Bryant v. Aiken Regional Medical Centers Inc.

• Decision Date: 27 June 2003
• Docket Number: No. 02-2147.,No. 02-2192.,02-2147.,02-2192.
• Citation: 333 F.3d 536
• Parties: Wanda M. BRYANT, individually and as class representative on behalf of all persons similarly situated, Plaintiff-Appellee, v. AIKEN REGIONAL MEDICAL CENTERS INCORPORATED, Defendant-Appellant. Wanda M. Bryant, individually and as class representative on behalf of all persons similarly situated, Plaintiff-Appellant, v. Aiken Regional Medical Centers Incorporated, Defendant-Appellee.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Fourth Circuit

333 F.3d 536

Wanda M. BRYANT, individually and as class representative on behalf of all persons similarly situated, Plaintiff-Appellee, v. AIKEN REGIONAL MEDICAL CENTERS INCORPORATED, Defendant-Appellant.

Wanda M. Bryant, individually and as class representative on behalf of all persons similarly situated, Plaintiff-Appellant, v. Aiken Regional Medical Centers Incorporated, Defendant-Appellee.

No. 02-2147.

No. 02-2192.

United States Court of Appeals, Fourth Circuit.

Argued: May 8, 2003.

Decided: June 27, 2003.

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ARGUED: Richard James Morgan, McNair Law Firm, P.A., Columbia, South Carolina, for Appellant. David Eliot Rothstein, Gergel, Nickles & Solomon, P.A., Columbia, South Carolina, for Appellee. ON BRIEF: Reginald Wayne Belcher, McNair Law Firm, P.A., Columbia, South Carolina, for Appellant.

Before WILKINSON, NIEMEYER, and KING, Circuit Judges.

Affirmed in part and reversed in part by published opinion. Judge WILKINSON wrote the opinion, in which Judge NIEMEYER and Judge KING joined.

OPINION

WILKINSON, Circuit Judge:

Plaintiff Wanda M. Bryant filed suit against defendant Aiken Regional Medical Centers, Inc. (ARMC), alleging that ARMC had denied her a promotion on several occasions both because of her race and in retaliation for her complaints about discrimination in ARMC's hiring policies. A jury found in her favor and awarded her backpay, compensatory damages for emotional distress, and punitive damages. The district court declined to overturn the jury's verdict. We affirm the jury's finding of liability and its award of backpay and compensatory damages for emotional distress, but we reverse the award of punitive damages.

I.

Wanda Bryant, an African-American woman, was trained as a surgical technician in the United States Army Reserves. She received her diploma in that field from the Army in February 1998. After completing her medical training, she took a full-time job as a surgical technician at the Medical College of Georgia. She also worked part-time — between twenty and thirty hours a month — as a surgical technician for ARMC on an as needed basis. She continued working part-time for ARMC until December 1990, when she was called up to active duty in Saudi Arabia during the first Gulf War. While in Saudi Arabia, she served as a surgical technician with the 382nd Field Hospital unit.

Some time after returning from the Persian Gulf, Bryant applied for a full-time position as a surgical technician with ARMC. She was informed that there were no openings for surgical technicians, but was offered a position as a full-time central services technician. The position of central services technician offered substantially less pay and required significantly less skill than the position of surgical technician. Central service technicians are chiefly responsible for assembling trays of surgical equipment for upcoming procedures and cleaning instruments after surgery. Surgical technicians, by contrast, act as direct assistants to doctors during surgical procedures in the operating rooms. While in Saudi Arabia with her reserve unit, for example, Bryant worked as a surgical technician on surgeries involving everything from war casualties and burn victims to the delivery of newborn babies. After receiving ARMC's offer, Bryant agreed to take the lower-status position of central services technician in the hope that a surgical technician position would become available.

While employed at ARMC as a central services technician, Bryant enrolled in an associate nursing degree program at the University of South Carolina-Aiken. She later applied and was accepted in an ARMC nursing scholarship program, under which ARMC agreed to give her a thousand dollars per semester towards her university tuition. As part of this scholarship program, Bryant agreed to work for ARMC for a year and a half in exchange for every year of tuition assistance she received from ARMC. She attended school full-time while continuing to work full-time as a central services technician at ARMC. She also began to work part-time on an as-needed basis for another employer, St. Joseph's Hospital, in her preferred position of surgical technician.

There was a shortage of surgical technicians throughout ARMC in both 1997 and 1998. In October 1997, Bryant saw a job as a surgical technician posted on an ARMC employee bulletin board. Bryant applied for the job, complying with required procedures and discussing her application with her manager and the perioperative surgical coordinator. She received no response of any kind to her application.

Three months later, in January 1998, the surgical technician position was still open, and Bryant submitted a second application for the job. This time, she received a response. The hiring managers informed her that in order to become a surgical technician she first had to complete a training program. When Bryant told them that she had already been certified as a surgical technician by the Army — and that she had in fact previously worked as a surgical technician for ARMC — the managers reiterated that she would have to complete the training program at the hospital in order to become a surgical technician. Because training was only offered during hours when Bryant was unavailable because of her class schedule at nursing school, she was not offered the job.

The surgical technician position still had not been filled in April 1998. Because Bryant's school semester had ended and she was therefore available for training, she reapplied once again for the same job.

Bryant also complained, she testified, to her supervisor and to the hospital's service excellence coordinator (who was a designated point person for race discrimination complaints) that she believed she was being discriminated against in the promotion process because of her race. The service excellence coordinator told her that he would "check into it" and get back to her with a response. She never heard anything back from him. Shortly after her complaint, however, her treatment at work changed dramatically. Previously, Bryant testified, she had been recognized as a good worker and the most experienced central service technician on her shift; in fact, she had been made a de facto supervisor of inexperienced technicians. After her discussion with the service excellence coordinator, however, she testified that she suddenly became subject to constant "nitpicky" critiques from ARMC management and that the atmosphere became "hostile." And once again, Bryant was not offered the surgical technician position, which remained open until September 1998 despite the acknowledged shortage ARMC was suffering throughout that entire year.

Bryant graduated from nursing school in December 1998, at a time when ARMC was suffering from a nursing shortage that had plagued the hospital throughout 1998. In the beginning of December, Bryant applied for a series of nursing positions that had been posted at ARMC. ARMC does not dispute that she would have qualified for at least two of these positions upon receiving her nursing license.¹ Beyond paper qualifications, Bryant also had a documentary record of strong job performance. Her immediate supervisor in the central services department wrote her an unsolicited letter of recommendation, stating that Bryant exhibited "discipline, energy and commitment," that her work ethic was "a[n] example for others on staff," that she was "almost passionate about getting the job done right," that she frequently "volunteered to cover shifts or work overtime even with short notice," and that "others on staff look[ed] to [her] for advice and guidance."

Despite this recommendation, Bryant was interviewed for only one position. When she arrived for the interview, however, she was informed that the hiring nurse was unavailable. Bryant was interviewed instead by two staff nurses. She never heard back from any nurse in that department. She repeatedly contacted ARMC's human resources department throughout the application process, to no avail. She also contacted the chief nursing executive, who "just casually dismissed" Bryant's concerns and repeatedly put Bryant off because she didn't have time to discuss the issue. The chief nursing executive ultimately told Bryant that "she didn't see what the problem was" with a licensed nurse simply continuing to work as a central services technician. And the director of human resources responded to her concerns by informing her that he did not have a signed copy of her scholarship agreement, telling her that she should not consider herself bound to work for ARMC any longer, and wishing her good luck in her future career.

Bryant finally decided that she had to seek employment as a nurse at other hospitals. She gave two weeks' notice to ARMC and resigned her position as a central services technician effective February 22, 1999. She took a nursing position at Barnwell County Hospital, a job which gave her lower pay and fewer employee benefits than the nursing positions at ARMC would have.

Bryant brought suit against ARMC under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, 42 U.S.C. § 2000e et seq., and 42 U.S.C. § 1981. She alleged that ARMC had repeatedly discriminated against her in the job application process both because of her race and because she had complained about racial discrimination. The case went to trial, and the jury found that ARMC had refused to promote Bryant to the surgical technician position in retaliation for her complaints about racial discrimination. The jury also found that Bryant had been denied a promotion to the registered nurse position because she was African-American. The jury found that racial discrimination was not a factor, however, in ARMC's failure to offer Bryant a surgical technician position. Bryant was awarded $40,000 in compensatory damages for lost wages and benefits, $50,000 for emotional distress, and $210,000 in punitive damages....