Carroll v. Maui County

• Decision Date: 21 October 1994
• Docket Number: Civ. No. 92-00729 SPK.
• Citation: 866 F. Supp. 459
• Parties: William P. CARROLL and Jo Ann Carroll, Plaintiffs, v. MAUI COUNTY; Linda Crockett Lingle, Individually and as Mayor of Maui County; George N. Kaya, Individually and as Director of the Maui County Department of Public Works; Eassie Miller, Melvin Hipolito, Jerry Morgan, Steven Parabicoli, and Ian Suzuki, Individually and as employees of the Maui County Department of Public Works; and Victor Moreland, and Harold Yee, as Members of the State of Hawaii Board of Certification of Wastewater Plant Operators, Defendants.
• Court: U.S. District Court — District of Hawaii

866 F. Supp. 459

William P. CARROLL and Jo Ann Carroll, Plaintiffs, v.MAUI COUNTY; Linda Crockett Lingle, Individually and as Mayor of Maui County; George N. Kaya, Individually and as Director of the Maui County Department of Public Works; Eassie Miller, Melvin Hipolito, Jerry Morgan, Steven Parabicoli, and Ian Suzuki, Individually and as employees of the Maui CountyDepartment of Public Works; and Victor Moreland, and Harold Yee, as Members of the State of Hawaii Board of Certification of Wastewater Plant Operators, Defendants.

Civ. No. 92-00729 SPK.

United States District Court, D. Hawai`i.

October 21, 1994.

Robert A. Smith, Kaneohe, HI, for plaintiffs.

Cyrus W. Chan, David M. Jorgensen, Deputies Corp.Counsel, Guy A. Haywood, Corp.Counsel, Wailuku, Maui, HI, for County of Maui and for defendants sued in their official capacities.

ORDER DENYING DEFENDANT MAUI COUNTY'S MOTION FOR PARTIAL SUMMARY JUDGMENT RE ALL WRONGFUL DISCHARGE CLAIMS

SAMUEL P. KING, Senior District Judge.

I.THE MOTION

This case arises from the dismissal of PlaintiffWilliam P. Carroll from employment with Maui County on August 19, 1992.His second amended complaint basically alleges that the Defendants conspired to silence him and that he was fired for whistleblowing in violation of Haw.Rev.Stat. § 378-62 and the United States Constitution.He asserted several causes of action including wrongful discharge, violations of 42 U.S.C. § 1983, violations of Civil RICO provisions (18 U.S.C. §§ 1961-65), as well as various other common law claims.In previous orders, this court dismissed some of the causes of action against certain defendants.In the present motion, DefendantCounty of Maui and Defendants Lingle, Kaya, Miller, Hipolito, Morgan, Parabicoli, and Suzuki, in their official capacities (collectively, "the Maui County Defendants"), have moved for partial summary judgment on all wrongful discharge claims, asserting that Plaintiff¹ is barred by doctrines of prior adjudication (i.e. res judicata and collateral estoppel) from litigating such claims.This court heard the matter on August 12, 1994.Robert A. Smith represented Plaintiff, Cyrus W. Chan appeared for the Maui County Defendants, Daniel A. Bent appeared for Maui employee Defendants(other than Lingle and Kaya) in their individual capacities, and other defendants joined.

II.BACKGROUND

Plaintiff was an operator at a Maui County Wastewater Reclamation Facility("WWRF").After being hired in 1989, he made a series of complaints to superiors, the Department of Health, the Environmental Protection Agency, the media,² and others.Plaintiff allegedly is well-known as a "staunch advocate of compliance with environmental regulations."

Among Plaintiff's complaints were that Maui County was hiring an improperly qualified individual and that the State Board of Certification of Wastewater Plant Operators("Board") was improperly certifying the individual in violation of its regulations.The Board asked Plaintiff for proof of his allegations.Plaintiff responded by producing documents obtained from the individual's personnel file.Apparently, the Board then presented the documents to Defendant Kaya, Director of the Maui County Department of Public Works.³Plaintiff was then fired by Maui County for (1) producing confidential documents without prior authority,⁴(2) altering information on a government document, and (3) insubordination for deliberately refusing to carry out a proper order from a superior (Plaintiff refused to reveal who gave him the documents).

After being fired, Plaintiff applied for unemployment compensation benefits.A claims examiner disqualified him from receiving benefits pursuant to Haw.Rev.Stat. § 383-30(2)⁵ because he was "discharged for misconduct connected with work."Plaintiff appealed the examiner's determination to the State Department of Labor and Industrial Relations, Employment Security Appeals Office.After a hearing, an appeals officer affirmed the determination.The December 15, 1992 decision provides in pertinent part:

The relevant issue in this case is whether the claimant was discharged for misconduct connected with work.

The issue in this case is whether or not those reasons cited by the employer for claimant's discharge constituted misconduct connected with work.As stated above, misconduct may be found where there is a willful or deliberate disregard of the employer's interest or a knowing violation of the standards of behavior which an employer has the right to expect of an employee.With reference to employer's charge that claimant altered a document, there is no evidence that a document was altered or that such alternation was critical to the discharge.Therefore, employer's charge of altering a document is not given weight in this matter.Claimant refuses to divulge the name of the individual(s) whom he states obtained the copies of the documents from the employee's personnel file and gave it to him.As such, in the absence of any other evidence, it is concluded that claimant obtained the documents from the employee's file and copied these documents for his personal use.The evidence in the record establishes, moreover, that claimant was aware that access to the files was restricted to only certain individuals in management capacity and that such documents were private.Claimant was also aware that he was prohibited from removing any documents from these files without permission from the individual.Despite claimant's awareness of these requirements, the facts show that claimant released information from an employee's personnel file to a third party without the expressed permission from the employee in question.

Claimant's actions to take this route was a conscious and willful decision on his part.The personnel rules and regulations specifically state that all documents in an employee's personnel file are confidential and may be released only under specific conditions.Claimant's bargaining unit also limits access to an employee's personnel file to that individual himself.Claimant knew, or should reasonably have known, therefore, that accessing another individual's personnel file when he was not in a position or authority to do so, removing such documents from a personnel file without permission from the employer, and releasing such information to a third party without the expressed permission of the employee in question was a clear violation of the personnel rules and regulations and a deliberate disregard of the employer's interests and of the standards of behavior which an employer has a right to expect of an employee.The claimant was discharged for misconduct connected with work.

DECISION

The determination of the Department is affirmed.The claimant is disqualified for benefits beginning August 16, 1992, and continuing until he is reemployed and paid wages five times his weekly benefit amount after August 22, 1992, on the basis that he was discharged for misconduct connected with work.

Exhibit 7 to the Maui County Defendants' motion (emphasis added).

Plaintiff did not appeal the decision.Haw. Rev.Stat. § 383-41 provides that decisions on unemployment benefits may be judicially reviewed by state circuit court.Because Plaintiff did not seek judicial review, the decision became final 30 days after being issued.

III.DISCUSSION

Given the decision in Plaintiff's unemployment compensation proceeding, the dispositive question is whether this court should grant partial summary judgment on all claims in this suit sounding in wrongful discharge because doctrines of prior adjudication bar such claims.For the reasons set forth, the answer is no.Therefore, Defendants' motion is DENIED.

A. Leongv. Hilton Hotels

The Maui County Defendants rely on Leong v. Hilton Hotels Corp.,698 F.Supp. 1496(D.Haw.1988).The Leong court held that a former employee's discrimination-related claims were barred on res judicata grounds because the claims were grounded on a showing of constructive discharge, which had been adversely determined in her previous unemployment compensation proceeding.Leong, however, is distinguishable from the present case in several critical ways.

In Leong,plaintiffSusan Leong resigned from her position as director of personnel at the Hilton Hawaiian Village, and filed for unemployment compensation.Leong initially stated that she"quit" for "personal" reasons; she later stated that her immediate supervisor had "undercut" her position at the hotel and that she had "good cause" to quit and was thus entitled to benefits.⁶Leong appeared pro se before the Claims Examiner of the State Department of Labor and Industrial Relations, Unemployment Insurance Division.The Examiner determined that there was no conclusive evidence that Leong's position had been undercut or that continued employment was unsuitable.The Examiner denied Leong's application, determining that she quit "for personal, non-compelling reasons and without cause."698 F.Supp. at 1497.

Leong retained counsel and appealed the Examiner's decision to the Employment Security Appeals Office.After a full evidentiary hearing on the merits, the Appeals Referee affirmed the denial of her unemployment benefits.Leong subsequently lost her appeal of the Referee's decision to the State Circuit Court.The circuit court held that the Referee's decision was not clearly erroneous or defective on either procedural or substantive grounds.Id. at 1498.

Leong then filed a complaint in federal court alleging a Title VII claim, constructive discharge in breach of an implied employment contract, constructive discharge in violation of public policy, intentional infliction of emotional distress, and violation of the due process and equal protection provisions of the Hawaii Constitution.Defendants moved for summary judgment, arguing that doctrines of prior adjudication prevented her from relitigating the essential issue of constructive discharge.

The Leong court noted that 28...