Chuan Wang v. Palmisano

• Decision Date: 26 January 2016
• Docket Number: Case No. 13-CV-2186 (KMK)
• Citation: 157 F.Supp.3d 306
• Parties: Chuan Wang, Plaintiff, v. Samuel J. Palmisano, Martin Schroeter, Mark Loughridge, J. Randall MacDonald, John Does No. 1-20, and Jane Does No. 1-20, Defendants.
• Court: U.S. District Court — Southern District of New York

157 F.Supp.3d 306

Chuan Wang, Plaintiff,

v.Samuel J. Palmisano, Martin Schroeter, Mark Loughridge, J. Randall MacDonald, John Does No. 1-20, and Jane Does No. 1-20, Defendants.

Case No. 13-CV-2186 (KMK)

United States District Court, S.D. New York.

Signed January 26, 2016

Chuan Wang, Lexington, MA, Pro se Plaintiff

Timothy M. Pomarole, Esq., Peabody & Arnold LLP, Boston, MA, Counsel for Defendants Palmisano, Schroeter, Loughridge, and MacDonald

Catherine B. Kelleher, Esq., Sedgwick LLP, New York, NY, Counsel for Defendants Palmisano, Schroeter, Loughridge, and MacDonald

OPINION & ORDER

KENNETH M. KARAS, District Judge

On April 1, 2013, pro se Plaintiff Chuan Wang (“Plaintiff”) filed a Complaint against Samuel J. Palmisano (“Palmisano”), Martin Schroeter (“Schroeter”), Mark Loughridge (“Loughridge”), and J. Randall MacDonald (“MacDonald”) (collectively “Defendants”), who at the relevant times were, respectively, the President, Chief Executive Officer, and Chairman; the Treasurer; the Chief Financial Officer and a Senior Vice President; and another Senior Vice President of International Business Machines Corp. (“IBM”). (See Compl. ¶¶ 2–5 (Dkt No. 1); Am. Compl. ¶¶ 2–5 (Dkt. No. 28).)¹ On September 30, 2014, this Court dismissed Plaintiff's original complaint without prejudice. (See Op. & Order (Dkt. No. 25).) This Amended Complaint followed, alleging multiple claims under federal and state law relating to Plaintiff's employment, termination, and subsequent reapplication efforts at IBM.

(See generally Am. Compl.)² Before the Court is Defendants' Motion to Dismiss all claims. (See Notice of Mot. To Dismiss Am. Compl. (Dkt. No. 33).) For the following reasons, Defendants' Motion is granted.

I. Background

A. Factual History

The following facts come from Plaintiff's Amended Complaint and, for purposes of resolving Defendants' Motion, will be accepted as true. Plaintiff, who is Chinese American, is a 56-year-old American citizen. (See Am. Compl. ¶ 12.) Plaintiff was educated in China through his undergraduate degree and also holds a PhD degree. (Id. ¶¶ 13, 100.) In addition, Plaintiff holds two U.S. patents that are relevant to “storage-area-networked computer storage technology.” (Id. ¶ 100.)

On February 1, 2008, Plaintiff received an email from Vishwadeep Sharma on behalf of Defendants soliciting Plaintiff for work. (See id. ¶ 14.) Artech Information Systems (“Artech”) arranged for Plaintiff to be interviewed by a team from IBM, and that interview occurred on February 22, 2008. (See id. ¶ 15.) Artech informed Plaintiff that he had the IBM job offer, and, “as requested [by] the employer,” Plaintiff provided a copy of his passport, which shows his birthdate of March 7, 1956, thereby indicating Plaintiff's age. (Id. ¶¶ 16–17.) Artech told Plaintiff that his position would be full time, exclusively for IBM, and would last for at least one year. (See id. ¶ 18.) In addition, Artech forwarded Plaintiff a proposed employment agreement, under which Plaintiff would be required to “surrender his 'rights to civil litigation' and agree [to a] proposed Arbitration provision [under which] Plaintiff must agree to resolve employment disputes in New Jersey by the pr [o]visions of New Jersey Permanent Statutes Section 2A:24–1.” (Id. ¶¶ 16–17.) In addition, the employment agreement provided that:

If employee is terminated by the client for cause or employee departs this assignment for any reason prior to the expiration of the probationary trial period or end of the project, Employee shall reimburse Artech for the amounts paid to employee as a draw during the probationary trial period. In that connection, employee acknowledges and understands that Artech will receive no payment for services performed hereunder by Employee from the proposed client if the proposed client terminates Employee during the probationary trial period.

(Id. ¶ 17.)

Plaintiff refused to enter into the agreement, contending that it would violate his rights under various employment laws, including the Massachusetts Wage Act (“Wage Act”) and the Fair Labor Standards Act (“FLSA”). (Id. ) With regard to overtime, Plaintiff was told that any overtime work would be deemed as voluntary work without pay, unless it were approved in advance by his IBM supervisor. (Id. ¶ 18.) Artech told Plaintiff that he was an “exempt employee” because his work was “computer related” and that, as a result, he was not entitled to overtime pay for any overtime work performed. (Id. ¶ 19.)

Between February and April 2008, Plaintiff provided more than 158 hours of service to Artech. (Id. ¶ 20.) From March 11 to March 28, 2008, Plaintiff worked full-time and exclusively for IBM under its direction and control, reviewing and evaluating more than a thousand of Novartis Corp.'s computer storage systems, as requested by IBM managers. (Id. ¶¶ 21–22.) During that time, Plaintiff spent 112 regular hours and 46 overtime hours to perform his work for IBM. (Id. ¶ 22.)

On March 28, 2008, Plaintiff alleges that his work was terminated by Defendants because he refused to give up his rights under the Wage Act and FLSA. (Id. ¶¶ 23–24.) On April 4, 2008, Plaintiff submitted an unpaid wages request to Artech via e-mail for the 112 regular-hour services that he performed. (Id. ¶ 23.) Plaintiff's request did not seek pay for the overtime hours that he worked “[b]ecause he relied on Artech's representations and the fact that his overtime works [sic] were not approved in advance.” (See id. ). Plaintiff alleges that Defendants, Artech, and/or IBM repeatedly refused to pay Plaintiff the wages that he earned, despite Plaintiff filing complaints against Defendants with government agencies and writing a demand letter to Defendants for unpaid wages. (See id. ¶¶ 27–29.)

Plaintiff has been unemployed and has received no unemployment compensation since April 2008 because Defendants made no contribution to unemployment insurance for Plaintiff. (See id. ¶¶ 25–26.) Between sometime thereafter and 2012, Plaintiff submitted applications for “about a hundred” jobs with IBM. (See, e.g. , id. ¶¶ 30, 40.)³ Of those job applications, Plaintiff indicates that many were made through CDI Corporation (“CDI”) and that many were directly mailed to the Defendants many times. (Id. ¶ 31.) Plaintiff provides a few examples: On July 19, 2011, Plaintiff sent an e-mail communication to CDI concerning a job that IBM sought to fill and also sent Palmisano and MacDonald a letter with his job application and a copy of his passport. (Id. ) Later, on January 11, 2012, Plaintiff sent another e-mail communication to CDI concerning a position with IBM and sent a letter with his job application and a copy of his passport, this time, to Palmisano, Schroeter, Loughridge, and MacDonald. (Id. )

Plaintiff maintains that, of the job applications he submitted, “IBM repeatedly rejected each and every [one] ... for more than [four] years until 2012.” (Id. ¶ 34.) For instance, on January 21, 2009, Alonna Ferris of CDI told Plaintiff via e-mail that IBM did not ask CDI to extend a job offer to Plaintiff. (Id. ) On another occasion, on November 29, 2011, after receiving Plaintiff's job applications, Kelli Jordan, on behalf of Defendants, sent Plaintiff an e-mail with a subject line that read “[y]our correspondence to Sam Palmisano of IBM” which did not include a job offer and which effectively rejected Plaintiff's applications. (Id. ¶ 31.) On yet another occasion, Plaintiff—presumably unsuccessfully—interviewed for five separate positions with IBM managers Stephen Wheatley, Gina Koppel, Ramakrishna Talkad, Janet Hamilton, and Linda Foster, all of which had similar job requirements as the work that Plaintiff had performed for IBM in March 2008 and for which Plaintiff consequently believed he was well qualified. (See id. ¶¶ 32–33.) Decisions to reject Plaintiff's work applications were made by IBM, rather than CDI. (Id. ¶ 34.)

B. Procedural History

Plaintiff has filed a number of claims against Defendants in both state and federal court as well as with various state agencies. First, on April 14, 2008, Plaintiff filed a wage complaint with the Office of the Massachusetts Attorney General. (Id. ¶¶ 11, 72; Mem. in Supp. of Mot. To Dismiss Am. Compl. (“Defs.' Mem.”) 5 (Dkt. No. 34); Defs.' Mem. Ex. 4 (April 14, 2008 Letter to Attorney General).)⁴ Next, on September 18, 2008, Plaintiff filed another wage complaint with the Massachusetts Attorney General. (See Am. Compl. ¶ 11; Defs.' Mem. 6; Defs.' Mem. Ex. 5 (Non-Payment of Wage and Workplace Complaint Form).)⁵ Later, on January 13, 2009, Plaintiff filed a complaint with the United States Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (“EEOC”). (Am. Compl. ¶¶ 11, 35; Defs.' Mem. 6; Defs.' Mem. Ex. 6 (Charge of Discrimination Form).) Plaintiff never received a right-to-sue letter. (Am. Compl. ¶ 35; Defs.' Mem. 6.)

Plaintiff brought his first lawsuit in connection with his work for IBM the following month, when, on February 12, 2009, he filed a complaint against IBM and Artech for unpaid wages and retaliatory termination against Defendants in Massachusetts state court. (See Am. Compl. ¶ 36; Defs.' Mem. 6; Defs.' Mem. Ex. 9 (Mar. 18, 2009 State Court Am. Compl.).)⁶ That complaint was dismissed on the grounds of improper jurisdiction. (See Am. Compl. ¶ 36; Defs.' Mem. 6–7.) Later, however, the Massachusetts Appeals Court reversed that decision to dismiss without prejudice instead. See Wang v. Int'l Bus. Machs. Corp. , 924 N.E.2d 334, at *1 (Mass.App.Ct.2010).

Next, on March 16, 2009, Plaintiff filed a complaint of employment discrimination with the Massachusetts Commission Against Discrimination (“MCAD”). (Am. Compl. ¶ 37; Defs.' Mem. 6; Defs.' Mem. Ex. 7 (Mar. 16, 2009 MCAD Complaint).) Also, on or around March 16, 2009, Plaintiff filed a complaint of employment retaliation with the Massachusetts Attorney General. (Am. Compl. ¶ 38; Defs.' Mem. 6; Defs.' Mem. Ex. 8 (Mar. 16, 2009 Letter to Attorney General).)

On November 25, 2009, Plaintiff returned...