Kass-Hout v. Cmty. Care Network

• Decision Date: 02 September 2022
• Docket Number: 2:20-CV-441-JPK
• Parties: DR. TAREQ KASS-HOUT, Plaintiff, v. COMMUNITY CARE NETWORK INC.; MUNSTER MEDICAL RESEARCH FOUNDATION, INC., d/b/a THE COMMUNITY HOSPITAL; AAMIR BADRUDDIN; and ALAN KUMAR, Defendants.
• Court: U.S. District Court — Northern District of Indiana

DR. TAREQ KASS-HOUT, Plaintiff,
v.
COMMUNITY CARE NETWORK INC.; MUNSTER MEDICAL RESEARCH FOUNDATION, INC., d/b/a THE COMMUNITY HOSPITAL; AAMIR BADRUDDIN; and ALAN KUMAR, Defendants.

No. 2:20-CV-441-JPK

United States District Court, N.D. Indiana, Hammond Division

September 2, 2022

OPINION AND ORDER

JOSHUA P. KOLAR MAGISTRATE JUDGE

Presently before the Court is the motion filed by Defendants Community Care Network, Inc. (“CCNI”), The Community Hospital, and Dr. Alan Kumar, seeking dismissal of Count III of the Amended Complaint alleging a violation of 42 U.S.C. § 1981. [DE 36]. The parties filed forms of consent to have this case assigned to a United States Magistrate Judge to conduct all further proceedings and to order the entry of a final judgment in this case. [DE 13]. Therefore, this Court has jurisdiction pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 636(c) to decide this motion. For the reasons discussed below, Defendants' motion is denied.

BACKGROUND

For purposes of Defendants' motion to dismiss, the Court considers the facts alleged in Plaintiff's Amended Complaint [DE 31] in the light most favorable to Plaintiff, accepting as true all well-pleaded facts alleged and drawing all plausible inferences in Plaintiff's favor. See Jackson v. Blitt & Gaines, P.C., 833 F.3d 860, 862 (7th Cir. 2016). Accordingly, the Court's recitation of

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the facts rests heavily upon the allegations in the Plaintiff's Amended Complaint, without making any findings or comments regarding the veracity, or lack thereof, of such facts.

Plaintiff is an accomplished Syrian Arab endovascular neurosurgeon specializing in stroke treatment and care. [DE 31 ¶ 1]. In March 2018, Plaintiff began working for Rush University Medical Center (“Rush”) as an Assistant Professor in the Department of Neurosurgery, with a conjoint appointment in the Department of Neurological Services. [Id. ¶ 9]. As part of his employment with Rush, Plaintiff provided neuroendovascular clinical services at The Community Hospital, a medical facility wholly owned and operated by CCNI. [Id. ¶ 10]. Those services were provided under an agreement between Rush, which “employs or contracts with licensed physicians [“Physicians”] ... who possess the training, expertise, knowledge and qualifications to provide [ ] neuroendovascular clinical services” [DE 37-1, Whereas ¶ D], and CCNI, which “desire[d] to partner with an academic medical center to provide comprehensive care for patients in need of neuroendovascular procedures in the community it serves” [id., Whereas ¶ C].

Pursuant to the Rush-CCNI agreement, Rush agreed to provide CCNI with one of its employed neuroendovascular Physicians to work at CCNI for “full time equivalent” [FTE], five days a week, 52 weeks a year, and provide in-patient and out-patient medical and clinical Services as set forth in the agreement. [Id. ¶ 1-1]. The agreement designates Rush and its Physicians as independent contractors. [Id., Article VII]. The contracting parties were to mutually agree on which Physicians would provide services under the agreement. [Id. ¶ 2.3]. Physicians providing services to CCNI under the agreement were required among other things to maintain membership on the Medical Staff of The Community Hospital with hospital privileges, and to discharge their duties in accordance with the bylaws, rules and regulations of The Community Hospital and its Medical Staff as well as the bylaws and policies and procedures of CCNI. [Id., ¶ 2.1]. Complaints

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regarding services rendered by provided Physicians were to be handled in accordance with written Community Hospital Medical Staff policies and applicable CCNI policies, which were to be made available to Physicians throughout the term of the agreement. [Id. ¶ 2.4]. During the term of the agreement, neither Rush nor any Physician was allowed to provide neuroendovascular program services on-site at any other acute service hospital or healthcare facility located in Lake County, Indiana without the written consent of CCNI, and Rush agreed to require each Physician employed or otherwise engaged by it to agree to this requirement. [Id. ¶ 12.2].

The Rush-CCNI Agreement was signed on behalf of CCNI by Defendant Kumar, a physician affiliated with CCNI who was acting as CCNI's Administrator. [DE 37-1 at 13; DE 31 ¶ 11]. Plaintiff alleges that Dr. Kumar was biased against Syrian Arab physicians, and that Defendants discriminated against him because of his race, ethnicity, and/or national origin. [DE 31 ¶¶ 19, 55]. In a previous opinion and order, the Court denied Defendants' motion to dismiss the claims in the original complaint (which are realleged in the Amended Complaint) for employment discrimination under Title VII and defamation. See [DE 17; Kass-Hout v. Cmty. Care Network Inc., No. 2:20-CV-441-JPK, 2021 WL 3709635 (N.D. Ind. Aug. 20, 2021)]. The sole issue in the current motion is whether Count III of the Amended Complaint states a legally sufficient claim for a § 1981 violation.

STANDARD OF REVIEW

Defendants cite both Rule 12(b)(1) and Rule 12(b)(6) of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure as the basis for their dismissal motion. See [DE 36 at 1]. Rule 12(b)(1) allows a party to move to dismiss a claim for lack of subject matter jurisdiction, while a motion under Rule 12(b)(6) challenges the sufficiency of the complaint to state a claim upon which relief may be granted. See Fed.R.Civ.P. 12(b)(1), 12(b)(6). As will be discussed in greater detail, Defendants

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argue that Plaintiff lacks standing to assert a discrimination claim under § 1981 because he was not a party to the Rush-CCNI Agreement. Defendants appear to invoke Rule 12(b)(1) under the understandable-if ultimately mistaken-belief that their standing argument calls into question the subject matter jurisdiction of this Court. It does not.

A. Rule 12(b)(1)

“A district court properly dismisses an action under Fed R. Civ. P. 12(b)(1) for lack of subject matter jurisdiction if ... the plaintiff lacks constitutional standing to bring the action.” Cortlandt St. Recovery Corp. v. Hellas Telcomms., S.A.R.L., 790 F.3d 411, 416-17 (2d Cir. 2015) (internal quotation marks and citation omitted). Constitutional standing, also known as “[s]tanding under Article III, is a threshold question in every federal case ... A federal court's jurisdiction can be invoked only ... when the plaintiff ... has suffered some threatened or actual injury resulting from the putatively illegal action[.]'” United States v. All Funds on Deposit with R.J. O'Brien & Assocs., 783 F.3d 607, 616 (7th Cir. 2015) (internal quotation marks and citations omitted). “Importantly, [Article III standing does not require] a claimant ... [to] establish that a right of his has been infringed; that would conflate the issue of standing with the merits of the suit.” Id. (internal quotation marks and citation omitted). Conflation of the two concepts often occurs because “[t]he term ‘statutory standing' is found in many cases, but it is a confusing usage.” Kohen v. Pac. Inv. Mgmt. Co. LLC, 571 F.3d 672, 677 (7th Cir. 2009) (internal citations omitted). Statutory standing “refers to a situation in which, although the plaintiff has been injured and would benefit from a favorable judgment and so has standing in the Article III sense, he is suing under a statute that was not intended to give him a right to sue; he is not within the class intended to be protected by it.” Id.

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Defendants' argument that Plaintiff lacks standing under § 1981 to assert a claim based on the Rush-CCNI Agreement because he is not a party to that agreement raises an issue of statutory standing, which does “not implicate the jurisdiction of the district court.” Ameritech Ben. Plan Comm. v. Commc'n Workers of Am., 220 F.3d 814, 819 (7th Cir. 2000). While Defendants make the additional argument that Plaintiff's injuries do not arise from the alleged breaches of the Rush-CCNI Agreement, that argument too does not call into question whether Plaintiff has suffered an Article III injury. See, e.g., Rothstein v. UBS AG, 708 F.3d 82, 91 (2d Cir. 2013) (constitutional standing requires only that the injury be “fairly traceable” to the defendant's acts, which is a lower standard than the standard for proximate causation); see also Dep't of Com. v. New York, ___ U.S. ___, 139 S.Ct. 2551, 2566 (2019) (“Article III requires no more than de facto causality” (internal quotation marks and citation omitted)). Accordingly, notwithstanding Defendants' use of the term “standing” to describe their dismissal arguments, Defendants' motion to dismiss is properly addressed under Rule 12(b)(6) and not Rule 12(b)(1). See, e.g., Hallinan v. Fraternal Order of Police of Chi. Lodge No. 7, 570 F.3d 811, 820-21 (7th Cir. 2009) (holding that the plaintiffs' failure to plead the state action necessary for maintaining an action pursuant to § 1983 raised an issue under Rule 12(b)(6) rather than Rule 12(b)(1)).

B. Rule 12(b)(6)

Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 8(a) provides, in part: “[a] pleading that states a claim for relief must contain: ... a short and plain statement of the claim showing that the pleader is entitled to relief.” Fed.R.Civ.P. 8(a). Dismissal under Rule 12(b)(6) is required, however, if the complaint fails to describe a claim that is plausible on its face. Sharp Elecs. Corp. v. Metro. Life Ins. Co., 578 F.3d 505, 510 (7th Cir. 2009) (citing Ashcroft v. Iqbal, 556 U.S. 662 (2009)). While a complaint is not required to contain detailed factual allegations,” a plaintiff's obligation to provide the

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‘grounds' of his ‘entitle[ment] to relief' requires more than labels and conclusions, and a formulaic recitation of the elements of a cause of action will not do. Factual allegations must be enough to raise a right to relief above the speculative level.” Bell Atlantic Corp. v. Twombly, 550 U.S. 544, 555 (2007) (internal citations omitted). The Seventh Circuit has instructed that plaintiffs...