Bradford v. General Telephone Co. of Michigan, K 83-383.

• Court: United States District Courts. 6th Circuit. United States District Court (Western District Michigan)
• Citation: 618 F. Supp. 390
• Docket Number: No. K 83-383.,K 83-383.
• Parties: David L. BRADFORD, Plaintiff, v. GENERAL TELEPHONE COMPANY OF MICHIGAN, a Michigan corporation, I.B.E.W., Local 1106, Jeanette Riley, Sue Schmidtendorf, Karen Jones, John E. Russell, and J.J. Birchmeier, individually and in their official capacities.
• Decision Date: 26 September 1985

618 F. Supp. 390

David L. BRADFORD, Plaintiff,
v.
GENERAL TELEPHONE COMPANY OF MICHIGAN, a Michigan corporation, I.B.E.W., Local 1106, Jeanette Riley, Sue Schmidtendorf, Karen Jones, John E. Russell, and J.J. Birchmeier, individually and in their official capacities.

No. K 83-383.

United States District Court, W.D. Michigan, S.D.

September 26, 1985.

618 F. Supp. 391

Kenneth Kobayashi, Kalamazoo, Mich., for plaintiff.

Michael McCasey, Grand Rapids, Mich., for Gen. Telephone Co., Riley, Schmidtendorf, Jones, Russell & Birchmeier.

Roger McClow, Southfield, Mich., for IBEW.

OPINION

ENSLEN, District Judge.

This case is a hybrid § 301/unfair representation action that also encompasses claims of sex-based discrimination under Title VII and various state law claims. Plaintiff was an employee of Defendant General Telephone Company of Michigan ("Defendant Company") from 1969 until his discharge on August 23, 1982, for alleged sexual harassment and physical abuse of

618 F. Supp. 392

some of the Company's female employees. Upon his discharge, Plaintiff filed a grievance through his local union, I.B.E.W. Local 1106 ("Defendant Local"), alleging that Defendant Company had failed to satisfy the "just cause" standard for dismissal contained in the collective bargaining agreement ("CBA") it had with Defendant Local. The Company denied Plaintiff's grievance in December of 1982. Defendant Local then filed a timely demand for arbitration on January 7, 1983. Defendant's Motion for Summary Judgment, Exhibit J

On or about January 24, 1983, Defendant Local received a notice from Plaintiff stating that he did not wish to proceed with the arbitration. Defendant Local subsequently, on or about January 26, 1983, notified Defendant Company that it was withdrawing Plaintiff's grievance from arbitration. Defendant Company then closed its file on the case and rejected Plaintiff and Defendant Local's requests to reopen the arbitration proceedings. Plaintiff alleges Defendant Local's withdrawal of his grievance breached an agreement between Plaintiff, Plaintiff's attorney, and Defendant Local that the Local would not withdraw from arbitration absent permission from Plaintiff's attorney. Plaintiff filed suit in this Court on August 2, 1983, raising a hybrid § 301/unfair representation claim against the company and the local, see 29 U.S.C. § 185(a) (1982), a Title VII claim of sexbased discrimination against the company, 42 U.S.C. § 2000e-2 (1982), and a variety of state law claims against the company and five of its employees. On June 22, 1984, the Court dismissed Plaintiff's unfair representation claim against Defendant Local as being barred by the statute of limitations. Judgment Order of June 22, 1984.¹

Two motions currently are pending before the Court: (1) Defendants' Motion to Dismiss, and (2) Defendant Company's Motion for Summary Judgment on Plaintiff's Title VII claim. I will first consider Defendant Company's Motion for Summary Judgment, and then will discuss the issues Defendants raise in their motion to dismiss.

Defendant Company's Motion for Summary Judgment

Plaintiff alleges in Count II of his complaint that his discharge:

Was also the result of the arbitrary, capricious, discriminatory, calculated, willful, wanton, malicious and/or wrongful efforts of Defendant Company to remove a male employee in violation of Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964; that in support of this allegation Plaintiff cites instances where many other female employees would bump into other female employees or male employees and no such investigation or discharge occurred to them.

Complaint, ¶ 51. On February 12, 1985, Defendant Company filed a Motion for Summary Judgment on Plaintiff's Title VII claim. It argued that Plaintiff has failed to establish a prima facie case of sexual discrimination or to introduce any evidence that the Company discharged him "for a sexually discriminatory motive." Plaintiff did not respond to Defendant Company's motion.²

The standard in this Circuit for granting summary judgment is well known. Adickes v. S.H. Kress & Co., 398 U.S. 144, 157, 90 S.Ct. 1598, 1608, 26 L.Ed.2d 142 (1970); Watkins v. Northwestern Ohio Tractor Pullers Association, 630 F.2d 1155, 1158 (6th Cir.1980); Province v. Cleveland Press Publishing Co., 605

618 F. Supp. 393

F.Supp. 945, 955-56 (N.D.Ohio 1985); See Federal Rules of Civil Procedure ("FRCP") 56(c). I therefor will mention only two aspects of the standard that are of particular importance to this case. First, although Plaintiff has failed to respond to Defendant Company's motion as required by Rule 56(e), FRCP 56(e), at his peril, Shavrnoch v. Clark Oil and Refining Corp., 726 F.2d 291, 293 (6th Cir.1984); Curtis v. International Brotherhood of Teamsters, 716 F.2d 360, 361 (6th Cir.1983), the Court still must search the entire record to determine whether there are any "genuine issues as to any material facts" requiring trial. Smith v. Hudson, 600 F.2d 60, 64-65 (6th Cir.), cert. dismissed, 444 U.S. 986, 100 S.Ct. 495, 62 L.Ed.2d 415 (1979); United States v. Crooksville Coal Co., 560 F.Supp. 141, 142 (S.D.Ohio 1982); FRCP 56(c) (judgment shall be rendered only "if the pleadings, depositions, answers to interrogatories, and admissions on file, together with the affidavits, if any, show that" the moving party satisfies the standard). Second, the Sixth Circuit has cautioned that summary judgment "must be used only with extreme caution for it operates to deny a litigant his day in court". Smith, 600 F.2d at 63; see also Bender v. Southland Corp., 749 F.2d 1205, 1210 (6th Cir.1984) ("the party seeking summary judgment must conclusively show that there exists no genuine issue of material fact and that the movant is entitled to judgment as a matter of law") (emphasis in original). It also has noted that grants of summary judgment generally are inappropriate in discrimination cases because "questions of intent or motive that are particularly ill-suited for such disposition" often are involved. Leonard v. City of Frankfort Electric and Water Plant Board, 752 F.2d 189, 194 (6th Cir.1985) (section 1981 claim); see also Jones v. Western Geophysical Co., 669 F.2d 280, 283 (5th Cir.1982) (summary disposition is not favored in Title VII cases)

With these standards in mind, I have carefully searched the record in this case and find that there exist genuine issues as to material facts regarding Plaintiff's claim of discriminatory treatment, particularly with regard to Defendant's alleged legitimate, non-discriminatory rationale for Plaintiff's discharge. A grant of summary judgment therefore would be inappropriate at this time. Smith, 600 F.2d at 63-66. Defendant Company's motion will be denied.

Defendant's Motion to Dismiss

Defendants have raised eight grounds for dismissing some or all of Plaintiff's claims: (1) that Plaintiff's claims for Defendants' alleged breach of the CBA are barred by the statute of limitations; (2) that Plaintiff's Title VII claim is barred by his failure to have received a right to sue notice from the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission ("EEOC") prior to filing suit; (3) that the Court should decline to exercise pendent jurisdiction over Plaintiff's state law claims; (4) that the Court should dismiss Plaintiff's pendent state claims and breach of contract claims as being subsumed within his Title VII claim; (5) that the Court should dismiss the individual Defendants not named in Plaintiff's complaint before the Michigan Civil Rights Commission and the EEOC; (6) that Plaintiff's claims are barred by the doctrine of "Election of Remedies"; (7) that Plaintiff cannot claim damages under Title VII; and (8) that Plaintiff has failed to state a claim upon which relief can be granted under the Michigan Handicappers' Civil Rights Act. The Court will discuss these grounds in order.

Statute of Limitations

I have already ruled on the statute of limitations issue with respect to Plaintiff's Union Local. In that ruling I held that the applicable six-month statute of limitations, DelCostello v. International Brotherhood of Teamsters, 462 U.S. 151, 103 S.Ct. 2281, 76 L.Ed.2d 476 (1983), bars Plaintiff's claim against the Local for breach of its duty of fair representation. Judgment Order of June 22, 1984 (granting Defendant Local's motion to dismiss); see also Judgment Order of September 19,

618 F. Supp. 394

1985 (denying Plaintiff's motion for reconsideration). I now find that the statute of limitations likewise bars Plaintiff's claim against Defendant Company for breach of the CBA. As was the case with Defendant Local, the key issue regarding Defendant Company's statute of limitations defense is when Plaintiff's cause of action against the Company accrued and the time for him to bring suit began to run. The statute of limitations for both branches of Plaintiff's hybrid § 301/unfair representation suit—his claim against the Company for breach of the CBA in violation of § 301 and his claim against the Local for breach of its duty of fair representation—is six-months. DelCostello, 462 U.S. at 155, 103 S.Ct. at 2285

The starting point for analysis of this issue is to understand the relationship between an employee's suit against his employer for breach of the CBA and his suit against his union for breach of its duty of fair representation. As the Supreme Court stated in DelCostello, "`the two claims are inextricably interdependent. To prevail against either the company or the Union, ... employee-plaintiffs must not only show that their discharge was contrary to the contract but must also carry the burden of demonstrating breach of duty by the Union.'" Id. at 164-65, 103 S.Ct. at...