Cweklinsky v. Mobil Chemical Co.

• Decision Date: 13 April 2004
• Docket Number: No. 01-7944(XAP).,No. 01-7848(L).,01-7848(L).,01-7944(XAP).
• Citation: 364 F.3d 68
• Parties: Victor CWEKLINSKY, Plaintiff-Appellee-Cross-Appellant, v. MOBIL CHEMICAL COMPANY, Defendant-Appellant-Cross-Appellee.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Second Circuit

364 F.3d 68

Victor CWEKLINSKY, Plaintiff-Appellee-Cross-Appellant, v. MOBIL CHEMICAL COMPANY, Defendant-Appellant-Cross-Appellee.

No. 01-7848(L).

No. 01-7944(XAP).

United States Court of Appeals, Second Circuit.

Argued: May 22, 2002.

Decided: April 13, 2004.

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Jeffrey J. Tinley, Tinley, Nastri, Renehan & Dost, L.L.P., Waterbury, CT (Robert Nastri, Jr., on the brief), for Defendant-Appellant-Cross-Appellee.

Victoria De Toledo, Casper & de Toledo, L.L.C., Stamford, CT (Rhonna W. Rogol, on the brief), for Plaintiff-Appellee-Cross-Appellant.

Before: McLAUGHLIN, JACOBS, and SACK, Circuit Judges.

McLAUGHLIN, Circuit Judge.

This case is before us for the second time, following our certification to the Connecticut Supreme Court of certain questions regarding Connecticut defamation law. In response to those questions, the Connecticut Supreme Court held that Connecticut does not recognize a cause of action for defamation by compelled self-publication. See Cweklinsky v. Mobil Chem. Co., 267 Conn. 210, 837 A.2d 759 (2004). Equipped with a newly delineated map of Connecticut's defamation law, we now turn to the merits of all the issues on appeal.

Defendant Mobil Chemical Company ("Mobil" or "the Company") appeals from a judgment of the United States District Court for the District of Connecticut (Squatrito, J.) entered on February 16, 2001. The judgment followed a jury verdict in favor of plaintiff Victor Cweklinsky ("Cweklinsky") on defamation and breach of implied contract claims, and in favor of Mobil on state and federal retaliation claims. For defamation, the jury awarded Cweklinsky $500,000 for lost earning capacity and $25,000 for emotional distress damages. For breach of implied contract, the jury awarded him $500,000 as future lost earnings and $122,000 in back pay. The jury also awarded punitive damages, which the court set at $177,000. Adding $13,000 in prejudgment interest but counting the $500,000 in lost earnings only once — because the two awards were duplicative — the court awarded Cweklinsky a total of $837,000.

On appeal, Mobil challenges the defamation and breach of implied contract verdicts on a number of grounds, pointing to what it believes were erroneous jury instructions that require us to vacate both.

Cweklinsky cross-appeals on two grounds. He contends that the district court: (1) improperly dismissed his promissory estoppel claim; and (2) erred in declining to add $122,000 back pay to his defamation award.

Given the decision of Connecticut's highest court on the issue of compelled self-publication defamation, we find that the district court erroneously instructed the jury on defamation. We likewise find that the court erred in instructing the jury on breach of implied contract, and thus we reverse the court's judgment on both issues. Although we dismiss Cweklinsky's request for back pay on the defamation claim, we agree that the district court should have submitted Cweklinsky's promissory estoppel claim to the jury. Hence, we vacate the judgment on three separate grounds and remand for a new trial consistent with this opinion.

BACKGROUND

We summarize the background only briefly here and assume familiarity with the underlying facts as set forth in our July 2002 decision, Cweklinsky v. Mobil Chemical Company, 297 F.3d 154 (2d Cir.2002). In that opinion, we laid out the events leading up to Cweklinsky's termination in 1999 after more than twenty-four years of employment as a machinist at Mobil.

In 1998, Cweklinsky took six weeks of paid medical leave from Mobil to undergo carpal tunnel surgery. Although his physician authorized him to return to work on December 11, 1998, Cweklinksy went back to the doctor's office for an extension of his time to return because his wrist was still sore. Cweklinsky never told anyone in the doctor's office that Mobil had scheduled him to work on Saturday, December 12 and Sunday, December 13. The office manager gave him an extension until December 14. There was conflicting testimony about whether the doctor authorized his office manager over the phone to change Cweklinsky's note. Regardless, the office manager altered Cweklinsky's copy of the note to reflect the new December 14 return-to-work date. However, she failed to amend the office copy.

When Cweklinsky presented his amended note to his supervisor at Mobil on December 14, the supervisor consulted with Mobil's human resources manager. Together they concluded that Cweklinsky himself had altered the return-to-work date and thus terminated him. After further investigation, however, they discovered that the doctor's office manager, not Cweklinsky, had changed the note, but, regardless, they again determined that termination was still appropriate because Cweklinsky had fraudulently obtained medical leave.

As detailed in our 2002 opinion, Cweklinsky subsequently sued Mobil for: (1) defamation; (2) breach of implied employment contract; (3) retaliation in violation of the Fair Labor Standards Act, 29 U.S.C. § 216, et seq.; (4) workers' compensation retaliation in violation of Conn. Gen.Stat. § 31-290a; and (5) numerous other claims which never reached the jury.

Because the status of the doctrine of compelled self-publication defamation was unsettled in Connecticut, our 2002 opinion certified three questions regarding state defamation law to the Connecticut Supreme Court. Cweklinsky, 297 F.3d at 161. The first and most general asked:

Does Connecticut recognize a cause of action for defamation based on a plaintiff employee's or former employee's compelled self-publication of a defendant employer's or former employer's defamatory statements made by the employer or former employer only to the employee or former employee?

Id. The Connecticut Supreme Court recently responded in the negative, see Cweklinsky v. Mobil Chem. Co., 267 Conn. 210, 837 A.2d 759 (2004), and thus found it unnecessary to address the two remaining queries, both of which were fact-specific and contingent on an affirmative answer to the first. See Cweklinsky, 297 F.3d at 161.

We now decide the merits of the appeal.

DISCUSSION

I. Defamation

After his termination, Cweklinsky sued Mobil, claiming defamation on account of the allegations in its January 1999 termination letter that Cweklinsky "fraudulently obtain[ed] additional time off with full pay to which [he was] not entitled."

In instructing the jury, the district court stated that defamatory statements in Connecticut could be published by two different methods — by compelled self-publication as well as by intra-corporate publication. After a one-week trial, the jury found in favor of Cweklinsky on the defamation claim. In handing down its verdict, the jury concluded that Mobil's statements were defamatory and that the Company had failed to prove their truth by a preponderance of the evidence. The jury further found as a predicate for punitive damages that Mobil's conduct was "malicious or wanton."

Mobil challenges the defamation verdict, claiming that: (1) compelled self-publication defamation is not recognized in Connecticut, and thus the jury should not have been allowed to consider that doctrine; (2) even if compelled self-publication were part of Connecticut law, the award for future lost earnings is "based upon rank speculation" and therefore impermissibly expands the doctrine; (3) Cweklinsky's defamation pleadings were deficient as a matter of law; and (4) Mobil's statements were undeniably true, thus entitling it to judgment as a matter of law. We consider each argument below.

A. Self-Publication Defamation

1. The Law

We review a district court's jury instructions de novo. Gordon v. New York City Bd. of Educ., 232 F.3d 111, 115 (2d Cir.2000). An instruction is erroneous "if it misleads the jury as to the correct legal standard or does not adequately inform the jury on the law." Id. at 116 (internal quotations omitted). Unless "convinced that [an erroneous instruction] did not influence the jury's verdict," we will reverse and grant a new trial. Id.

To succeed on a defamation claim in Connecticut, a plaintiff must show that: (1) defendant made a false statement about plaintiff; (2) defendant published the statement to a third party; and (3) plaintiff's reputation was thereby injured. See Torosyan v. Boehringer Ingelheim Pharms., Inc., 234 Conn. 1, 662 A.2d 89, 103 (1995).

Connecticut recognizes that intra-corporate communications may satisfy the publication element of a defamation claim. Id. Although otherwise defamatory intra-corporate statements are usually privileged and thus an employer is protected from liability, malice on the part of an employer-defendant in making such a communication defeats the privilege. See Gaudio v. Griffin Health Servs. Corp., 249 Conn. 523, 733 A.2d 197, 210-11 (1999); Torosyan, 662 A.2d at 103-04; see also Bleich v. Ortiz, 196 Conn. 498, 493 A.2d 236, 240 (1985).

Some states have also expanded the publication element of a defamation claim in the employment context by adopting the doctrine of compelled self-publication defamation. See, e.g., Churchey v. Adolph Coors Co., 759 P.2d 1336, 1343-45 (Colo.1988) (en banc); Lewis v. Equitable Life Assurance Soc'y, 389 N.W.2d 876, 888 (Minn.1986); Belcher v. Little, 315 N.W.2d 734, 737-38 (Iowa 1982); McKinney v. County of Santa Clara, 110 Cal.App.3d 787, 168 Cal.Rptr. 89, 93-95 (1980). This doctrine allows compelled self-publication by a plaintiff-employee to substitute for the traditional requirement of publication by a defendant-employer in cases where the compulsion is reasonably foreseeable. See Lewis, 389 N.W.2d at 888.

2. The Merits

In defining the parameters of Cweklinsky's defamation claim, the district court instructed the jury as to both intra-corporate publication and compelled self-publication. The district court specifically recognized compelled self-publication defamation as part and parcel of Connecticut law when it...