Cram v. Lamson & Sessions Co.

• Decision Date: 15 March 1995
• Docket Number: 94-1838,Nos. 94-1720,s. 94-1720
• Citation: 49 F.3d 466
• Parties: 67 Fair Empl.Prac.Cas. (BNA) 449, 66 Empl. Prac. Dec. P 43,491 Lisa CRAM, Appellant, v. LAMSON & SESSIONS CO., Carlon Division, an Ohio corporation, Appellee. Lisa CRAM, Appellant, v. James ROGERS, Appellee.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Eighth Circuit

Page 466

49 F.3d 466

67 Fair Empl.Prac.Cas. (BNA) 449,

66 Empl. Prac. Dec. P 43,491

Lisa CRAM, Appellant, v. LAMSON & SESSIONS CO., Carlon Division, an Ohio corporation,

Appellee.

Lisa CRAM, Appellant, v. James ROGERS, Appellee.

Nos. 94-1720, 94-1838.

United States Court of Appeals Eighth Circuit.

Submitted Nov. 17, 1994.

Decided March 15, 1995.

Dorothy A. O'Brien, Davenport, IA, argued (Dorothy A. O'Brien and Charles W. Brooke, on the brief), for appellant.

Scott A. Moorman, Cleveland, OH, argued for appellees; Stephen D. Haufe, Clinton, IA, on the joint brief, for appellee James Rogers, and Thomas H. Barnard and Scott A. Moorman, Cleveland, OH, on the joint brief, for appellee Lamson & Sessions Co.

Before MAGILL, Circuit Judge, JOHN R. GIBSON, Senior Circuit Judge, and LOKEN, Circuit Judge.

MAGILL, Circuit Judge.

Lisa Cram appeals from the district court's ¹ grants of summary judgment in favor of Carlon Company and James Rogers in these sexual harassment actions brought pursuant to Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, 42 U.S.C. Sec. 2000(e)-2(a)(1). We affirm.

I. BACKGROUND

This case concerns a workplace romance gone awry. Lisa Cram started work as an assembly line operator at Carlon Company, a manufacturer of plastic boxes, in June 1991. In December 1991, Cram and James Rogers, one of the rotating staff of foremen in her department, became involved in a consensual romantic affair outside the workplace. Rogers and Cram shared work hours only about one day each week due to the rotation system. Less than two months went by before Cram broke up with Rogers on January 25, 1991, as a result of his mentioning to her that he had had sexual relations with other Carlon employees, Barb Frett and Bonnie Mitchell. ²

Cram, angry, approached Mitchell at work that evening, and repeated what Rogers had said to her. Mitchell denied ever having had a sexual encounter with Rogers. When the story reached Frett on January 27, she, equally irate, confronted Cram and accused Cram of telling lies about her. The confrontation escalated into a screaming match, in which each woman accused the other of lying and other improprieties. At the end of her shift that day, Cram went to Rogers' apartment, where, unaware of the incident with Frett, he gave her a note saying that he loved her and was sorry for hurting her feelings. The note explained that Rogers in fact only had a single sexual encounter with Frett, whom he had known before working with her at Carlon. Frett had initiated the one-night encounter, appearing at his apartment uninvited. The note also said that he was only joking about Mitchell, and had never had sexual relations with her. Cram showed this note, as evidence of Rogers' perfidy, to Mitchell and other coworkers, and tried to show it to Frett, who was not interested.

During the following weeks, Rogers, in an attempt to recapture Cram's affections, left a few brief notes on the hood of her car and truck asking Cram to speak with him. One of the notes was accompanied by a birthday gift of a plastic flower. When encountering her at work or at the local bar, he asked her why she did not stop by to see him, said that he was sorry, and on occasion changed the station on her workplace radio, suggesting that she listen for certain country and western songs, presumably significant to their relationship. He also drove past her house a few times without stopping his car. He made no sexual comments, threats, or references to her job status.

On February 11, her birthday, Cram stopped by at Rogers' apartment, where she told him that she would like them to be friends, and he gave her a birthday card. Then on Valentine's Day, the two exchanged Valentine cards, and Cram gave Rogers an expensive gold necklace, matching one she wore herself, as a Valentine's Day gift.

In the meantime, the hostility between Cram and Frett and Mitchell continued unabated. Cram tried to apologize to Frett for the January 27 fray, but, in yet another of the displays of temperament that seem to be commonplace in this case, Frett rejected her apology and said that she would take care of the situation herself. Cram took this to mean that Frett and Mitchell intended to complain to management about Cram's behavior and went to tell "her side of the story" to Carlon's office manager, Richard Mineck, on February 20, blaming Rogers for her difficulties with Frett and Mitchell. The next day Mineck and Bill Bowmaster, the fabrication department superintendent, discussed Cram's complaint with Rogers. They reviewed the company's sexual harassment policy with Rogers, and explained to him that coworker dating was strongly discouraged, and that retaliation against Cram for her complaint would not be tolerated. Not to be outdone, on March 4, Frett and Mitchell went to Bowmaster, complaining that Cram was continuing to spread nasty rumors about them among their coworkers. When Mineck, as part of a follow-up plan regarding Cram's February 20 complaint, talked with Cram about the situation, however, she made no complaints to him, instead stating that she had not been at work much recently, and that any problems she had were not work-related.

Things finally came to a head on April 17, when Cram and Rogers both showed up at a local bar called Kilroy's, where they had spent time together during their relationship. Rogers arrived at about 10:30 p.m., and sometime between 11 p.m. and midnight approached Cram and her group of friends. After "hovering" around, he joined them in their booth and tried to engage Cram in conversation. All parties appear to have been quite drunk. After some time, Cram climbed over Rogers to exit the booth, after which Cram and her friends, including a man Cram had met that evening, Rob Bray, then decided to move on to a restaurant, Maude's. Rogers accompanied Cram to Maude's where Cram became angry because Bray assumed that Rogers was her boyfriend. She told Rogers to leave, using abundant profanity, and explained to Bray that Rogers was not her boyfriend. Bray remonstrated with Rogers about his hanging around Cram, after which Rogers and Bray got into a fracas in which, inter alia, Rogers "flipped [Bray] off," Bray threatened to break Rogers' finger, and Rogers picked up Bray's beeper and dropped it in the street. All eventually departed Maude's and returned to their respective homes without actual violence taking place, but, as he was leaving, Rogers said to Cram, "you know I'll get you for this."

On April 24, the first event giving rise to Cram's termination took place. Cram arrived before time for her shift and asked Rogers, who was foreman that day, if she could skip work but punch in and show a "tardy" rather than an absence for the day. ³ Rogers told her that she should ask Bowmaster, because he was not sure if she could receive a "tardy" instead of an absence. Cram said she did not want to ask Bowmaster, and Rogers responded that she could work for fifteen minutes and then leave sick, "but you didn't hear that from me." Cram left, returned at her shift time, and then left again after fifteen minutes without further contacting Rogers, Bowmaster or the lead man that day, who would ordinarily be the person in charge of dismissing a worker early. Under Carlon's policy, leaving work early without first informing a supervisor is grounds for immediate dismissal. At the end of the shift, Rogers asked the lead man if Cram had told him she was leaving; the lead man said that she had not. Rogers nevertheless recorded only that Cram left early on her attendance record.

On April 28, another employee similarly left early after telling Rogers she wanted and intended to leave, but without specifically informing Rogers or another supervisor that she was in fact leaving; Rogers recorded that she left early on her record. Bowmaster met with Rogers to discuss this incident and, seeking advice as to how to handle such situations, Rogers mentioned the fact that Cram had, a few days earlier, also left early without notice to him or the lead man. When Bowmaster reported Cram's actions to Mineck, Mineck issued a five-day suspension notice for Cram, which was sent to Bowmaster as the department head. Bowmaster called a meeting with Cram, Rogers, and the union steward, Melanie Bailey, to hear Cram's explanation of the incident. Cram became upset with Bowmaster, who proposed changing her tardy mark to an absent mark and who felt that she had left work without properly notifying a supervisor. She walked out of the meeting and went to the employee locker room. Bowmaster and Bailey followed her; Bailey said that they wanted to help her, and asked her to return to the meeting. Cram responded that they should "leave [her] alone," and refused to return. After several pleas for her to return, to which Cram did not respond, Bowmaster told her that if she did not return, he would consider it insubordination, and would terminate her employment. She nevertheless did not return to the meeting and left the building.

Bowmaster suspended Cram indefinitely after this meeting, and Mineck and the plant manager then decided to terminate Cram's employment based on her misconduct in leaving work without notice and then refusing to participate in the meeting.

Cram filed suit against Carlon and Rogers, alleging sexual harassment and retaliatory termination. After Cram filed her suit, Carlon discovered that she had falsified her educational qualifications on her employment application form by untruthfully stating that she had completed high school.

The district court granted summary judgment to Carlon on all claims, and soon thereafter granted summary judgment to Rogers on grounds of issue preclusion. This appeal followed.

II. DISCUSSION

Cram argues that the district court erred in: (1) failing to properly apply a Price Waterhouse mixed motives analysis; (2) failing to apply a quid pro quo analysis; (3) granting summary judgment when a material issue of fact existed...