I've been -- I don't hang -- I don't do -- get around my
21 brother no more. I don't have nothing to do with him ever
22 again.
23 Q And then you've had a clean --
24 A Oh, yeah.
25 Q -- criminal record since then?

1 A Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah.
2 Q And does anything about that incident affect your ability
3 to give truthful testimony here today about how you were paid
4 --
5 A No, sir.
6 Q -- at Tenet?
7 A No, sir.
8 Q And were -- Tenet drivers were minimum wage workers; is
9 that correct?
10 A Yes. Yes.
11 Q Would a lot of your fellow workers have had various
12 spotted backgrounds?
13 A I think quite a few of them did.
14 Q And do you think that that in any way, you know, that
15 conviction in any way harms your ability to represent your
16 fellow drivers in getting their fair pay?
17 A No.
18 MR. LACKEY: I'll pass the witness
19 THE COURT: Okay, sir. You may step down.
20 THE WITNESS: I think he wants to ask me something
21 else.
22 THE COURT: What, what are we doing? That was
23 redirect, wasn't it?
24 MR. LACKEY: Yes. Yes, Judge.
25 THE COURT: Is there some new line of questioning

Lines - Recross 128
1 that came up that you feel like you need to cross-examine?
3 THE COURT: Tell me what it's about.
4 MR. DIVIN: One is over Exhibit 37, where he said
5 there's something funny because there are no -- the amounts.
6 I was going to ask him about that.
7 And I was going to ask him about the number of people who
8 he alleges did pre-shift work that came up in the prior
9 questioning.
10 THE COURT: All right. I'll allow brief questioning
11 on those topics and then an opportunity for further redirect.
13 RECROSS-EXAMINATION
14 BY MR. DIVIN:
15 Q So, Mr. Lines, I believe you had said that there were
16 approximately 60 drivers at the Dallas facility?
17 A Fifty, sixty, around that location.
18 Q And I believe you were testifying that there's different
19 shifts, right?
20 A They had me on a 3:00 to 7:00, 3:00 to 10:00 shift, but
21 there's -- oh, you can work all day if you -- if there's an
22 opening.
23 Q Was there a shift prior to the 3:00 to 7:00 shift?
24 A Yeah. There is a morning shift all the way up until, I
25 think, 4:00 o'clock or 6:00 o'clock.

Lines - Recross 129
1 Q And approximately when did the morning shift start?
2 A For me?
3 Q No, sir. For the people who came in on that earlier
4 shift.
5 A Oh, I think they came in, I want to say at 7:00 o'clock
6 or 7:30, --
7 A So, --
8 A -- started at 8:00.
9 Q -- were the approximately 60 drivers split with about 30
10 in the morning shift and about 30 in the afternoon?
11 A I think so. I think they had us --
12 Q Okay. So, obviously, you would have no knowledge, since
13 you came in around 3:00 o'clock or 2:30, about what work
14 people did before their shift, if any, in the morning shift,
15 right?
16 A No. I don't have no knowledge of that.
17 Q Okay. So that leaves approximately 30 drivers who were
18 on your shift?
19 A Okay. Yeah.
20 Q Okay. So out of those 30 drivers, I believe you were
21 asked about how many that you claimed came in early and did
22 work. So, was it less than half of those?
23 A It could vary. It, you know, it can be around 20, 23,
24 22. You know, it depends on, you know, who decides who wants
25 to do it. A lot of people, when management tell you

Lines - Recross 130
1 something, they're going to do it.
2 Q But that's my question, though. Out of the 30, are you
3 saying that as many as 22 to 24 were there --
4 A I'm talking, when you say 60 people, there's like 60
5 people in the evening shift, majority of it. I don't know
6 about the morning, how many people are on the morning shift.
7 I just know when I come into work we got tables filled. We
8 got a whole bunch of people. So we're talking about 50, 60
9 people working there at the evening shift.
10 Q I see.
11 A I don't know exactly what they have in the morning shift.
12 Q So, switching gears to Exhibit 37, Debtor's Exhibit 37,
13 would it be true that there are no entries on there for
14 people who gave you zero tips?
15 A (Pause.) No, but I see a lot of odd numbers.
16 Q So, Exhibit 37, you understand, is limited to people who
17 actually gave you tips?
18 A Yeah. These are -- these are -- these are all the ones I
19 got -- shows on here just for the tips. That's it. I don't
20 --
21 MR. DIVIN: Pass the witness, Your Honor.
22 THE COURT: Any redirect?
23 MR. LACKEY: No, Your Honor.
24 THE COURT: Okay, Mr. Lines. You may step down.

Lines - Recross 131
1 (The witness steps down. Conclusion of transcript
2 excerpt at 3:41 p.m.)
3 --oOo--
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
CERTIFICATE
20
I certify that the foregoing is a correct transcript from
21 the digital sound recording of the proceedings in the above-
entitled matter.
22
/s/ Kathy Rehling 02/28/2019
23
______________________________________ ________________
24 Kathy Rehling, CETD-444 Date
Certified Electronic Court Transcriber
25
132
INDEX
1 Excerpt: Testimony of Jeffrey Lines
1:01-3:40 p.m.
2
PROCEEDINGS 3
3
4 WITNESSES
5 Plaintiffs' Witnesses
6 Jeffrey Lines
- Direct Examination by Mr. Lackey 4
7 - Cross-Examination by Mr. Divin 54
- Cross-Examination by Mr. Gibson 101
8 - Redirect Examination by Mr. Lackey 118
- Recross-Examination by Mr. Divin 128
9
EXHIBITS
10
Lines' Exhibits Identified Received
11
1 Handbook 10 --
12
Debtor's Exhibits Identified Received
13
27 Timesheets 23 --
14 29 Exhibit 63 --
30 Earnings Statements 27 --
15 35 Text 70 --
37 Tip List 33 --
16
RULINGS
17
END OF PROCEEDINGS 131
18
INDEX 132
19
20
21
22
23
24
25

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Case 18-04171-elm Doc 29 Filed 02/28/19 Entered 02/28/19 07:47:21 Page 1 of 132

IN THE UNITED STATES BANKRUPTCY COURT

1 FORT WORTH, TEXAS - FEBRUARY 26, 2019 - 1:01 P.M.

2 THE COURT: Good afternoon. Please be seated. All

3 right. We're on the February 26, 2019 1:00 p.m. docket. We

4 have the Tenet Concepts matter, Case 18-40270, and the

5 related Lines versus Amazon.com adversary, Adversary 18-4171.

6 It looks like we might have one telephonic appearances, but

7 let me take appearances in the courtroom first.

8 MR. LACKEY: Holt Lackey and David Henderson

9 representing Jeffery Lines and Willie Mukes and the

11 THE CLERK: I can't hear you.

12 MR. LACKEY: Oh. Holt Lackey and David Henderson

13 representing Jeffrey Lines, Willie Mukes, and the collective

15 MS. REA: Laurie Rea, and on the phone, Bobby

16 Forshey, for the Debtor.

17 MR. DIVIN: And I'm Rory Divin, Your Honor, on behalf

18 of the Debtor, along with Russell Davenport on behalf of the

20 MR. GIBSON: Darren Gibson on behalf of Amazon.

21 THE COURT: You might want to come up to the

23 MR. GIBSON: Darren Gibson on behalf of Amazon.

24 THE COURT: All right. Very good. Good afternoon to

25 all of you. And Mr. Forshey obviously was announced by Ms.

1 Rea. Is there anyone else on the phone? All right. Mr.

2 Lackey, I think that where we left off was we had just

3 concluded with Ms. Miller, --

4 MR. LACKEY: Yes.

5 THE COURT: -- correct?

6 MR. LACKEY: Yes, Your Honor.

7 THE COURT: All right. So are we prepared to

9 MR. LACKEY: Yes, Your Honor. We'd call Jeffrey

10 Lines to the stand.

11 THE COURT: Okay. Mr. Lines, if you'll just come up

12 on the other end close to the microphone, I'll swear you in

13 real quick before you sit down.

14 JEFFREY LINES, PLAINTIFFS' WITNESS, SWORN

15 THE COURT: Okay. Please be seated.

18 Q Good afternoon. I know that you and I know each other,

21 A Jeffrey Lines. J-E-F-F-R-E-Y L-I-N-E-S.

22 Q And what is your date of birth?

24 Q And did you previously work for the Debtor, Tenet

2 Q When did you work for Tenet?

3 A I think it was on October 6th, 2015.

4 Q And when did you stop working for Tenet?

5 A January 2nd of 2016.

6 Q And what did you do for Tenet?

8 Q And what did being a driver involve?

9 A We had to deliver packages, an amount of different

10 packages. It can -- we had a two-hour window frame. So we

11 had -- say, for instance, the windows go from 8:00 to 10:00,

12 10:00 to 12:00, 12:00 to 2:00. And then when I come on at

13 3:00 o'clock, 3:00 to 10:00 at first, I have to prepare

15 phone, which is an S5 phone, Samsung, and we'd get the orders

19 A It would come through Amazon, and Tenet Concepts will

20 send it to us, and it can be from around five to ten orders

21 for different customers. And we have to drive to that

22 location, which everything is built into GPS through the toll

25 A Then it's mandatory that we drive through the toll roads

1 on the GPS that they have programmed.

2 Q And who would program the GPS route for you?

4 Q Okay. And so Amazon would send an order to Tenet

5 Concepts with the order in which you had to make the

9 Q And would you have to talk to any Tenet person in order