Gorbea v. Verizon N.Y., Inc., 11-CV-3758 (KAM)(LB)

• Decision Date: 25 June 2014
• Docket Number: 11-CV-3758 (KAM)(LB)
• Parties: SONYA GORBEA, Plaintiff, v. VERIZON NEW YORK, INC., Defendant.
• Court: U.S. District Court — Eastern District of New York

SONYA GORBEA, Plaintiff, v. VERIZON NEW YORK, INC., Defendant.

11-CV-3758 (KAM)(LB)

UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT EASTERN DISTRICT OF NEW YORK

Dated: June 25, 2014

MEMORANDUM & ORDER

MATSUMOTO, United States District Judge:

Presently before the court are the parties' motions in limine.¹ Defendant moves to exclude from trial evidence regarding claims previously dismissed by the court in ruling on the parties' cross-motions for summary judgment and claims that plaintiff presented to the New York State Workers' Compensation Board. (ECF Nos. 48-49.) Plaintiff moves to preclude defendant from asserting an affirmative defense (and evidence thereof) of undue hardship to plaintiff's disability accommodation claims. (ECF No. 50.) For the reasons set forth below, defendant's motion to exclude from trial claims previously dismissed by the court is granted. Defendant's motion to exclude evidence regarding claims presented to the Workers' Compensation Board is granted in part and denied in part, and plaintiff's motion to exclude the undue hardship defense is denied. As previously decided, and as will be discussed below, only the followingclaims will be tried in this case: 1) whether defendant failed to accommodate plaintiff's alleged disability related to her back, in violation of the Americans with Disabilities Act ("ADA") and New York City Human Rights Law ("NYCHRL") (the court previously determined that plaintiff is not disabled due to back-related limitations in the major life activity of working); and 2) whether plaintiff was suspended from her job in October of 2010 in retaliation for requesting certain accommodations, in violation of the ADA only. The NYCHRL retaliation claims are barred by the prior decision of the Workers' Compensation Board.

DISCUSSION

I. Motion in Limine Standard

The purpose of a motion in limine is to allow the trial court to rule in advance of trial on the admissibility and relevance of certain forecasted evidence. See Luce v. United States, 469 U.S. 38, 40 n.2 (1984); Palmieri v. Defaria, 88 F.3d 136, 141 (2d Cir. 1996); Nat'l Union Fire Ins. Co. v. L.E. Myers Co. Grp., 937 F. Supp. 276, 283 (S.D.N.Y. 1996). "Evidence should be excluded on a motion in limine only when the evidence is clearly inadmissible on all potential grounds." United States v. Paredes, 176 F. Supp. 2d 179, 181 (S.D.N.Y. 2001). Further, the court's ruling regarding a motion in limine is "subject to change when the case unfolds, particularly if theactual testimony differs from what was [expected]." Luce 469 U.S. at 41.

II. Defendant's Motion to Exclude Evidence of Previously Dismissed Claims

On March 10, 2014, the court issued an order denying plaintiff's motion for summary judgment and granting in part and denying in part defendant's motion for summary judgment. ("Mem. & Order," ECF No. 46.) In its order, the court made the following rulings: 1) that plaintiff's lumbosacral sprain did not substantially limit the major life activity of working (Mem. & Order at 18-20); 2) that plaintiff's asthma did not constitute a disability as defined by the ADA (Mem. & Order at 21-22); and 3) that plaintiff's current medical leave is not retaliatory (Mem. & Order at 31-33). In addition, the court declined to analyze whether plaintiff's asthma would be considered a disability under the NYCHRL because, having dismissed plaintiff's federal claim regarding her asthma, it would not exercise supplemental jurisdiction over plaintiff's related asthma claims under the NYCHRL. (Mem. & Order at 22.) See also, e.g., Thomas v. City of New York, 953 F. Supp. 2d 444, 462 (E.D.N.Y. 2013) ("Especially in light of the Second Circuit's decision in Mihalik v. Credit Agricole Cheuvreux North America, Inc., 715 F.3d 102 (2d Cir. 2013), recognizing that the NYCHRL has a lower threshold of proof than its federal counterparts,comity suggests that the state courts should resolve these local law claims. This is particularly appropriate since this heightened standard has been applied primarily at the intermediate appellate level of the state courts, with limited opportunity for the New York Court of Appeals to construe it, and thus there is no reason for a federal court to apply the statute [to a claim over which] it no longer has original jurisdiction."). Accordingly, the court, in the March 10, 2014 Memorandum and Order, granted defendant's summary judgment motion regarding plaintiff's disability due to her asthma and dismissed plaintiff's asthma accommodation claim. (See Mem. & Order at 22.)

Except as provided herein, claims that were dismissed or determined by summary judgment, including the alleged failure to accommodate plaintiff's asthma, the finding that plaintiff's alleged back disability does not limit the major life activity of working, and the determination that plaintiff's current medical leave is not retaliatory, may not be tried, and evidence relating thereto may not be introduced at trial. Federal Rule of Evidence 402 states that "[i]rrelevant evidence is not admissible." The Rules define evidence as relevant if: "(a) it has any tendency to make a fact more or less probable than it would be without the evidence; and (b) the fact is of consequence in determining the action." Fed. R. Evid. 401. Thepreviously dismissed claims, and evidence thereof, are not "of consequence in determining the action" and therefore will be excluded. Id. ; see also Hamza v. Saks Fifth Ave., Inc., No. 07-CV-5974, 2011 WL 6187078, at *7 (S.D.N.Y. Dec. 5, 2011) (excluding, pursuant to Federal Rules of Evidence 401 and 402, evidence of previously dismissed disability discrimination claims where only plaintiff's retaliatory discharge claims were at issue at trial). Accordingly, defendant's motion to preclude previously dismissed claims and evidence thereof is granted.

III. Defendant's Motion to Preclude Claims Presented to the Workers' Compensation Board

Defendant moves to exclude certain of plaintiff's claims that she previously presented to the Workers' Compensation Board on the grounds that they are barred by the doctrines of collateral estoppel and res judicata. For the reasons set forth below, defendant's motion is granted in part and denied in part.

On October 21, 2010, plaintiff was suspended for thirty days for, according to her supervisor, being "off the job" without permission on October 18, 2010. (Ltr. dated Oct. 21, 2010, ECF No. 49-2, at 34.) Plaintiff filed a complaint with the Workers' Compensation Board stating that she left work to get fresh air because she was having difficulty breathing, due to a recent fumigation after work hours in the building.(Discrimination Compl., ECF No. 49-2, at 36.) On April 27, 2011, the Board found that plaintiff's "lost time claimed was due to her being suspended and unrelated to her medical condition" and that her suspension was "for nondiscriminatory purposes" and that defendant did not act with retaliatory intent in suspending plaintiff. (Notice of Bd. Decision, Pl. Summ. J. Ex. 9, ECF No. 29-9; Bd. Decision., ECF No. 49-2, at 39.) The decision was affirmed by an administrative panel on appeal. (Bd. Panel Decision, ECF No. 49-2, at 41.)

Defendant argues that the Workers' Compensation Board's decision bars this court's consideration of plaintiff's claim that her suspension was in retaliation for protected activities under the ADA. It is, however, "well established that state administrative proceedings not reviewed by state court do not have preclusive effect on an ADA claim."² Greenberg v. N.Y.C. Trans. Auth., 336 F. Supp. 2d 225, 242-43 (E.D.N.Y. 2004) (holding that a Workers' Compensation Board decision did not have preclusive effect in an ADA action and noting the differences between retaliation claims under the ADA and Workers' Compensation Law); see also Kosakow v. New Rochelle Radiology Assocs., P.C., 274 F.3d 706, 735 (2d Cir. 2001)(noting that an administrative decision by the New York State Division of Human Rights "would have . . . no effect on subsequent federal litigation.").

Although plaintiff's federal ADA retaliation claim is not precluded by the decision of the Workers' Compensation Board, the Board's decision is nonetheless relevant to plaintiff's federal retaliation claims at trial. Federal courts give "great weight" to findings of fact made during state administrative proceedings. Ragusa v. United Parcel Serv., No. 05-CV-6187, 2008 WL 612729, at *5 (S.D.N.Y. Mar. 3, 2008) (collecting cases). Therefore, defendant's motion is denied to the extent defendant seeks to preclude plaintiff from asserting federal retaliation claims at trial but evidence of the Workers' Compensation Board decision may be presented at trial.

The Workers' Compensation Board's decision, however, precludes plaintiff's NYCHRL retaliation claims based on plaintiff's alleged asthma and back sprain. "[F]ederal courts must give a state agency acting in a judicial capacity 'the same preclusive effect to which it would be entitled in the State's courts' as long as 'the parties have had an adequate opportunity to litigate.'" Rahman v. Museum of Natural History, No. 10-CV-921, 2012 WL 1077679, at *8 (E.D.N.Y. Mar. 30, 2012) (quoting DeCintio v. Westchester Cnty. Med. Ctr., 821 F.2d 111, 116 (2d Cir. 1987)). An administrative agency's ruling collaterallyestops the plaintiff from relitigating her NYCHRL claim when "(1) the issue sought to be precluded is identical to a material issue necessarily decided by the administrative agency; and (2) there was a full and fair opportunity to contest the issue." Id. (citing Jeffreys v. Griffin, 1 N.Y.3d 34, 39 (2003)).

The court agrees with defendant that the Workers' Compensation Board decision has a preclusive effect under New York law on plaintiff's NYCHRL claims. The issues and retaliation claim presented to the Workers' Compensation Board are identical to those before the court under the NYCHRL, to the extent plaintiff claims that her suspension was based on discriminatory retaliation. The provision of the ...