Carter v. Duncan-Huggins, Ltd.

• Decision Date: 12 March 1984
• Docket Number: No. 82-1082,LTD,DUNCAN-HUGGIN,82-1082
• Citation: 234 U.S. App. D.C. 126,727 F.2d 1225
• Parties: 34 Fair Empl.Prac.Cas. 25, 33 Empl. Prac. Dec. P 34,162, 234 U.S.App.D.C. 126 Geraldine V. CARTER v., Appellant.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — District of Columbia Circuit

Page 1225

727 F.2d 1225

34 Fair Empl.Prac.Cas. 25, 33 Empl. Prac.

Dec. P 34,162,

234 U.S.App.D.C. 126

Geraldine V. CARTER v. DUNCAN-HUGGINS, LTD., Appellant.

No. 82-1082.

United States Court of Appeals District of Columbia Circuit.

Argued Nov. 2, 1982.

Decided Feb. 17, 1984.

As Amended Feb. 17 and March 12, 1984.

Appeal from the United States District Court for the District of Columbia (Civil Action No. 81-00546).

James H. Heller, Washington, D.C., for appellant.

JePhunneh Lawrence, Washington, D.C., for appellee.

Before ROBINSON, Chief Judge, MIKVA and SCALIA, Circuit Judges.

Opinion for the Court filed by Circuit Judge MIKVA.

Dissenting opinion filed by Circuit Judge SCALIA.

MIKVA, Circuit Judge:

This is an appeal from a jury verdict that awarded Geraldine V. Carter $10,000 as compensatory damages for discriminatory activities proscribed by section 1981 of the Civil Rights Act of 1870, 42 U.S.C. Sec. 1981. Carter had alleged that throughout her employment, her employer, Duncan-Huggins, Ltd. had intentionally discriminated against her because of her race. Following the jury verdict for Carter, appellant Duncan-Huggins timely moved for a judgment non obstante veredicto (judgment n.o.v.). The trial court denied the motion and this appeal followed. Appellant here challenges the denial of the judgment n.o.v. motion and the trial court's failure to give certain jury instructions. Finding no merit in appellant's arguments, we affirm.

I. STANDARD OF REVIEW

In reviewing a motion for a judgment n.o.v., we ask the same question that the district court asked initially in considering the motion. Because a motion for judgment n.o.v. intrudes upon the jury's domain, that question is very narrow. The jury's verdict must stand unless "the evidence, together with all inferences that can reasonably be drawn therefrom is so one-sided that reasonable men could not disagree on the verdict." Coburn v. Pan American World Airways, Inc., 711 F.2d 339, 342 (D.C.Cir.1983) (quoting Murphy v. United States, 653 F.2d 637, 640 (D.C.Cir.1981)), cert. denied, --- U.S. 683, 104 S.Ct. 488, 78 L.Ed.2d ---- (1983). See also Vander Zee v. Karabatsos, 589 F.2d 723, 726 (D.C.Cir.1978), cert. denied, 441 U.S. 962, 99 S.Ct. 2407, 60 L.Ed.2d 1066 (1979). The motion should be denied unless

"there can be but one reasonable conclusion" drawn from the evidence viewed "in the light most favorable to the [plaintiffs] ..., giving them the advantage of every fair and reasonable inference that the evidence may justify".

Metrocare v. Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority, 679 F.2d 922, 924-25 (D.C.Cir.1982) (quoting Foster v. Maryland State Savings and Loan Association, 590 F.2d 928, 930 (D.C.Cir.1978), cert. denied, 439 U.S. 1071, 99 S.Ct. 842, 59 L.Ed.2d 37 (1979)). If fair-minded people may differ as to the conclusion, or if there is substantial conflicting evidence, the judgment n.o.v. motion must be denied. Necessarily, the reviewing court must consider all the evidence offered. In evaluating the evidence, however, the court should not decide the motion based on which side has the "better of the case." Bohrer v. Hanes Corp., 715 F.2d 213, 218 (5th Cir.1983) (quoting Maxey v.Freightliner Corp., 665 F.2d 1367, 1371 (5th Cir.1982)), petition for cert filed, 52 U.S.L.W. 3512 (U.S. Jan. 10, 1984) (No. 83-1017). Nor should the court assess witness credibility or weigh the evidence. Coburn v. Pan American World Airways, Inc., 711 F.2d at 342. Those are functions reserved for the jury.

II. BACKGROUND

We rehearse the testimony in detail so that we can evaluate what inferences a reasonable juror may have drawn. Appellee Geraldine V. Carter, a black woman, secured employment with Duncan-Huggins, Ltd., in January 1979. Duncan-Huggins operates a wholesale showroom of fabric and furniture for architects and designers. At all times relevant to this case, Duncan-Huggins hired less than fifteen people and thus did not fall within the ambit of Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, 42 U.S.C. Secs. 2000e to 2000e-17 (1976). Instead, this case falls within the purview of section 1981, which imposes as an additional prerequisite to a finding of liability that the plaintiff prove intentional discrimination. General Building Contractors Association v. Pennsylvania, 458 U.S. 375, 102 S.Ct. 3141, 73 L.Ed.2d 835 (1982).

Carter was the first, and only, black employee. When Carter applied for the job, Perez, Duncan-Huggins' president, informed her that her primary duties would be as sample librarian, with some opportunities to make sales. Transcript (Tr.) at 81. As sample librarian, Carter would retrieve carpet samples that customers wanted to borrow and reshelve those that had been returned. Carter remained at Duncan-Huggins until June 1980, when she voluntarily left to begin a job elsewhere.

During Carter's initial period of employment, she shared desks with the other, white employees in the Company's showroom. Eventually, however, Carter was given a desk behind the tall shelves in which the carpet samples were kept. Because of these shelves, the desk was isolated from the showroom and from customer contact. In contrast, all the white employees used desks located in the showroom. Duncan-Huggins suggested at trial that the placement of the desk reflected Carter's duties as sample librarian. Id. at 37. Moreover, the employee responsible for this work arrangement testified that Carter had asked for the desk. Id. at 262. Carter denied having made this request and instead testified that she had been instructed to work in the back. Id. at 123-24. No explanation was proffered, however, as to why Carter's desk could not have been placed closer to the shelves, but not in such an extremely isolated position.

In June, 1979 Duncan-Huggins moved to a new facility. That facility had a sample library that was separated from the showroom by a wall with two doorways. For a short period of time following the move, Carter allegedly occupied a desk in the showroom. Id. at 128, 265-66. Thereafter, one of Carter's de facto supervisors carried her desk into the separate sample library. This library, according to Carter, had inadequate lighting and ventilation. Not surprisingly, the parties all suggested different reasons for this relocation. Carter alleged that the move was motivated by a discriminatory intent. The employee who actually moved the desk testified that he did so at the direction of one of Duncan-Huggins' owners. Id. at 266. That owner, who admitted having responsibility for the placement of furniture, and who indicated that because sample work was messy the sample room was to be secluded from the showroom, never specifically explained whether, and if so why, he ordered the desk to be moved. Id. at 289-93. Moreover, the owner denied saying anything about where Carter was to be stationed. Id. at 292. Perez, Duncan-Huggins' president, suggested that the desk was relocated because construction work in the showroom had not been completed. Id. at 234-35. Yet, when the construction work was completed, Carter's desk was not returned to the customer area. The desk was not returned to the showroom, according to Perez, because its placement in the back gave Carter better access to the samples. Id. at 235. As evidence that the placement did not reflect Carter's race, Duncan-Huggins pointed to the fact that the current librarian, a white woman spends all her time at the same remote desk. This does not alter the fact, however, that Carter, Duncan-Huggins' only black employee, was separated from both other employees and the customers for the overwhelming majority of her work experience.

Carter's isolation from the customers extended beyond the opportunity to make personal contact. The same owner who allegedly instructed that Carter's desk be moved, admitted that he directed Carter to not answer the phones. Id. at 293. To justify this additional isolation, the owner indicated that answering phones was not within Carter's responsibilities, but instead was to be the responsibility of others. Id. He offered no explanation of why the responsibility was so allocated. Indeed, if sales personnel in the showroom were allowed to answer the phone, logic might suggest that Carter, who was also hired to have some sales responsibilities, also should have been expected to answer the phone.

An additional facet of Carter's unique treatment was her level of compensation. ^* In terms of both salary and incentive payments, Carter's compensation consistently stayed at the low end of the pay scale. Appellee's starting salary of $7500 was markedly less than the salary of any other then-employed Duncan-Huggins worker. Although Carter received two raises totalling $1500, no full-time employee had a salary lower than Carter. (One white employee, whose starting salary was larger than Carter's starting salary, received no raises during her tenure.) At one point in the summer of 1979, Carter's salary, enlarged by a raise, may have been equal to a white employee's salary. Id. at 14. That white employee, however, had joined Duncan-Huggins after Carter and thus was her junior. More reflective of the pattern demonstrated by the testimony was the employment, in April 1980, of two new white sales personnel at starting salaries of $9,000 and $10,400. Id. at 51. Duncan-Huggins suggested that the higher salaries of the white employees mirrored their past experience. Id. at 81-85. Carter, however, also had a significant amount of previous experience. Id. at 120-22. Additionally, the salary differential could not be justified on the basis of inadequate work performance since Duncan-Huggins' president testified that she had no complaints about Carter's work. Id. at 60.

This disparity in compensation was aggravated by Carter's consistently lower incentive payments. Duncan-Huggins had a program in which the president awarded incentive payments to employees twice annually. For the same three periods, two...