Feazell v. Tropicana Products, Inc., 86-3314

• Decision Date: 22 June 1987
• Docket Number: No. 86-3314,86-3314
• Citation: 819 F.2d 1036
• Parties: 44 Fair Empl.Prac.Cas. 101, 44 Empl. Prac. Dec. P 37,378, 106 Lab.Cas. P 34,924, 8 Fed.R.Serv.3d 331, 23 Fed. R. Evid. Serv. 744 Jessica B. FEAZELL, Plaintiff-Appellant, v. TROPICANA PRODUCTS, INC. Defendant-Appellee.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Eleventh Circuit

Page 1036

819 F.2d 1036

44 Fair Empl.Prac.Cas. 101,

44 Empl. Prac. Dec. P 37,378,

106 Lab.Cas. P 34,924, 8 Fed.R.Serv.3d 331,

23 Fed. R. Evid. Serv. 744

Jessica B. FEAZELL, Plaintiff-Appellant, v. TROPICANA PRODUCTS, INC. Defendant-Appellee.

No. 86-3314.

United States Court of Appeals, Eleventh Circuit.

June 22, 1987.

Robert F. McKee, Tampa, Fla., for plaintiff-appellant.

Steven L. Brannock, Holland & Knight, Tampa, Fla., for defendant-appellee.

Appeal from the United States District Court for the Middle District of Florida.

Before GODBOLD and HILL, Circuit Judges, and ESCHBACH ^*, Senior Circuit Judge.

GODBOLD, Circuit Judge:

Jessica B. Feazell, a female employee of Tropicana Products, Inc., filed suit against Tropicana alleging that it violated the Equal Pay Act of 1963, Sec. 6(d)(1) of the Fair Labor Standards Act, 29 U.S.C. Sec. 206(d)(1) and Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, 42 U.S.C. Sec. 2000e et seq., by willfully discriminating against her on the basis of her sex with regard to her compensation. Feazell's claims under the Equal Pay Act were tried to a jury, and the district court heard the claims under Title VII. Both the jury and the district court found for the defendant, and judgment was entered in favor of Tropicana on all claims.

With regard to the Equal Pay Act claims, the jury found that Feazell's job required substantially equal skill, effort, and responsibility, and was performed under similar working conditions as the work performed by Donald Brittain, Charles Donaldson, and "Harold Mussett" ¹ but that the salaries of the employees were based on factors other than sex. The jury also rendered an advisory verdict finding that Tropicana did not intentionally discriminate against Feazell on the basis of her sex in connection with her salary. On the Title VII claims the district court held that Feazell had established a prima facie case of sex-based discrimination with regard to her compensation by Tropicana but that Tropicana had articulated legitimate non-discriminatory reasons for any differences between her compensation and that of Tropicana's male accounting supervisors, reasons that Feazell failed to prove were pretextual. The district court held that Feazell failed to prove intentional discrimination by Tropicana.

On appeal Feazell makes three primary assertions: the district court evaluated Tropicana's evidence in defense of the Title VII claims under an erroneous interpretation of the applicable burden of proof; the district court erred in excluding testimony by Tropicana's management personnel offered as evidence of intentional discrimination and in denying Feazell's motion for a new trial on this ground; and the district court's findings of fact were not sufficiently detailed to permit meaningful appellate review. We affirm.

The parties entered into a pretrial stipulation in which they agreed that the burdens of proof and production on the Title VII claims were governed by the principles enunciated in McDonnell Douglas Corp. v. Green, 411 U.S. 792, 93 S.Ct. 1817, 36 L.Ed.2d 668 (1973), Furnco Construction Co. v. Waters, 438 U.S. 567, 98 S.Ct. 2943, 57 L.Ed.2d 957 (1978), and Texas Department of Community Affairs v. Burdine, 450 U.S. 248, 101 S.Ct. 1089, 67 L.Ed.2d 207 (1981). The district court entered a pretrial order stating that the pretrial stipulation was approved and adopted and along with the order was to govern the trial of the case.

Feazell's claims turn on allegations that seven male employees were paid more wages than she for substantially equal work. At trial Feazell attempted to introduce the testimony of Wingate, who had been a manager in the Financial Department at Tropicana, and the deposition testimony of Mattson, who at the time of the deposition was manager of Tropicana's Payroll and Accounts Payable Departments, as evidence of intentional discrimination by Tropicana. In an effort to establish the attitudes of Rossi, the founder of Tropicana and its president until it was sold to Beatrice Foods, and Ogleby, its Vice President of Finance, Feazell asked Wingate:

In your position as a manager in the financial department at Tropicana, did you ever express the view that Mr. Rossi and Mr. Ogleby did not pay women as much as men?

Tropicana's objection to this question as irrelevant personal opinion was sustained by the court.

Feazell later attempted to introduce the following deposition testimony of Mattson:

Q: Were you employed at Tropicana when Mr. Rossi was there?

A: Yes.

Q: Were you employed when Mr. Ogleby was there?

A: Yes.

Q: Did you ever tell George Feazell that Mr. Rossi and Mr. Ogleby did not like to pay women what men were paid?

A: Yes.

Q: In your opinion is that attitude still prevalent at Tropicana?

A: Not as much.

Tropicana objected to the testimony as irrelevant, and the district court sustained the objection:

What this question is is did you ever tell George Feazell that Mr. Rossi and Mr. Ogleby did not like to pay women what men were paid? His answer was yes. There is no suggestion here that that was, in fact, either Mr. Rossi or Mr. Ogleby's belief, opinion or that they had ever made such a statement. This is this witness's testimony that that's what he told George Feazell. We don't know whether its true or not....

* * *

[i]f [Wingate and Mattson's] opinion becomes material, then you may elicit their opinion, but not with that background, and there is no basis set forth for this opinion to get a manager from Tropicana, put him on the stand and say, in your opinion, does Tropicana discriminate against women? You can't ask him that question that way. You need to lay a predicate showing some basis for which--on which that opinion is predicated and showing some foundation for it. But just to say that because he has a position in the firm, in Tropicana and he has the personal opinion that Tropicana discriminates against women is not....

Feazell timely filed a motion for new trial challenging the district court's failure to admit the testimony of both Wingate and Mattson into evidence on the ground that their statements were admissions by Tropicana's management personnel admissible under Fed.R.Evid. 801(d)(2)(D). The motion was denied.

The district court's conclusion that Tropicana had not violated Title VII rested on extensive factual findings. Plaintiff is a white female who has been employed by defendant Tropicana since March of 1973. She had no previous formal accounting education or experience and was intially employed as a clerk but then promoted to "accountant" in 1978 and to "supervisor-cost accounting" in 1983. Plaintiff completed four accounting classes between 1979 and 1983 but has no college degree or professional certification in accounting. She has received regular increases in salary.

The district court found that Feazell had proven that the work she performed required equal skill, effort and responsibility and was performed under similar working conditions as that performed by the seven male supervisors to whom she compared her position and that Tropicana paid a lower wage to her than to such male employees. The court concluded, however, that sex was not a factor in Tropicana's employment decisions and actions regarding the compensation of Feazell and these seven male employees. The court set forth the qualifications, years with Tropicana, and salaries of the seven male supervisors and compared their salaries and raises at various points to those of Feazell. It concluded that the differences between Feazell's salary and that of each male supervisor were based on factors other than sex, including CPA certification, length of service with Tropicana, annual merit raises, promotions, participation in the bonus-buyout, ² years as supervisor, prior accounting experience, college degree in accounting, or refusal to accept a lower initial salary at Tropicana.

I. BURDEN OF PROOF ON TITLE VII CLAIMS

Feazell contends that the district court erred when it allocated the burdens of proof and production according to the structure set forth in McDonnell Douglas under which the burden of production shifts to the defendant to articulate a legitimate, non-discriminatory reason for wage disparities once a plaintiff has established a prima facie case of discrimination under Title VII, but the burden of persuasion always remains with the plaintiff alleging sex discrimination. See McDonnell Douglas Corp. v. Green, 411 U.S. 792, 93 S.Ct. 1817, 36 L.Ed.2d 668 (1973); Texas Department of Community Affairs v. Burdine, 450 U.S. 248, 101 S.Ct. 1089, 67 L.Ed.2d 207 (1981). ³ In County of Washington, Oregon v. Gunther, 452 U.S. 161, 101 S.Ct. 2242, 68 L.Ed.2d 751 (1981) the Supreme Court held that the "Bennett Amendment" to Title VII extended the protection of the four affirmative defenses of the Equal Pay Act to Title VII actions for sex-based wage discrimination and therefore that wage differentials attributable to one of the four affirmative defenses are not unlawful employment practices under Title VII. ⁴ The Court, however, explicitly refrained from deciding how burdens of proof or production should be structured in a Title VII action premised on a claim of sex-based wage discrimination and the Eleventh Circuit has yet to reach the issue. Feazell contends that when a Title VII claim addresses salary discrepancies between male and female employees performing the same work, the burden of proof should be allocated in the same fashion as in actions under the Equal Pay Act, i.e., the burden that shifts to the defendant to rebut a prima facie case of sex-based wage discrimination should be one of both production and persuasion and not of mere production and should be limited to the four affirmative defenses set forth in the Equal Pay Act.

We find it unnecessary to reach this issue because of the pretrial stipulation between the parties in which they agreed that the burdens of proof and production in the Title VII action were...