Black v. Ryder/P.I.E. Nationwide, Inc., Teamsters Local No. 519, Joint Council No. 87 of Brotherhood of Teamsters, Chauffeurs, Warehousemen & Helpers of America, Southern Conference of Teamsters, International Brotherhood of Teamsters, Chau

• Citation: 15 F.3d 573
• Decision Date: 02 February 1994
• Docket Number: Nos. 92-5611,92-5694,No. 87,D,No. 519,519,87,s. 92-5611
• Parties: 145 L.R.R.M. (BNA) 2387, 127 Lab.Cas. P 11,008, 1994 Fed.App. 31P Donald L. BLACK, Plaintiff-Appellant (92-5611), Plaintiff-Appellee (92-5694), v. RYDER/P.I.E. NATIONWIDE, INC.; Teamsters Local; Joint Councilof the International Brotherhood of Teamsters, Chauffeurs, Warehousemen & Helpers of America; Southern Conference of Teamsters, International Brotherhood of Teamsters, Chauffeurs, Warehousemen & Helpers of America, Defendants-Appellees (92-5611), Teamsters Local, Defendant-Appellant (92-5694).
• Court: United States Courts of Appeals. United States Court of Appeals (6th Circuit)

Page 573

15 F.3d 573

145 L.R.R.M. (BNA) 2387, 127 Lab.Cas. P 11,008,

1994 Fed.App. 31P

Donald L. BLACK, Plaintiff-Appellant (92-5611) Plaintiff-Appellee (92-5694), v. RYDER/P.I.E. NATIONWIDE, INC.; Teamsters Local No. 519 Joint Council No. 87 of the International Brotherhood of Teamsters, Chauffeurs, Warehousemen & Helpers of America Southern Conference of Teamsters, International Brotherhood of Teamsters, Chauffeurs, Warehousemen & Helpers of America Defendants-Appellees (92-5611), Teamsters Local No. 519, Defendant-Appellant (92-5694).

Nos. 92-5611, 92-5694.

United States Court of Appeals, Sixth Circuit.

Argued June 28, 1993.

Decided Feb. 2, 1994.

Paul A. Levy, Public Citizen Litigation Group, Washington, DC, Peter Alliman (argued and briefed), Lee, Alliman & Carson, Madisonville, TN, Arthur L. Fox, II (briefed), Kator, Scott & Heller, Washington, DC, for Donald L. Black in Nos. 92-5694 and 92-5611.

Cecil D. Branstetter (briefed), Jane B. Stranch (argued and briefed), Branstetter, Kilgore, Stranch & Jennings, Nashville, TN, for Teamsters Local # 519 in Nos. 92-5694 and 92-5611.

Howard H. Vogel, O'Neil, Parker & Williamson, Knoxville, TN, Peter Reed Corbin, Corbin & Dickinson, Jacksonville, FL, John Paul Jones, Clearwater, FL, for Ryder/P.I.E. Nationwide, Inc. in No. 92-5611.

Cecil D. Branstetter, Jane B. Stranch, Branstetter, Kilgore, Stranch & Jennings, Nashville, TN, for Joint Council # 87 of the Intern. Broth. of Teamsters, Chauffeurs, Warehousemen & Helpers of America in No. 92-5611.

G. William Baab, Mullinax, Wells, Baab & Cloutman, Dallas, TX, for Southern Conference of Teamsters, Intern. Broth. of Teamsters, Chauffeurs, Warehousemen & Helpers of America in No. 92-5611.

Before: RYAN and BOGGS, Circuit Judges; and ROSEN, District Judge. ^*

RYAN, Circuit Judge.

The plaintiff, Donald L. Black, sued Ryder/P.I.E. Nationwide, Inc. and Teamsters Local No. 519 in 1985, alleging a hybrid section 301 ¹ claim. ² The district court originally dismissed this claim, following a nonjury trial, pursuant to Fed.R.Civ.P. 41(b). This court reversed and remanded for a jury trial, Black v. Ryder/P.I.E. Nationwide, Inc., 930 F.2d 505 (6th Cir.1991), and in February 1992, a jury returned a verdict in favor of the plaintiff, awarding compensatory damages, emotional distress damages, and attorney fees against Local 519. ³ The district court, however, vacated the emotional distress part of the damage award, on the grounds that the award was duplicative of damages already received by the plaintiff in a separate action under 29 U.S.C. Sec. 411(a)(2). Black appeals from that order, arguing that the district court's conclusion that the damages were duplicative is clearly erroneous. For the reasons discussed below, we agree, and therefore reverse the district court's order.

Local 519 also cross-appeals from the district court's denial of its motion for judgment as a matter of law. It argues, first, that the district court erred in finding that the evidence was sufficient to support the conclusion that the union had breached its duty of fair representation to the plaintiff; and second, that the district court abused its discretion in excluding evidence of an NLRB decision not to issue a complaint on Black's charges against the union. We reject these arguments, and affirm the district court's judgment.

I.

Black's section 301 claim arises out of his termination by Ryder for his alleged failure to report an accident, and Local 519's alleged dereliction of its duty to represent him in the subsequent grievance proceedings.

In November 1984, Black drove a loaded truck from Knoxville, Tennessee, to Birmingham, Alabama. At that time, Black had worked for Ryder for almost twenty years. Driving in a convoy with Black on this trip, and never more than half a mile away from him, were two other drivers. During the trip, the three passed each other periodically, and verified that the trucks' turn signals were operating at all times. The three arrived at the Birmingham terminal within moments of each other, at approximately 5:00 a.m., and parked their trucks in the fuel lane, about 250 to 300 feet from the shop garage, to await servicing. Neither Black nor the other drivers noticed any damage to Black's truck at that time, nor had they noticed an accident on the trip that could have led to any damage. The three drivers turned in their paperwork at the dispatch office, and then proceeded to perform a pre-trip inspection on the different trucks that they had been assigned to take back to Knoxville. While doing this, Black and another driver noticed that the truck Black had driven from Knoxville was being moved between the fuel line and the tire shop by a yard hostler. ⁴ Black commented to his companions, "[B]oy, they must have sure needed my load quick because they just pulled my truck off and are taking it around." This occurred at approximately 5:30 a.m.

Black and his companions then embarked on the return trip to Knoxville. Some thirteen hours after his arrival in Knoxville, Black was informed that the truck he had driven to Birmingham had been discovered to have approximately $300 worth of damage. A vehicle repair order prepared by the shop foreman at the Birmingham terminal, and signed by the mechanic, reported the following:

Unit came in with damage on L. front. L. turn signal and marker light knocked off. Area around unit inspected and no broken lenses or fiberglass around unit.

Because Black had turned in the truck without reporting any damage, the company informed him that he would be suspended. ⁵ Several days thereafter, Ryder dismissed him.

Black approached Jimmy Metts, the business agent of the union, because according to the union's bylaws, the business agent had sole responsibility for representing union members in grievance proceedings. The business agent also had the duty of investigating a discharge case. At the core of Black's claim in this case is his contention that Metts, as the union representative, deliberately did an inadequate job of representing him. ⁶

Metts and Black have an acrimonious history, of which much evidence was introduced at trial in this case. Black, who had consistently been a strong union supporter, became, in the early 1980s, an active leader in a dissident group that was a political threat to those holding power in the union, including Metts. The dissident group consisted of union members who were disillusioned by what they viewed as corruption on the part of the union president who had been elected in 1980. Black's active participation in the group put him in conflict with the local and national Teamster leadership. As animosity toward the president and his associates grew within the Local, Black let it be known in July 1984 that he was going to challenge the president in the next election. ⁷

The dissension within Local 519 reached its apex in the establishment of a picket line around the local union hall in the summer of 1984. On the first morning of the picket, Metts was the first union official to come to work. As Metts drove up, several picketers, including Black, approached his car, and told him that he was part of the problem in the local union. Metts left immediately and no other official returned to the hall that day.

Local 519 officers filed a complaint against the picketers, and the Tennessee Chancery Court issued a restraining order requiring the picketers to leave the union hall. The Executive Board of Local 519 brought charges against Black and the other protestors for their conduct during the four days of picketing. At a hearing before the next higher Teamster body, Joint Council 87, Black and the other picketers were convicted and suspended from the union for six months and fined $150 each. ⁸ In addition, according to Black, the local officials took retaliatory action against him by deliberately referring him to a job that involved heavy physical labor, and where Black ultimately injured his back and was forced to remain out of work for some time. ⁹

Black's subsequent section 411 claim, which derived from these incidents, was tried in June 1990. In a general verdict, the jury found in favor of the plaintiff, and the court entered judgment against Local 519 in the amount of $30,000 in compensatory damages and $10,000 in punitive damages. ¹⁰

In sum, there was ample evidence at trial that would allow the jury to conclude there was substantial animosity between Black and the union generally, as well as Metts specifically. ¹¹ According to Black, it was this animosity that led Metts to refuse to take the one step that would have been favorably dispositive of Black's case: going to Birmingham and interviewing the mechanic who fixed the truck, and who signed the damage report. When Black specifically asked Metts to go to Birmingham in order to be properly prepared for Black's grievance hearing, Metts told Black that "he wasn't going to Birmingham, said he didn't have time in the first place and said he couldn't find nothing out down there." Black acknowledges, nonetheless, that Metts did produce at the grievance hearing a number of statements from witnesses, specifically, the drivers who had accompanied Black to Birmingham. Black, however, either pre-prepared all those statements, or physically brought the witnesses to Metts for the purpose of preparing a statement. According to Black, Metts "wasn't asking for nobody to give no statement."

Black's grievance was heard by a joint committee, and both Black and Metts were present at the hearing. Ryder called no witnesses at the grievance committee hearing, but introduced various documents, including the vehicle repair order prepared by the Birmingham mechanic, as well as relevant correspondence, a diagram of the service aisle at the terminal, photographs of the damaged truck, and documents relating to the repairs. Ryder did not call Everett Alderson, the mechanic who discovered the damage to the truck, nor did it present...