Catron v. Eastman Chem. Co.

• Decision Date: 07 December 2016
• Docket Number: No. 2:15-CV-169,2:15-CV-169
• Parties: PATTIE L. CATRON, Plaintiff, v. EASTMAN CHEMICAL COMPANY, Defendant.
• Court: U.S. District Court — Eastern District of Tennessee

PATTIE L. CATRON, Plaintiff, v. EASTMAN CHEMICAL COMPANY, Defendant.

No. 2:15-CV-169

UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT EASTERN DISTRICT OF TENNESSEE AT GREENEVILLE

December 7, 2016

Judge Phillips

MEMORANDUM OPINION

Plaintiff Pattie L. Catron has sued her former employer, defendant Eastman Chemical Company ("Eastman"), for various employment discrimination claims arising from her termination in September 2013. Specifically, she claims that she was terminated due to her age in violation of the Age Discrimination in Employment Act ("ADEA"), 29 U.S.C. § 623, her gender in violation of Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 ("Title VII"), 42 U.S.C. § 2000e, in retaliation for her complaints of age and gender discrimination in violation of the ADEA and Title VII, and that she was subject to a hostile work environment. Eastman has now moved for summary judgment [Doc. 13] on all of plaintiff's claims. The parties have filed thorough briefs in support of and in opposition to the pending motion, along with supporting affidavits and exhibits [Docs. 14, 15, 16, 21, 22, 23, 29].

After careful consideration of all the relevant pleadings, the defendant's motion for summary judgment [Doc. 13] will be GRANTED.

I. Plaintiff's Affidavit

Before addressing the merits of the pending motion, the Court will first address the concerns raised by Eastman regarding plaintiff's affidavit. In response to Eastman's motion for summary judgment, plaintiff filed a responsive brief [Doc. 21] in compliance with this Court's 25-page limit, E.D. Tenn. L.R. 7.1(b), and a 40-page affidavit [Doc. 22]. Eastman's reply brief [Doc. 23] urges the Court to completely disregard this affidavit as full of inadmissible hearsay, contradictory to plaintiff's deposition testimony, argumentative, and an attempt to evade the page limits of the local rules. Plaintiff's supplemental response [Doc. 29] argues that the purported hearsay statements are within the exception of Fed. R. Evid. 801(d)(2)(D) as statements by employees regarding work-related matters within the scope of their employment, that some of the statements provide non-hearsay notice to the plaintiff, and that the alleged testimonial inconsistencies are not in fact inconsistent with or embellishments of plaintiff's deposition testimony.

Eastman is correct that the Court must consider only admissible evidence presented in conjunction with a motion for summary judgment. Fed. R. Civ. P. 56(c)(2) ("A party may object that the material cited to support or dispute a fact cannot be presented in a form that would be admissible evidence."); see Jacklyn v. Schering-Plough Healthcare Prods. Sales Corp., 176 F.3d 921, 927 (6th Cir. 1999) ("Hearsay evidence may not be considered on summary judgment"). Eastman is also correct that a party may not create a question of fact by filing an affidavit in direct contradiction to the party's earlier sworn testimony. Aerel v. S.R.L. v. PCC Airfoils, LLC, 448 F.3d 899, 907—08 (6th Cir. 2006); Reid v. Sears,Roebuck & Co., 790 F.2d 453, 460 (6th Cir. 1986). If, however, the affidavit is not directly contradictory, the Court should not strike or disregard the affidavit unless it is "an attempt to create a sham fact issue." Aerel, 448 F.3d at 908. Thus, to the extent plaintiff's affidavit is directly contradictory to her deposition testimony, the Court will not consider the affidavit.

Plaintiff is correct that a statement is not hearsay under Rule 801(d)(2)(D) when it concerns a matter within the scope of the declarant's employment.¹ Back v. Nestle USA, Inc., 694 F.3d 571, 577 (6th Cir. 2012) (citing Carter v. Univ. of Toledo, 349 F.3d 269, 275—76 (6th Cir. 2003)). However, when statements concern decisions to which the employee was not a party, they are outside the scope of the employee's employment and are therefore not subject to the party-admission rule. Liadis v. Sears, Roebuck & Co., 47 F. App'x 295, 303 (6th Cir. 2002). Further, "Rule 801(d)(2)(D) is designed to bind the employer where one of its managerial employees makes a statement within the scope of the employee's duties as a manager." Barner v. Pilkington N. Am., Inc., 399 F.3d 745, 750 (6th Cir. 2005). Many of the statements of which Eastman complains were made by non-managerial employees and the statements are not binding on the employer. See Jacklyn, 176 F.3d at 928 ("There is a critical difference between making a statement while one is an employee and having the actual or implied authority to make such a statement on behalfof your employer"). Most importantly, many of the statements of which Eastman complains are simply not material to the issues to be determined by Eastman's motion. See Anderson v. Liberty Lobby, Inc., 477 U.S. 242, 248 (1986) (a genuine issue of material fact must involve facts that might affect the outcome of the suit under the governing law). To the extent that plaintiff's affidavit contains material, non-hearsay statements, or facts which are not directly contradictory of plaintiff's deposition testimony, the Court will consider it.

Finally, while plaintiff's 40-page affidavit may indeed be an effort to circumvent the page limitation in E.D. Tenn. L.R. 7.1(b), the Court observes that the explicit language of Rule 7.1(b) applies the page limit to "briefs" and does not include affidavits or other supporting materials. Eastman has not cited any authority, nor is the Court aware of any authority, to support the argument that the plaintiff's affidavit may be completely disregarded because of its length.

II. Relevant Facts

Plaintiff Pattie L. Catron was hired in August 2012 as an Administrative Assistant to Dr. Brendan Boyd, a Director in Eastman's Additive and Functional Products Technology Division at Eastman's facility in Kingsport, Tennessee [Doc. 14-1 at pp. 4—5; Doc. 15 at ¶¶ 2—3]. At the time she was hired, plaintiff was 57 years old [Doc. 14-1 at p. 44].

As an Administrative Assistant, plaintiff reported directly to Dr. Boyd and she occasionally provided assistance to other Group Leaders in the department [Doc. 15 at ¶4]. Her duties involved handling administrative tasks for Dr. Boyd, including managing his Outlook schedule; scheduling and planning meetings and events; submitting travel and other business expenses for reimbursement; managing and updating budgeting and expense spreadsheets and reports; timekeeping for employees in the department; creating and formatting documents; and performing other administrative tasks related to Dr. Boyd and his team's work product [Id.]. These duties required attention to detail, problem solving skills, and proficiency with a number of computer programs utilized on a daily basis [Id.].

As a new employee, plaintiff had several months of orientation, Eastman training, and on-the-job training with assistance from other Administrative Assistants in her division [Doc. 14-1 at pp. 11—12]. During this time, Dr. Boyd was out of the office travelling quite a bit and for medical treatment [Doc. 15 at ¶ 5]. He concluded that her work performance was satisfactory during this period [Id.]. Plaintiff describes him as very busy and "kind" to her during this time [Doc. 14-1 at p. 14].

All new Eastman employees participate in quarterly development and evaluation reviews ("D&ER") during the first year of their employment. These reviews generally are to be conducted at the 13-week, 26-week, 39-week, and 52-week marks [Doc. 15 at ¶ 6]. The reviews are to provide feedback and coaching on employee performance, strengths, and opportunities for development [Doc. 14-1 at p. 62]. The expectation is that if, despite the opportunities provided through this process, an employee fails to meet performance expectations, the employee will be terminated [Doc. 15 at ¶ 6].

In her 13-week and 26-week D&ERs, Dr. Boyd rated plaintiff as "fully meeting company's requirements for regular employment and has shown the capability for continued career growth" [Doc. 14-1 at pp. 75—77, 79—81].² Plaintiff agrees that she was treated fairly in these performance reviews [Doc. 14-1 at pp. 18, 20].

As plaintiff's employment with Eastman continued, however, the parties agree that her relationship with Dr. Boyd deteriorated.³ Dr. Boyd states that plaintiff's performance declined as she "became fully engaged" in the responsibilities of her position with less support from her peers [Doc. 15 at ¶ 8]. Specifically, he states that she was having difficulty with attention to detail, accuracy, thoroughness, problem solving, and decision-making [Id.]. Dr. Boyd perceived that plaintiff lacked proficiency in using Outlook, Excel, PowerPoint and SAP [Id. at ¶ 9]. As an example, Dr. Boyd states that she made errors when organizing his meetings on Outlook; incorrectly submitted his expense reports; and provided incorrect information on spreadsheets used for monthly leadership team meetings [Id.]. Plaintiff claims that Dr. Boyd "started being pretty hostile" and saying "belittling" things to her [Doc. 14-1 at p. 15].

On June 17, 2013, Dr. Boyd sent an email to certain other Group Leaders who worked with Ms. Catron soliciting feedback on her job performance [Doc. 15 at ¶ 10].Jeremy Lizotte responded that he had experienced difficulty with plaintiff "in scheduling things and her not considering where I already have conflicting meetings on my calendar. ...[S]he has called with scheduling conflicts two times recently rather than simply scheduling over something I already have on my calendar. The big issue is having to provide so much input into getting something done that it is often easier to do it myself. I have tried to let her know she has the power to decide food or other fairly benign details but she still requires a final decision from someone else" [Doc. 15-1 at p. 2].⁴ Jake Goodrich responded that he was reluctant to rely on her for scheduling meetings, interviews, or ordering lunches for meetings based on the negative experiences he had heard from others. He specifically observed that she had difficulty using...