Beck

MEMORANDUM **

1. The district court did not err in certifying the class of women employed at Boeing’s Puget Sound facilities for purposes of determining whether the employer engaged in a pattern or practice of discrimination against its female employees because of sex (Phase I). See, e.g., Int’l Bhd. of Teamsters v. United States, 431 U.S. 324 , 97 S.Ct. 1843 , 52 L.Ed.2d 396 (1977). In a systemic disparate treatment case seeking class-wide injunctive or declaratory relief, plaintiffs are “not required to offer evidence that each person [who] seek[s] relief was a victim of the employer’s discriminatory policy” to establish their prima facie case. Id. at 360 . Rather, their burden is to prove only that “discrimination was the company’s standard operating procedure.” Id. at 336 . This may be done through statistics alone. See id. at 339-40 .

Because the employer’s defense must be “designed to meet the prima facie case” established by plaintiffs’ statistical proof, the focus of its rebuttal case likewise “will not be on individual [employment] decisions.” Id. at 360 n. 46. Instead, to meet its rebuttal burden, the employer must demonstrate that the plaintiffs’ statistical evidence…