Waldo v. Consumers Energy Co.

Decision Date09 August 2013
Docket NumberNo. 12–1518.,12–1518.
Citation726 F.3d 802
PartiesTheresa WALDO, Plaintiff–Appellee, v. CONSUMERS ENERGY COMPANY, Defendant–Appellant.
CourtU.S. Court of Appeals — Sixth Circuit

OPINION TEXT STARTS HERE

ARGUED:Richard J. Seryak, Miller Canfield, Paddock and Stone, P.L.C., Detroit, Michigan, for Appellant. Stephen R. Drew, Drew, Cooper & Anding, Grand Rapids, Michigan, for Appellee. ON BRIEF:Richard J. Seryak, Brian M. Schwartz, Miller Canfield, Paddock and Stone, P.L.C., Detroit, Michigan, for Appellant. Stephen R. Drew, Adam C. Sturdivant, Drew, Cooper & Anding, Grand Rapids, Michigan, for Appellee. Paul D. Ramshaw, U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, Washington, D.C., for Amicus Curiae.

Before: MOORE, SUTTON, and DONALD, Circuit Judges.

MOORE, J., delivered the opinion of the court, which DONALD, J., joined. SUTTON, J. (pp. 827–30), delivered a separate opinion concurring in part and dissenting in part.

OPINION

KAREN NELSON MOORE, Circuit Judge.

While employed as an electrical line worker, PlaintiffAppellee Theresa Waldo (Waldo) was subjected routinely to sexual harassment. Waldo's coworkers displayed sexually explicit materials in the workplace, locked her in a porta-potty, demanded that she “pee like a man” and clean up her male coworkers' tobacco spit, ridiculed her for bringing a purse to work, ostracized and ignored her on job sites and in training sessions, and referred to her using gender-specific demeaning language. Waldo initiated litigation against her employer, DefendantAppellant Consumers Energy Company (Consumers), bringing six federal and state-law discrimination claims, as well as a state-law tort claim. Although a jury rendered a verdict in favor of Consumers following a trial in 2009, the district court granted Waldo's motion for a new trial on her Title VII hostile-work-environment claim, finding that the jury's verdict as to this claim was against the clear weight of the evidence. After a second trial in 2010, the jury found in favor of Waldo, and the district court awarded Waldo attorney fees and costs as a prevailing plaintiff. On appeal, Consumers contends that the district court erred by granting a new trial on Waldo's hostile-work-environment claim, denying Consumers's renewed motion for judgment as a matter of law after the second trial, and awarding Waldo excessive attorney fees and costs. For the reasons that follow, we AFFIRM the judgment of the district court on all grounds.

I. BACKGROUND

Waldo began working for Consumers in Grand Rapids, Michigan in 1997 as a part-time mail room clerk. R. 291 (1st Trial Tr. at 1719) (Page ID # 6448). 1 In June 2001, Waldo transferred to the Transmission Department, which involved working in rural areas with electric lines containing high-voltage current attached to tall steel towers. Appellant Br. at 12–13. From September 2002 until June 2005, Waldo participated in an apprentice program that trained employees to become journeyman electrical workers. R. 291 (1st Trial Tr. at 1719–20) (Page ID # 6448–49). Waldo alleges that from 2001 until 2005 she was subjected to “constant and unwelcome gender/sexual harassment” at Consumers. R. 1 (Compl.¶ 10) (Page ID # 4).

While working with the Transmission crews, Waldo testified that she constantly was called derogatory and demeaning names, including “bitch,” “cunt,” and “wench”; her coworkers would “just hammer [her] all day long,” never referring to her by her real name. R. 297 (2nd Trial Tr. at 611–15) (Page ID # 7162–66); see id. at 629 (Page ID # 7180). While working in rural areas, where male crew members would urinate outdoors, Waldo testified that her coworkers would not permit her to use work trucks to travel to a nearby bathroom. See id. at 640–41 (Page ID # 7191–92). Waldo says her male coworkers told her: “You want to work in a man's world, pee like a guy.” Id. at 641 (Page ID # 7192). Waldo also described an incident when her coworkers locked her in a trailer with instructions to clean up their tobacco-chew spit from the floor. See id. at 644–45 (Page ID # 7195–96). On another day, Waldo's male coworkers locked her in a porta-potty—she escaped only after using a pocket knife to cut through the tape her coworkers had used to seal the door. See id. at 649–51 (Page ID # 7200–02). Further, there were sometimes sexually explicit playing cards, calendars, and magazines in the work trucks. See id. at 671, 676 (Page ID # 7222, 7227).

Waldo testified that on her first day of the apprentice training program, her supervisor, James McDonald (“McDonald”), told her that he intended to “wash [her] out” of the program because this was not a job for a woman, and he did not want women in the program. R. 283 (1st Trial Tr. at 202) (Page ID # 4933). Waldo told the jury about an incident when her coworkers threw her purse out of the window of one of the trucks into the dirt and told her that “purses aren't allowed here in this type [of] work.” R. 297 (2nd Trial Tr. at 615–17) (Page ID # 7166–68). When Waldo tried to carry a smaller change purse in her pocket, the crew called her a “dike.” Id. at 618 (Page ID # 7169). Waldo often rode alone to the rural work sites, because male coworkers avoided traveling with her in order to prevent being teased about having sex with her. See id. at 622 (Page ID # 7173).

In late 2002, Waldo began working mainly with Distribution crews, which involved “maintenance work performed on wooden utility poles supporting lower voltage lines such as those found in residential areas.” Appellant Br. at 13. Waldo testified that her coworkers' hostility continued during her time working with Distribution crews. See R. 297 (1st Trial Tr. at 668–69) (Page ID # 7219–20). Waldo's coworkers in Distribution isolated her and refused to work with her, making it clear that women were not welcome. See id. at 676–80 (Page ID # 7227–31). There was also testimony concerning an incident on April 18, 2005, when Waldo was unexpectedly evaluated by members of the Apprentice Committee. Waldo made mistakes while she was climbing a pole during the evaluation, which led to her dismissal from the training program. Both Waldo and her coworker Michael Cutts (“Cutts”) testified that they perceived this surprise evaluation to be motivated by gender and engineered to push Waldo out of the program. See id. at 683–89 (Page ID # 7234–40); R. 284 (1st Trial Tr. at 413–16) (Page ID # 5144–47). Consumers asserts that this was a routine visit by the Apprentice Committee to observe all of the trainees, and that Waldo's dismissal from the program was based on the severity of the mistakes she made. See Appellant Br. at 25–27.

Waldo complained numerous times about the harassment to her supervisor, McDonald, a union representative, and Human Resources (“HR”) staff members Pam Bolden (“Bolden”) and William Eckert (“Eckert”). See, e.g., R. 295 (2nd Trial Tr. at 389–98) (Page ID # 6941–50); id. at 214–19 (Page ID # 6766–71); R. 298 (2nd Trial Tr. at 966–67) (Page ID # 7517–18). In March 2003, Waldo had a meeting with members of Consumers's HR Department, including Bolden, in which she complained that she was being sexually harassed. However, Bolden testified that no formal investigation followed from this meeting, and that no formal reprimands were given to any of Waldo's coworkers or supervisors. See R. 294 (2nd Trial Tr. at 115) (Page ID # 6666). Consumers did respond to Waldo's complaints by holding a “diversity training session,” but that session did not lead to an end to the sexual harassment in Waldo's workplace. See Appellee Br. at 20–21. The diversity session covered “all aspects of diversity” but did not involve a discussion of the kinds of sexual slurs and sexual harassment about which Waldo complained. See R. 286 (1st Trial Tr. at 836–37) (Page ID # 5566–67).

After Waldo was removed from the apprentice program in June 2005, this litigation commenced. Waldo brought seven claims, all centering around allegations that she was discriminated against and harassed because of her gender; the complaint included three Title VII claims (a sex-discrimination claim, a hostile-work-environment claim, and a retaliation claim), three state-law sex-discrimination claims, and a tort claim for intentional infliction of emotional distress. See R. 1 (Compl. at 8–15) (Page ID # 9–16). Prior to trial, Waldo withdrew her claim for intentional infliction of emotional distress. Appellee Br. at 4 n. 1. Before jury deliberations, she also withdrew her three state-law sex-discrimination claims. Id.

A trial was held in August and September 2009, and the jury rendered a verdict in favor of Consumers on the three remaining federal claims. See R. 191 (Judgment) (Page ID # 3080). Waldo then filed a motion for a new trial pursuant to Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 59, arguing that the jury verdict on Waldo's retaliation and hostile-work-environment claims under Title VII was against the clear weight of the evidence. R. 197 (Pl.'s Mot. for New Trial at 2) (Page ID # 3090). The district court denied the motion as to Waldo's retaliation claim, but granted a new trial on the hostile-work-environment claim. Waldo v. Consumers Energy Co., No. 1:06–cv–768, 2010 WL 2302305, at *8 (W.D.Mich. June 4, 2010).

A second trial was held on the only remaining claim in 2010, and the jury rendered a verdict in favor of Waldo, awarding her $400,000 in compensatory damages and $7,500,000 in punitive damages. See R. 255 (Judgment) (Page ID # 4125). The district court granted Consumers's motion to remit damages pursuant to a statutory cap, and lowered the total amount of damages recoverable by Waldo to $300,000. Waldo v. Consumers Energy Co., No. 1:06–cv–768, 2011 WL 4529375, at *8 (W.D.Mich. Sept. 30, 2011). Consumers filed a renewed motion for judgment as a matter of law pursuant to Rule 50(b), arguing that Waldo had not presented sufficient evidence to establish an actionable hostile work environment, and that she had not established...

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