DiMartino v. City of Hartford

• Citation: 636 F. Supp. 1241
• Decision Date: 23 May 1986
• Docket Number: Civ. No. H-81-637(MJB).
• Court: U.S. District Court — District of Connecticut
• Parties: Salvatore DiMARTINO, v. CITY OF HARTFORD and George W. Sicaras, Chief of Police.

636 F. Supp. 1241

Salvatore DiMARTINO, v. CITY OF HARTFORD and George W. Sicaras, Chief of Police.

Civ. No. H-81-637(MJB).

United States District Court, D. Connecticut.

May 23, 1986.

Robert W. Heagney, Gilman & Marks, East Hartford, Conn., for plaintiff.

Richard M. Cosgrove, Deputy Corp. Counsel, Hartford, Conn., for defendant.

RULING ON DEFENDANT CITY OF HARTFORD'S MOTION FOR SUMMARY JUDGMENT

BLUMENFELD, Senior District Judge.

Salvatore DiMartino brought this action in 1981 against the defendants, former Police Chief George Sicaras and the City of Hartford, alleging that they failed to reinstate him to the Hartford Police Force because of his age, in violation of the Age Discrimination in Employment Act (ADEA), 29 U.S.C. §§ 621-634 (1976 & Supp. IV 1980). Following a period of discovery and negotiations between the parties, the attorneys for DiMartino and the City of Hartford drafted and signed a "Settlement Agreement" in which DiMartino agreed to withdraw this action in return for certain concessions on the part of the City of Hartford relating to DiMartino's effort to gain reinstatement. DiMartino personally signed that agreement on November 6. 1984. Defendant City of Hartford now moves for summary judgment claiming that the settlement agreement validly compromised the instant action, and that the City of Hartford fully performed its promises under the agreement, thereby barring the plaintiff from pursuing this ADEA claim. DiMartino contests the enforceability of the settlement agreement under the terms of the ADEA, and further contends that he signed the agreement under duress, that the agreement was void for lack of consideration, and that the City of Hartford never fully performed its obligations as agreed. This case raises the question of the appropriate law to apply in evaluating the validity of compromises of actions brought under the ADEA.

I. The Facts

Except where indicated, the following facts are not in dispute.

The plaintiff, Salvatore DiMartino, was born on January 16, 1929. He joined the Hartford Police Force as a patrolman in 1953. In 1962, while directing traffic in an intersection, DiMartino was struck by an automobile and injured his knee. DiMartino reinjured his knee while on police duty in 1966. Claiming a twenty percent permanent partial disability, DiMartino applied to the Employee Pension Commission for the City of Hartford for permission to retire from the police force with a service-connected disability pension. The commission informed him that he could retire with a "special disability allowance," which is designed for a municipal employee with sufficient length of service "who suffers a permanent job-related disability which does not prevent him from engaging in gainful employment" apart from his job duties with the city. DiMartino retired from the police force in May 1967 and began collecting his pension allowance of approximately $3650 per year. He was 38 years old at the time.¹

In June 1980, believing himself to be rehabilitated, DiMartino requested reinstatement as an officer with the City of Hartford. DiMartino claims that he was denied reinstatement and was told that the reason for the denial was that he was too old.

On August 27, 1981, DiMartino filed this action in federal court. Apparently as a result of the filing of this suit the City of Hartford gave DiMartino a medical examination in September 1982 to determine if he was physically qualified to be rehired. The examining physician determined that he was not qualified because of faulty vision and high blood pressure, and because he had a history of both major joint surgery and spinal column surgery.

DiMartino continued to pursue his claim. Following a period of discovery the parties engaged in settlement negotiations. In the spring of 1984, Aaron Slitt, one of DiMartino's attorneys at the time, and Marie Cone of the City of Hartford's Office of Corporation Counsel, reached a tentative agreement to settle the DiMartino case. Attorney Cone drafted a "Settlement Agreement" and mailed it unsigned to Attorney Slitt.² In the proposed agreement DiMartino agreed to withdraw his lawsuit in exchange for the opportunity to take and pass all examinations necessary to become an entry-level police officer.

For reasons unexplained Attorney Slitt did not immediately sign and return the agreement. Several months later, on October 23, 1984, Slitt sent a letter to Attorney Cone proposing a modification of the proposal that would have permitted DiMartino to be reinstated as an officer commensurate with his experience, rather than as a probationary recruit. Attorney Cone rejected the modification.

Shortly thereafter Slitt signed the draft of the original proposal that had been mailed to him and returned it to Cone. According to Slitt, DiMartino was present when Slitt signed the agreement, and consented to his signature. According to DiMartino, he was not aware that Slitt signed the agreement or that he sent it to Cone.

On November 6, 1984, Attorney Cone telephoned Slitt and requested his permission to ask DiMartino to add his signature to the settlement agreement. Slitt gave her that permission, and Cone immediately phoned DiMartino and asked him to come to her office. DiMartino arrived a few minutes later. He was presented with the agreement signed by Slitt, with the addition of a space typed in for DiMartino's signature. He signed and dated the agreement in the presence of Attorney Slitt and Bernard Sullivan, the Chief of Police at that time. Attorney Cone also signed the agreement that day.

Pursuant to the settlement agreement, on December 20, 1984 the City of Hartford Health Department gave DiMartino a physical examination to determine whether he was qualified for the position of police officer. The following day the City's Department of Personnel sent DiMartino a letter informing him that he was not qualified to be a police officer because of excessive weight and high blood pressure.

DiMartino was subsequently allowed an appeal of his disqualification in accordance with the City's personnel regulations. DiMartino was informed by a letter dated January 8, 1985 that his appeal was denied.

II. Analysis

Where the parties to a dispute have entered into a valid settlement agreement to pending litigation, that agreement will be enforced by the court. See, e.g., National Lawyers Guild v. Attorney General, 94 F.R.D. 592, 599 (S.D.N.Y.1982). A valid settlement agreement will be held to bar those parties on the underlying claim. Aro Corporation v. Allied Witan Co., 531 F.2d 1368, 1371 (6th Cir.), cert. denied, 429 U.S. 862, 97 S.Ct. 165, 50 L.Ed.2d 140 (1976). Courts may enforce such agreements summarily. See, e.g., National Lawyers Guild v. Attorney General, 94 F.R.D. at 597 n. 2; Cia Anon Venezolana de Navegacion v. Harris, 374 F.2d 33 (5th Cir.1967).

In this case the settlement agreement at issue was validly signed by attorneys for the plaintiff and the City of Hartford, and was separately signed by the plaintiff himself. That alone would normally be sufficient for an award of summary judgment against plaintiff. Here, however, plaintiff raises several challenges to the agreement on statutory and common law grounds. These are (1) that such agreements to settle age discrimination suits are unenforceable and void under the terms of the ADEA, (2) that the settlement agreement is void for lack of consideration, (3) that the City of Hartford failed to perform its promises under the agreement thereby excusing the plaintiff from his promise to withdraw the suit, and (4) that the plaintiff was under duress when he signed, thereby permitting him to void the contract.

A. The Statutory Challenge

DiMartino initially challenges the validity of the settlement agreement by claiming that the Age Discrimination in Employment Act flatly bars private settlements of age discrimination claims. He bases this argument on the interrelationship between the ADEA and the Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938 (FLSA), which sets nationwide standards governing minimum wages and overtime pay for employees in interstate commerce. 29 U.S.C. §§ 206, 207; Brooklyn Savings Bank v. O'Neil, 324 U.S. 697, 698-99, 65 S.Ct. 895, 898, 89 L.Ed. 1296 (1945). Section 7(b) of the ADEA, 29 U.S.C. § 626(b), provides that the rights created by the ADEA are to be "enforced in accordance with the powers, remedies and procedures of" specified sections of the FLSA. See Lorillard v. Pons, 434 U.S. 575, 579, 98 S.Ct. 866, 869, 55 L.Ed.2d 40 (1978); Goodman v. Heublein, Inc., 645 F.2d 127, 129 (2d Cir.1981). DiMartino points out that one of these specified FLSA sections, section 16(b), has been interpreted by the Supreme Court to prohibit settlements of FLSA wage claims, even where the employee and employer have agreed to compromise a bona fide dispute over the amount of wages legally owed. Schulte, Inc. v. Gangi, 328 U.S. 108, 114-16, 66 S.Ct. 925, 928-29, 90 L.Ed. 1114 (1946); Brooklyn Savings Bank v. O'Neil, 324 U.S. at 707-14, 65 S.Ct. at 902-06. DiMartino claims that by incorporating FLSA "powers, remedies and procedures," section 7(b) of the ADEA also incorporates the FLSA's strict prohibition against settlement.³ This court disagrees.

The Supreme Court had occasion to consider the scope of the ADEA's incorporation of FLSA procedures in Lorillard v. Pons, 434 U.S. at 577-83, 98 S.Ct. at 868-72, where the Court held that the ADEA incorporates the FLSA's right to a trial by jury. In that case the Court observed that Congress modeled the ADEA on Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, the FLSA, and other existing statutes. Id. at 578, 98 S.Ct. at 868. In the process the ADEA became "something of a hybrid, reflecting, on the one hand Congress' desire to use an existing statutory scheme ... and, on the other hand, its dissatisfaction with some elements of each of the preexisting schemes." Id. at 578, 98 S.Ct. at 868. The Court pointed out that section 7(b) of the ADEA evi...