Karraker v. Rent-a-Center, Inc.

• Decision Date: 14 June 2005
• Docket Number: No. 04-2881.,04-2881.
• Citation: 411 F.3d 831
• Parties: Steven L. KARRAKER, Michael A. Karraker, and Christopher M. Karraker, Plaintiffs-Appellants, v. RENT-A-CENTER, INC., J. Ernest Tally, and Associated Personnel Technicians, Defendants-Appellees.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Seventh Circuit

411 F.3d 831

Steven L. KARRAKER, Michael A. Karraker, and Christopher M. Karraker, Plaintiffs-Appellants, v. RENT-A-CENTER, INC., J. Ernest Tally, and Associated Personnel Technicians, Defendants-Appellees.

No. 04-2881.

United States Court of Appeals, Seventh Circuit.

Argued January 4, 2005.

Decided June 14, 2005.

COPYRIGHT MATERIAL OMITTED

Mary L. Leahy (argued), Springfield, IL, for Plaintiffs-Appellants.

M. Brenk Johnson (argued), Jarrett R. Andrews, Winstead Sechrest & Minick, Dallas, TX, Gary Ayers, Foulson & Siefkin, Wichita, KS, for Defendants-Appellees.

Before FLAUM, Chief Judge, and EVANS and WILLIAMS, Circuit Judges.

TERENCE T. EVANS, Circuit Judge.

To prove their worth prior to the annual college draft, NFL teams test aspiring professional football players' ability to run, catch, and throw. But that's not all. In addition to the physical tests, a draft prospect also takes up to 15 personality and knowledge tests, answering questions such as:

Assume the first two statements are true.

The boy plays football. All football players wear helmets. The boy wears a helmet.

Is the final statement:

"True?

"False?

"Not certain

They are also asked questions like "What is the ninth month of the year?" See Richard Hoffer, "Get Smart!", Sports Illustrated (Sept. 5, 1994).

This case involves a battery of nonphysical tests similar to some of those given by NFL teams, though the employees here applied for less glamorous, and far less well-paying, positions. Steven, Michael, and Christopher Karraker are brothers who worked for Rent-A-Center (RAC), a chain of stores that offer appliances, furniture, and other household goods on a rent-to-own basis. During the relevant time, each RAC store had a store manager, several middle managers, and entry-level account managers. Most new employees start as account managers and can progress to upper-level positions. In order to secure a promotion, however, an employee was required to take the APT Management Trainee-Executive Profile, which was made up of nine tests designed to measure math and language skills as well as interests and personality traits.

As part of the APT Test, the Karrakers and others were asked 502 questions from the Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory (MMPI), a test RAC said it used to measure personality traits. But the MMPI does not simply measure such potentially relevant traits as whether someone works well in groups or is comfortable in a fast-paced office. Instead, the MMPI considers where an applicant falls on scales measuring traits such as depression, hypochondriasis, hysteria, paranoia, and mania.¹ In fact, elevated scores on certain scales of the MMPI can be used in diagnoses of certain psychiatric disorders.

All parts of the APT Test were scored together, and any applicant who had more than 12 "weighted deviations" was not considered for promotion. Thus, an applicant could be denied any chance for advancement simply because of his or her score on the MMPI. The Karrakers, who all had more than 12 deviations on the APT, sued on behalf of the employees at 106 Illinois RAC stores, claiming RAC's use of the MMPI as part of its testing program violated the Americans With Disabilities Act of 1990(ADA). They also claimed that RAC failed to protect the confidentiality of the test results in violation of Illinois tort law.

The district court first granted RAC's motion for partial summary judgment on Steven Karraker's failure to promote claim, finding that he did not file his charge of discrimination with the EEOC within 300 days of any alleged discrimination. The court also granted the Karrakers' motion for class certification on the ADA and public disclosure of private facts claims.

The district court later granted RAC's motion for summary judgment and denied the Karrakers' motion for summary judgment on the outstanding claims with the exception of Steven Karraker's wrongful termination claim. The Karrakers stipulated to the dismissal of that claim to allow this appeal to go forward. Here, they challenge the district court's decision that the use of the MMPI did not violate the ADA, the dismissal of Steven Karraker's failure to promote claim, and the dismissal of the Karrakers' claim of public disclosure of private facts. We review the district court's grant of summary judgment de novo. See Carreon v. Ill. Dep't of Human Servs., 395 F.3d 786, 790 (7th Cir.2005).

Americans with disabilities often faced barriers to joining and succeeding in the workforce. These barriers were not limited to inaccessible physical structures. They also included attitudinal barriers resulting from unfounded stereotypes and prejudice. People with psychiatric disabilities have suffered as a result of such attitudinal barriers, with an employment rate dramatically lower than people without disabilities and far lower than people with other types of disabilities. See Jans, Stoddard & Kraus, Chartbook on Mental Health and Disability in the United States, U.S. Department of Education, National Institute on Disability and Rehabilitation Research, 2004, figure 11, www.infouse.com.

Congress enacted the ADA, 42 U.S.C. §§ 12101 et seq., to "provide a clear and comprehensive national mandate for the elimination of discrimination against individuals with disabilities." 42 U.S.C. § 12101(b)(1). Congress recognized that "the Nation's proper goals regarding individuals with disabilities are to assure equality of opportunity, full participation, independent living, and economic self-sufficiency for such individuals." 42 U.S.C. § 12101(a)(8). The ADA's definition of disability is not limited to physical impairments, but also includes mental impairments. 42 U.S.C. § 12102(2). Title I of the ADA, 42 U.S.C. § 12111, is devoted to eliminating employment discrimination based on actual or perceived disabilities.

Congress enacted three provisions in Title I which explicitly limit the ability of employers to use "medical examinations and inquiries" (42 U.S.C. § 12112(d)(1)) as a condition of employment: a prohibition against using pre-employment medical tests; a prohibition against the use of medical tests that lack job-relatedness and business necessity; and a prohibition against the use of tests which screen out (or tend to screen out) people with disabilities.

At its heart, the issue in this case is whether the MMPI fits the ADA's definition of a "medical examination." In that regard, we note the parties' agreement that, although the Karrakers were already employed by RAC, the tests here were administered "pre-employment" for ADA purposes because they were required for those seeking new positions within RAC. This agreement means we need not determine whether the Karrakers should be considered to be in the pre-employment offer category. Plaintiffs have argued only that the MMPI is a medical examination. RAC could have argued not only that the MMPI is not a medical examination, but also that even if it is, it is "job-related and consistent with business necessity." By prevailing on the latter, defendants could claim that the test is permissible during employment, even if impermissible pre-offer. By not arguing that the test is "job-related and consistent with business necessity," RAC seeks a clear finding that the MMPI is not a medical examination and thus not regulated at all by the ADA.

The EEOC defines "medical examination" as "a procedure or test that seeks information about an individual's physical or mental impairments or health." See"ADA Enforcement Guidance: Preemployment Disability-Related Questions and Medical Examinations" (1995).² According to the EEOC, factors to consider in determining whether a particular test is a "medical examination" include:

(1) whether the test is administered by a health care professional;

(2) whether the test is interpreted by a health care professional;

(3) whether the test is designed to reveal an impairment of physical or mental health;

(4) whether the test is invasive;

(5) whether the test measures an employee's performance of a task or measures his/her physiological responses to performing the task;

(6) whether the test normally is given in a medical setting; and

(7) whether medical equipment is used.

"[O]ne factor may be enough to determine that a procedure or test is medical." Psychological tests that are "designed to identify a mental disorder or impairment" qualify as medical examinations, but psychological tests "that measure personality traits such as honesty, preferences, and habits" do not. Id.

Therefore, this case largely turns on whether the MMPI test is designed to reveal a mental impairment. RAC argues that, as it used the MMPI, the test only measured personality traits. For example, RAC argues in its brief that the MMPI does not test whether an applicant is clinically depressed, only "the extent to which the test subject is experiencing the kinds of feelings of `depression' that everyone feels from time to time (e.g., when their favorite team loses the World Series)." Although that particular example seems odd to us (can an Illinois chain really fill its management positions if it won't promote disgruntled Cubs fans?), the logic behind it doesn't seem to add up, either. Repeating the claim at oral argument, RAC argued that the MMPI merely tested a "state of mood" and suggested that an applicant might, for example, score high on the depression scale because he lost his keys that morning. But why would RAC care if an applicant lost his keys the morning of the MMPI or took the test the day after another Cubs loss? Would RAC really want to exclude an employee from consideration for a promotion because he happened to feel sad on the wrong day? We see two possibilities: either the MMPI was a very poor predictor of an applicant's potential as a manager (which might be one reason it is no longer used by RAC), or it actually was designed to measure more than just an applicant's mood on a given day.

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