Buckner v. General Motors Corp.

• Decision Date: 05 July 1988
• Docket Number: No. 65197,65197
• Citation: 760 P.2d 803,1988 OK 73
• Court: Oklahoma Supreme Court
• Parties: Sheila R. BUCKNER, Appellant, v. GENERAL MOTORS CORPORATION, Appellee.

Page 803

760 P.2d 803

1988 OK 73

Sheila R. BUCKNER, Appellant, v. GENERAL MOTORS CORPORATION, Appellee.

No. 65197.

Supreme Court of Oklahoma.

July 5, 1988.

CERTIORARI TO THE COURT OF APPEALS DIVISION NO. 3.

The trial judge, the Honorable Leamon Freeman, sustained the employer's motion for summary judgment in an action for retaliatory discharge brought under 85 O.S.1981 § 5. The trial court held that the appellant, a temporary probationary employee, could be discharged with or without cause, and that there was no factual controversy to support a cause of action for retaliatory discharge. On appeal, the Court of Appeals reversed and remanded the cause with instructions finding that there was a material issue of fact concerning the cause of the employee's termination, and that the employer had failed to comply with Rule 13 of the District Courts Rules.

The employee alleged that she was terminated for having instituted a proceeding against her employer. The employer argued that the employee was dismissed for loitering, that no proceedings were instituted during the employee's tenure at General Motors, and that the discharge was not retaliatory. On certiorari, the employer asserts that the employee failed to follow Rule 13 because she placed no issues into controversy, and that the termination of an employee after an alleged injury does not automatically result in stating a prima facie case. We find that because the term institution of proceedings is broader than the term filing or commencing a claim, the employee stated a prima facie case under 85 O.S.1981 § 5, that both the employer's motion for summary judgment and the employee's response failed to comply with Rule 13, and that there are material questions of fact to be resolved.

CERTIORARI PREVIOUSLY GRANTED; OPINION OF THE COURT OF APPEALS VACATED; JUDGMENT OF THE TRIAL COURT REVERSED AND REMANDED.

Marilyn D. Barringer, Oklahoma City, for appellant.

A. Scott Johnson, Holloway, Dobson, Hudson & Bachman, Oklahoma City, for appellee.

KAUGER, Justice.

The questions presented are 1) whether a worker who obtains medical treatment from a physician provided by the employer at the job situs has instituted proceedings under 85 O.S.1981 § 5, ¹ thus triggering the threshold requisites for stating a prima facie case for retaliatory discharge, and; 2) whether either of the parties complied with 12 O.S.Supp.1985 Ch. 2, App., District Court Rule 13. We find that: 1) because the term institution of proceedings is broader than the term filing or commencing a claim, the employee stated a prima facie case under 85 O.S. 1981 § 5; and 2) the employer's motion for summary judgment and the employee's response failed to comply with Rule 13, and that there are material questions of fact to be resolved.

FACTS

The parties do not dispute that during the summer of 1984, Sheila R. Buckner, employee-appellant, was hired on a part-time basis by General Motors, employer-appellee, to work no more than eighty-nine days. On June 15, she signed a statement verifying that she was a college student; that the job she was applying for was strictly temporary; and that she would not gain seniority. On June 26, while lifting a car part from the machine, the worker injured her shoulder. On July 2, she was referred for medical treatment to the plant physicians, who placed her on limited duty. Apparently, because she had accumulated no sick leave benefits, she was given time off without pay. On July 6, 1984, having returned to work voluntarily, the worker reported to the plant's first-aid facilities complaining of pain in her injured shoulder.

At this juncture the employee and the employer differ on the facts. The employer's version is that because the physician on duty could not see the employee immediately the nurse on duty told her to go back to work until she could be seen. The employer asserts that instead of returning to her station, the employee went to the cafeteria. The employee contends that she was merely waiting to be seen by the doctor. It is undisputed that later that day she received a letter notifying her that she was being discharged for loitering. On July 9, 1984, the employee signed her first notice of accidental injury and claim for compensation claim for workers' compensation benefits which was filed on July 11. The worker was awarded workers' compensation benefits, and on October 11, 1984, she filed an action in the district court of Oklahoma County ² asserting that she had been discharged in retaliation for having instituted a proceeding under the provisions of 85 O.S. 1981 § 5.

The worker testified in a deposition given on May 22, 1985, that she had not consulted an independent physician concerning any of her injuries; that she had received no treatment from the plant physicians other than medication for pain; that after her injury she was physically incapable of doing her work; that she did not receive sick leave nor did she apply for any kind of compensation during the time she was off work; and that after she was fired she was advised by the union's grievance officer that he could not help her seek relief under the collective bargaining agreement with General Motors because she was a probationary employee who had worked less than the thirty day probationary period.

The employer filed a motion for summary judgment attaching the employment agreement, the employee's deposition, and the affidavit of its general supervisor for employee relations stating that the attached termination letter was a correct copy of the discharge notice given to the employee. However, neither the affidavit of the nurse who had told the employee to return to work, the affidavit of the person who allegedly had seen the employee loitering, nor the affidavit of the employee's direct supervisor were obtained and attached to the employer's motion for summary judgment. Although the employer alluded to the fact that the employee had been unable to perform satisfactorily any of the tasks she had been assigned to do during the period of her employment either in quantity or quality, these were but bare allegations in the briefs unsupported by any evidence. The employee by deposition denied that she had trouble keeping up with her job until after she hurt her shoulder. However, the employee failed to provide affidavits or other evidentiary materials in opposition to the motion, and the employer's motion was sustained on August 30, 1985.

The employee appealed and the Court of Appeals reversed and remanded the cause with instructions, after finding that the employer's motion for summary judgment failed to comply with Rule 13 of the District Court Rules. It held that there was a material factual issue as to the cause of termination because of the employee's allegation that she had been terminated for having instituted a proceeding against General Motors, while General Motors contended that she had been dismissed for loitering.

Although our primary task in this appeal is to elucidate the parameters of "proceedings instituted" under § 5, this case raises important ancillary issues; namely, the order and burdens of proof when retaliatory discharge claims are advanced, and the proper function of summary judgment. We turn first to the order of proof problem.

I

A The Order and Burdens of Proof in a Retaliatory Discharge Case

A review of our prior decisions, especially in view of the apparent confusion generated in this case, persuades us that it is desirable and necessary to provide further guidance to the trial courts and to the litigants they serve in order to promote the orderly presentation and resolution of retaliatory discharge claims. We conclude that the jurisprudence developed in the law of employment discrimination, as it pertains to the order and burdens of proof, is particularly adaptable to the problems encountered in cases brought under 85 O.S. 1981 § 5. It should be emphasized that we are applying standards developed by the federal courts only to the degree specified and discussed in this opinion; we do not mean to signal the wholesale adoption and application of the federal law of employment discrimination to retaliatory discharge claims brought under § 5. ³

The Legislature has made the burden of establishing a prima facie case for retaliatory discharge relatively easy. The discharged employee must show employment, on the job injury, receipt of treatment under circumstances which put the employer on notice that treatment had been rendered for a work-related injury, or that the employee in good faith instituted, or caused to be instituted, proceedings under the Act, and consequent termination of employment. After a prima facie case is established, the burden then appropriately shifts to the employer to rebut the inference that its motives were retaliatory by articulating that the discharge was for a legitimate non-retaliatory reason for the discharge. Two of these reasons include the employee's inability to perform the assigned duties, or the bad faith pursuit of a compensation claim. ⁴ The employer need not persuade the court that it was actually motivated by the proffered reasons. The employer's burden is a burden of production of relevant and credible evidence, not a burden of persuasion. It is sufficient if the employer's evidence raises a genuine issue of fact concerning whether it retaliatorily discharged the employee.

To accomplish this, the employer must set forth clearly, through the introduction of admissible evidence, the reasons for the employee's termination. The explanation provided must be legally sufficient to justify entering judgment for the employer. If the employer carries this burden of production, the presumption raised by the prima facie case is rebutted, and the factual inquiry proceeds to a new level of specificity. Placing this burden of production on the employer serves two purposes--it meets the plaintiff's prima facie case by presenting a legitimate reason...