Torres-Arroyo v. Rullan, 03-2722.

Decision Date13 January 2006
Docket NumberNo. 03-2722.,03-2722.
PartiesDr. Ernesto TORRES-ARROYO and Marcial Berríos-Cintrón, Plaintiffs, Appellants, v. Dr. John V. RULLÁN, etc., et al., Defendants, Appellees.
CourtU.S. Court of Appeals — First Circuit

Francisco R. Gonzalez, with whom F.R. Gonzalez Law Office was on brief, for appellants.

Eduardo Vera Ramírez, with whom Roberto Sánchez Ramos, Secretary of Justice, Salvador Antonetti Stutts, Solicitor General, Eileen Landrón Guardiola, Courtney R. Carroll, and Landrón & Vera, LLP were on brief, for appellees.

Before SELYA, Circuit Judge, STAHL, Senior Circuit Judge, and LIPEZ, Circuit Judge.

SELYA, Circuit Judge.

Although a jury determined that political discrimination spurred the non-renewal of the plaintiffs' government contracts, it awarded no damages. Dissatisfied with this Pyrrhic victory, the plaintiffs appealed. We conclude that the plaintiffs have waived virtually all of their claims of error and that their only properly preserved claim lacks merit. Consequently, we affirm the judgment below.

I. BACKGROUND

The record reveals that the plaintiffs, Dr. Ernesto Torres-Arroyo (Torres) and Marcial Berríos-Cintrón (Berríos), are aligned with the New Progressive Party (NPP). During a period when the NPP held the reins of power in Puerto Rico, Torres and Berríos became contract employees of the Correctional Health Program (CHP), a government agency. Torres served as the CHP's executive director and Berríos as an accountant.

During the times material hereto, the United States District Court for the District of Puerto Rico was exercising supervisory authority over various aspects of the Puerto Rican correctional system, including the CHP. This supervision came about as a result of a long-running inmate class action, presided over by Judge Pérez-Giménez, familiarly known as the Morales Feliciano case.1 When Dr. Aida Guzmán resigned her position as chief health care coordinator (CHCC), effective March 31, 2000, Judge Pérez-Giménez, acting at the instance of the inmate class in an order entered April 19, 2000, temporarily assigned some of Guzmán's duties to Torres. Those duties included the responsibility for executing and renewing certain CHP personnel contracts.

Torres and Berríos each signed a renewed professional services contract with the CHP on July 1, 2000. In accordance with the usual custom, each agreement covered a one-year period. Despite the fixed term and the stated expiration date (June 30, 2001), each agreement provided for unilateral termination by either party on thirty days' notice.

A new administration came to power when a gubernatorial candidate endorsed by the Popular Democratic Party (PDP) prevailed in the November 2000 general elections. On February 6, 2001, Dr. Pedro Ramos Hiraldo, the acting Secretary of Health, wrote to Torres informing him that the Department of Health was exercising its right to terminate his contract, effective thirty days hence. That plan was foiled, however, when the inmate class opposed the termination (due to the vacancy that then existed in the CHCC position) and Judge Pérez-Giménez, on February 8, 2001, issued a temporary restraining order (the TRO) preventing the Secretary from removing Torres. Morales Feliciano v. Calderón, No. 79-4 (D.P.R. Feb. 8, 2001) (unpublished). The judge set a hearing on preliminary injunction for February 20, 2001.

While the TRO was in force, Dr. John Rullán took office as Secretary of Health. Prior to the scheduled hearing, Rullán's representatives met with the lawyers for the inmate class. On February 20, the parties jointly proposed to Judge Pérez-Giménez that Dr. Guzmén be reappointed as CHCC and resume her former duties (including those that Torres had temporarily assumed). In that capacity, Guzmán would be responsible for evaluating Torres's performance.

Despite agreeing on these salient points, the parties were unable to settle upon a complete job description for Guzmán. Judge Pérez-Giménez indicated that he would approve Guzmán's reappointment, but asked that the parties submit their versions of her overall job description by March 2, 2001. To provide breathing room, the judge extended the TRO until March 9, 2001.

When the parties were unable to reach an agreement by the March 2 deadline, Judge Pérez-Giménez took the bull by the horns. He allowed the TRO to expire and delineated the particulars of Guzmán's position in an order entered May 23, 2001.2 Eight days later, Guzmán, acting in her official capacity as the CHCC, wrote to both plaintiffs and informed them of her decision not to renew their professional services contracts. The contracts expired on June 30, 2001.

The plaintiffs thereafter sued Rullán and Guzmán in their personal and official capacities under the First and Fourteenth Amendments and 42 U.S.C. § 1983. They maintained that the non-renewals were motivated by political discrimination and executed in violation of their due process rights. The new case was assigned to Judge Cerezo.

On October 10, 2002, Judge Cerezo dismissed the due process claims. She relied on the plain language of the one-year contracts and held that the plaintiffs had no property interest in their government positions beyond the expiration date stipulated in the contracts. Relatedly, she rejected the plaintiffs' contention that they had a property interest in continued employment by reason of court orders issued in the Morales Feliciano case. She noted that the TRO had expired on March 9, 2001; that it never affected Berríos; and that, in all events, Judge Pérez-Giménez had not granted any relief that would have created an expectancy of continued employment on the part of either plaintiff.

The case proceeded solely on the plaintiffs' political discrimination theory. The plaintiffs indicated that they planned to offer documents from the Morales Feliciano case, including the order of April 19, 2000, the TRO, and the transcript of the hearing held on February 20, 2001. On the defendants' motion, Judge Cerezo, in an in limine order, ruled the documents inadmissible.

The plaintiffs persisted. They filed a motion for clarification, arguing that the Morales Feliciano documents provided relevant background information, constituted circumstantial evidence vis-à-vis their political discrimination claims, and demonstrated that Guzmán did not have the legal authority to terminate their employment. Judge Cerezo flatly rejected the last of these claims but acknowledged that the documents might constitute relevant background information for the political discrimination claims. Judge Cerezo nonetheless worried that, if admitted wholesale, the documents would confuse the issues and risk unfair prejudice. Steering a middle course, she reiterated that the documents would be excluded as full exhibits but allowed the plaintiffs to refer to their contents at trial, as long as they acknowledged that Torres's position enjoyed no special legal protection once the TRO had expired.

Trial commenced on October 24, 2003. Notwithstanding the court's pretrial ruling that Guzmán had plenary authority, as the CHCC, to decide whether to renew their contracts, the plaintiffs tried to argue on no fewer than ten occasions that the Morales Feliciano documents established the contrary. In an effort to curb possible jury confusion resulting from the plaintiffs' repeated misinterpretations about what had been decided in the Morales Feliciano case, Judge Cerezo summarized the relevant portions of the proffered Morales Feliciano documents for the jury.

Undeterred, plaintiffs' counsel continued to question Guzmán's authority and reiterated, time and again, his request to admit as full exhibits the Morales Feliciano documents. Judge Cerezo repeatedly rejected these importunings and chastised plaintiffs' counsel for attempting to mislead the jury. She also threatened to impose sanctions should the lawyer continue to voice improper arguments before the jury.

At the close of the plaintiffs' case in chief, Judge Cerezo granted Rullán's motion for judgment as a matter of law. See Fed.R.Civ.P. 50(a). That left Guzmán as the sole defendant. In her end-of-case instructions, Judge Cerezo again summarized the Morales Feliciano documents. She emphasized that, by May 31, 2001, Guzmán occupied the CHCC position and possessed all the powers of that office.

Shortly after the jurors began to deliberate, they requested the Morales Feliciano documents. Judge Cerezo declined the request but, in open court, reread her summary of those documents. The jury, responding to a special verdict form, ultimately found Guzmán guilty of political discrimination, but awarded the plaintiffs "$0.00" in damages. Although the plaintiffs asked the court to poll the jurors (which request the court honored), they did not raise any question of verdict inconsistency. Accordingly, Judge Cerezo discharged the jury without further inquiry. On November 24, 2003, the court entered judgment on the jury verdict.

That same day, the plaintiffs filed a notice of appeal. Buried deep within that document was a reference to a "Petition for a New Trial for Compensatory and Punitive damages for a contradictory Jury Verdict." The plaintiffs never filed a motion for a new trial with the district court within the prescribed ten-day period. See Fed.R.Civ.P. 59(b). On May 1, 2005 — over seventeen months later — they attempted to rectify this omission by filing a paper entitled "Plaintiffs' Amended Motion for a New Trial." Four days later, they unsuccessfully requested this court to stay the instant appeal pending the district court's resolution of that motion.

II. DISCUSSION

On appeal, the plaintiffs offer a potpourri of arguments. Their principal claims are that (i) the jury's special findings (i.e., its liability finding and its finding that the plaintiffs sustained no damages) are internally inconsistent and entitle the plaintiffs to a new trial on the...

To continue reading

Request your trial
24 cases
  • Gray v. Cummings
    • United States
    • U.S. Court of Appeals — First Circuit
    • 22 Febrero 2019
    ...coupled with Gray's failure to offer any developed argumentation with respect to these claims, ends our inquiry. See Torres-Arroyo v. Rullán, 436 F.3d 1, 7 (1st Cir. 2006) ("Gauzy generalizations are manifestly insufficient to preserve an issue for appellate review."). We deem waived any cl......
  • U.S. v. Pires
    • United States
    • U.S. Court of Appeals — First Circuit
    • 6 Abril 2011
    ...normally precludes us from substituting our judgment for that of the district court absent an obvious mistake. Torres–Arroyo v. Rullán, 436 F.3d 1, 7 (1st Cir.2006). Within this rubric, abstract legal questions are reviewed de novo with the understanding that a material error of law is alwa......
  • Burnett v. Ocean Props., Ltd.
    • United States
    • U.S. Court of Appeals — First Circuit
    • 2 Febrero 2021
    ...(1st Cir. 2012) (deeming inconsistent verdict claim waived where party failed to object when jury returned verdict); Torres-Arroyo v. Rullán, 436 F.3d 1, 6 (1st Cir. 2006) (deeming inconsistent verdict claim waived where party failed to object after jury announced verdict but before jury wa......
  • Cham v. Station Operators, Inc.
    • United States
    • U.S. Court of Appeals — First Circuit
    • 16 Julio 2012
    ...only those evidentiary rulings that affect a party's “substantial rights” might warrant overturning a verdict. Torres–Arroyo v. Rullán, 436 F.3d 1, 8 (1st Cir.2006); see alsoFed.R.Civ.P. 61; Fed.R.Evid. 103(a). Cham's first argument is that it was error to grant Station Operators's motion i......
  • Request a trial to view additional results
1 books & journal articles
  • Witness
    • United States
    • James Publishing Practical Law Books Trial Objections
    • 5 Mayo 2022
    ...under FMLA, since evidence prior to that date had been too attenuated from employee’s FMLA retaliation claim. Torres-Arroyo v. Rullan , 436 F.3d 1, 7-8 (1st Cir. 2006). Although the district court concluded that documents from related court cases provided relevant background information for......

VLEX uses login cookies to provide you with a better browsing experience. If you click on 'Accept' or continue browsing this site we consider that you accept our cookie policy. ACCEPT