Hine v. Extremity Imaging Partners Inc.

• Decision Date: 25 February 2011
• Docket Number: No. 1:09–cv–416–SEB–TAB.,1:09–cv–416–SEB–TAB.
• Citation: 773 F.Supp.2d 788
• Parties: Tamara M. HINE, Plaintiff,v.EXTREMITY IMAGING PARTNERS, INC., Defendant.
• Court: U.S. District Court — Southern District of Indiana

773 F.Supp.2d 788

Tamara M. HINE, Plaintiff,

v.EXTREMITY IMAGING PARTNERS, INC., Defendant.

No. 1:09–cv–416–SEB–TAB.

United States District Court, S.D. Indiana, Indianapolis Division.

Feb. 25, 2011.

Richard L. Darst, Cohen Garelick & Glazier, Indianapolis, IN, for Plaintiff.Maureen E. Ward, Wooden & McLaughlin LLP, Indianapolis, IN, Toni L. Digiacobbe, Wexford, PA, for Defendant.

ENTRY GRANTING DEFENDANT'S MOTION FOR SUMMARY JUDGMENT

SARAH EVANS BARKER, District Judge.

This matter is before the court on Defendant Extremity Imaging Partners, Inc.'s (“EIP”) Motion for Summary Judgment (Doc. # 36). For the reasons explicated in this entry, the motion is granted.

Factual Background ¹

EIP is a company which provides magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) services and support specifically focused on a patient's extremities. During the time periods relevant to this lawsuit, it marketed its services to physician specialists, such as podiatrists, in part through regional account managers. The six regional account managers working at the time Plaintiff held that position with EIP answered to George Beluk, who worked out of EIP's home offices in Wexford, Pennsylvania. Not long after Plaintiff's employment was terminated, EIP let all of its regional account managers go due to financial circumstances.

In November 2006, Beluk hired Susan DeMunbrun as a part-time account manager to cover the Indianapolis region. Ms. DeMunbrun worked in that capacity for a little less than seven months before resigning because she found it too difficult to work for Beluk. According to DeMunbrun, Beluk had a poor reputation for honesty, asked her to lie to a superior if she were ever asked about a particular division sale Beluk had discussed with her and, in general, made it hard for her to do her job. While DeMunbrun states that Beluk never made any sexual advances toward her, he did make her feel uncomfortable during her short tenure by referring to the regional managers as his “girls,” commenting on other employee's sexual affairs and referring to her “nice looks.” According to DeMunbrun, Kim Bourke, an account manager from Dayton, Ohio, who interacted often with DeMunbrun, had complained to her as well about her feelings of discomfort around Beluk.

After DeMunbrun resigned in May 2007, Beluk offered the job to Plaintiff, Tamara Hine, who had applied to and interviewed with Beluk for the Indianapolis position when it had been offered to DeMunbrun. Beluk telephoned Hine and told her that the previous hire had not worked out and he wanted Hine to consider taking the job of part-time ² account manager for EIP in the Indianapolis region. Hine recalls that Beluk had made her feel somewhat uncomfortable by the way he had stared at her during her interview, but she was not particularly concerned about that and thought that she was a good fit for the job based on her past marketing experience, so she accepted the offer of employment.

Hine traveled to Dayton on May 30, 2007, to complete her employment paperwork, to meet with Beluk and to receive training from Kim Bourke. While in Dayton, her training consisted of shadowing Bourke on doctor's calls and discussing Bourke's daily routine with her. Beluk had provided her with a box of information and materials that had come from DeMunbrun and told Hine to take as much time as she needed to study the company's services and prepare herself to market them. Hine had worked in the health care industry previously, prior to putting her career on hold to raise her children.

On the evening of May 30, 2007, Hine, Bourke and Beluk went to dinner. Hine felt that Beluk was staring at her again, similar to his behavior during her interview. Beluk commented about how lucky he was to be having dinner with two attractive women and that other men in the restaurant were probably trying to figure out why he was the lucky guy with two attractive dates. Such comments from Beluk as well as what Hine describes as other non-personal “sexual” jokes or comments made by Beluk that evening left her feeling uncomfortable. However, since she was going to be working in Indiana, she did not think it likely that Beluk's conduct would be repeated or that he would cause any problems for her in her day-to-day work.

In July 2007, Beluk traveled to Indianapolis for a marketing lunch and a client appreciation dinner which Hine had arranged. In between the lunch and dinner, Beluk again made “snide little sexual jokes” and commented on Hine's appearance. According to Hine, Beluk was very professional and all business while they were with the podiatrists at lunch and dinner, but when the doctors were not around, he made inappropriate comments and continued to stare at her in a way that made her feel uncomfortable.

In late September 2007, the Indiana Podiatric Medical Association held a conference in Indianapolis. Hine, Bourke and Beluk attended the conference and, according to Hine, Beluk continued to make offensive comments and tell sexual jokes while around her and Bourke. Unlike the other times they were together concerning which Hine has no recollection of Beluk's specific sexual or distasteful comments, during the conference Beluk told stories and made specific statements which Hine does recall as being highly inappropriate. Beluk told Hine and Bourke, embellished by a descriptive rude gesture, that his wife was a “feisty little redhead” who had given him “the finger” the first time he approached her. Beluk commented that his wife's feisty attitude is what “turned him on”; he later mentioned that he thought Hine and Bourke had some “feistiness” in their personalities as well. At some point in their conversations, Bourke commented that her mother was aging and her “rear end was drooping,” to which Beluk responded that he couldn't imagine either Bourke or Hine being in that condition. Both Bourke and Beluk also commented in detail about an employee at the home office who was apparently notorious for wearing revealing attire.

According to Hine, while Beluk was in Indianapolis attending the convention, Bourke had begged her to go with them to dinner because it was so exhausting for Bourke to try to keep Beluk entertained and she was not always comfortable being alone with him. However, Hine had previous commitments which prevented her going to dinner with Bourke and Beluk. Over the course of her employment with EIP, Hine claims to have had several other conversations with Bourke regarding Beluk's inappropriate comments and behavior and the manner in which he made both women feel uncomfortable when they were around him.

Hine received no hands-on training or instruction and had only very limited interaction with anyone other than Beluk from the home office. Her job was to grow the business in the Indianapolis area and make sure the current customers of EIP were satisfied. Beluk encouraged her to develop marketing strategies, providing her with a book to help inspire her. She would fax her time sheets and her expense reimbursement requests to Judy Moffa, EIP's Vice President of Business Administration, but Hine claims she was never informed of the names of people who occupied the company's chain of command. Nor did Hine ever receive an employee handbook, policies or guidelines and, despite her request to Beluk for an opportunity to do so, she never visited the home offices in Pennsylvania.

Beluk telephoned Hine often, too often, in her opinion. He would often discuss personal issues in addition to work related matters. He would discuss his and Hine's spouses and inquire as to who wore the pants in her family or whether, like him, she enjoyed “making up” after arguments. During one such conversation, Hine told Beluk that “it was too much information” and his remarks were becoming “inappropriate.”

On one occasion, Hine mispronounced Beluk's name during a conversation and, in response, Beluk told Hine he was going to have to start calling her “Hiney.” Another time Beluk expressed to Hine his belief that women hold an advantage over men as salespersons because they are able to use their sex appeal on the job. Beluk encouraged Hine to use her attractiveness to her advantage in connection with her visits to doctors' offices. Hine would attempt to discourage Beluk from making what she considered inappropriate statements by not responding to them, or, if he were talking with her in-person, by walking away or turning her head away.

On November 10, 2007, Hine and her husband traveled to Pennsylvania to attend the EIP holiday party. They met Beluk and his wife at the hotel where the party was held and, according to Hine, Beluk immediately began flirting by commenting on how attractive Hine looked and mentioning how lucky he was to have the best looking department in the company. According to Ms. Bourke, during the party Beluk told many of the employees, including Bourke, that they looked beautiful or amazing. Hine described Beluk as having “wandering eyes” during the holiday party.

Hine claims that when she worked more than the 25–hour limit for a particular week which she was supposed to adhere to as a part-time employee, Beluk authorized her to “carry-over” any extra hours to the next week's time sheet. On December 20, 2007, in an e-mail exchange with Beluk, Hine wrote: “Also, just fyi ... I will be carrying over some hours to next week. I really want to spend some time (and need some input) in trying to put together some type of marketing packet.” When Hine submitted her time sheet to Judy Moffa for the week following Christmas 2007, she included a full 25 hours, with time included for the 26th, 27th and 28th of December. Moffa was suspicious of the hours submitted by Hine because she knew that quite a few doctors close their offices during the week following Christmas. Moffa telephoned Hine to inquire about the weekly hours report she had submitted. Hine explained that the hours listed for the 26th were hours carried over from the...