[PUBLISH] In the United States Court of Appeals For the Eleventh Circuit

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No. 22-13691 ____________________

WILLIAM HEATH HORNADY, CHRISTOPHER MILLER, TAKENDRIC STEWART, COLIN HARTERY, Plaintiffs-Appellees-Cross Appellants, LAFAYETTE WILSON, BRIAN MOORE, Plaintiffs-Appellees, versus OUTOKUMPU STAINLESS USA, LLC,

Defendant-Appellant-Cross Appellee. USCA11 Case: 22-13691 Document: 76-1 Date Filed: 10/11/2024 Page: 2 of 34

2 Opinion of the Court 22-13691

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Appeals from the United States District Court for the Southern District of Alabama D.C. Docket No. 1:18-cv-00317-JB-N ____________________

Before BRANCH, GRANT, Circuit Judges, and CALVERT,∗ District Judge. GRANT, Circuit Judge: In this labor dispute, the district court ordered defendant Outokumpu Stainless to produce key time and pay records. For more than two years, Outokumpu begged for more time and promised both the court and the plaintiffs that it would produce the records—but time after time, it failed to comply. And as it repeated this pattern, Outokumpu began to paint its third-party payroll processor as the true culprit. Until, that is, the payroll processor caught wind of Outokumpu’s misrepresentations and corrected the record. Confronted with a merry-go-round of broken promises and blatant misrepresentations, along with an upcoming wage-and-hour trial for which no wages or hours were known, the district court issued the only sanction remaining in its arsenal: default judgment.

∗ Honorable Victoria M. Calvert, United States District Judge for the Northern

District of Georgia, sitting by designation. USCA11 Case: 22-13691 Document: 76-1 Date Filed: 10/11/2024 Page: 3 of 34

22-13691 Opinion of the Court 3

Outokumpu now turns to this Court for relief, but it will find none. First, we conclude that the district court did not err when it found Outokumpu’s intentionally subversive approach to discovery worthy of the sanction of last resort. Second, because district courts have plenary power to reconsider their interlocutory orders, we conclude that the court here did not abuse its considerable discretion when it declined to revisit the default judgment sanction. Third, we determine that the district court properly found that the plaintiffs alleged a sufficient basis for their claims, entitling them to relief on all counts. Fourth, and finally, we conclude that the record does not enable us to analyze the last issue raised—the district court’s application of the statute of limitations—and so we remand for more explanation. I. Outokumpu Stainless, USA, is the domestic subsidiary of Outokumpu Oyj—a multinational steel fabricator and manufacturer headquartered in Finland. It has operated a steel mill in Calvert, Alabama for over a decade. As Outokumpu admits, at least some of its employees are covered by the Fair Labor Standards Act, 29 U.S.C. § 201 et seq. Four of those employees sued Outokumpu under the FLSA