Lumpkins-Benford v. Allstate Ins. Co.

Decision Date05 November 2013
Docket NumberNo. 11 C 6547,11 C 6547
Citation987 F.Supp.2d 807
PartiesAnn Lumpkins–Benford, Plaintiff, v. Allstate Insurance Company, Defendant
CourtU.S. District Court — Northern District of Illinois

OPINION TEXT STARTS HERE

Ann Lumpkins–Benford, Bolingbrook, IL, pro se.

Peter Petrakis, Meckler, Bulger & Tilson, Jason E. Barsanti, Meckler Bulger Tilson Marick & Pearson LLP, Chicago, IL, for Defendant.

MEMORANDUM OPINION AND ORDER

Ruben Castillo, Chief Judge

Plaintiff Ann Lumpkins–Benford, proceeding pro se,1 brings this suit against Defendant Allstate Insurance Company, alleging employment discrimination on the bases of race and sex and retaliation in violation of Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, 42 U.S.C. § 2000e et seq. (Title VII) and 42 U.S.C. § 1981. Presently before the Court are Defendant's motion for summary judgment pursuant to Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 56 and Defendant's motion to strike some of Plaintiff's statements of fact. For the reasons set forth below, Defendant's motion to strike is granted in part, and Defendant's motion for summary judgment is granted.

RELEVANT FACTS2

Before summarizing the facts of this case, the Court notes that Defendant has objected to several of Plaintiffs responses to Defendant's statement of undisputed facts, as well as to portions of Plaintiff s statements of additional facts and disputed facts, for failure to comply with Local Rule 56.1. (R. 74, Def.'s Objections & Mot. Strike.) Although this Court typically strictly enforces Local Rule 56.1, seeMalec v. Sanford, 191 F.R.D. 581 (N.D.Ill.2000), it is appropriate to apply the Rule less strictly to pro se pleadings, seeLipsey v. United Parcel Serv., Inc., 618 F.Supp.2d 903, 905 n. 2 (N.D.Ill.2009). However, a pro se litigant is not completely excused from the requirements of Local Rule 56.1, which requires the non-movant's response to the movant's statement of facts to contain, “in the case of any disagreement, specific references to the affidavits, parts of the record, and other supporting materials relied upon.” Local R. 56.1(b)(3)(B); seeBenuzzi v. Bd. of Educ. of Chi., 647 F.3d 652, 654 (7th Cir.2011) (We have emphasized the importance of local rules and have consistently and repeatedly upheld a district court's discretion to require compliance with its local rules governing summary judgment.”) (quoting Metro. Life Ins. Co. v. Johnson, 297 F.3d 558, 562 (7th Cir.2002)). The Court accordingly sustains many of Defendant's objections.

Specifically, several of Plaintiff s responses to Defendant's facts are not denials supported by the record, but rather conclusory assertions, conjecture, additional facts, or argumentative denials without citations to specific evidentiary materials. The consequence of Plaintiff's failure to satisfy Local Rule 56.1 in her responses is that the factual allegations she improperly responded to are deemed admitted.3 Additionally, several of the “paragraphs” in Plaintiff's statement of additional facts, which themselves contain multiple paragraphs, are speculations and legal arguments or are unsupported by any submitted evidence. Other statements are supported only by citations to letters or emails that Plaintiff wrote, While these correspondences may prove that Plaintiff provided certain information to Defendant, they do not prove that the substance of the correspondence is true. Accordingly, the Court disregards certain portions of Plaintiff's additional facts.4Finally, Plaintiff's amended statement of fact consists of six additional “facts”; Plaintiff admits, however, that all but the first fact are immaterial. (R. 78, Pl's Am. Facts at 4.) The Court thus disregards Plaintiff's additional facts two through six.

With these exclusions made, the Court now turns to the facts giving rise to this suit, viewing the facts in the light most favorable to Plaintiff and drawing all reasonable inferences in her favor. SeeBenuzzi, 647 F.3d at 656. The facts are undisputed unless otherwise indicated.

Plaintiff is a black female citizen and resident of Will County, Illinois, (Pl.'s Rule 56.1 Resp. ¶ 3.) Defendant is a corporation that provides insurance in the state of Illinois. ( Id. ¶2.) Plaintiff was employed at Defendant's Woodridge Customer Contact Center (“WCCC”) in Woodridge, Illinois from August 2005 until the WCCC closed in August 2013. ( Id. ¶14; Def.'s Resp. Disputed Facts ¶ 23.) From approximately July 2008 to December 2010, Plaintiff worked from home as part of a home-based worker pilot program (the “Work–at–Home program”), servicing Defendant's customers over the telephone. (Pl.'s Rule 56.1 Resp. ¶¶ 5, 7.) Plaintiff stopped working from home in January 2011 and returned to work at WCCC. ( Id. ¶7.) While participating in the Work–at–Home program, Plaintiff's direct manager was Patrice Walls, but once she returned to WCCC, Letta Faye Lis became her direct supervisor. ( Id. ¶¶ 6, 7.) Both Walls and Lis reported to Elena Withers, the division manager. ( Id. ¶¶ 7, 9.)

I. Plaintiffs 2009 Complaint

In 2009, Plaintiff complained about her job duties to April White, her supervisor at the time, and Withers. ( Id. ¶9.) She did not indicate in her complaint to White that she thought she was being discriminated against due to her race or gender. ( Id.) In that complaint, Plaintiff stated that she felt “singled out” for some unknown reason, but not because of her race or gender. ( Id.; R. 65–3, Pl.'s Second Dep. at 42:5–24.) Plaintiff also complained to her site manager, Ann Gross, that she was not being given enough time off from her phone duties so she could be trained to write renter's policies. ( Id. ¶10.)

One day in December 2010, Plaintiff worked for eight hours. (Pl.'s Rule 56.1 Resp. ¶ 17.) Plaintiff was originally paid for all eight hours, but in January 2011, someone in the Timekeeping Department changed the code on four of the hours, which resulted in four hours being subtracted from her February paycheck. ( Id.; R. 65–3, Pl.'s Second Dep. at 24:10–16.) Plaintiff reported the incident to the Human Resources Department, and it investigated the issue. (Pl.'s Rule 56.1 Resp. ¶ 17.) Plaintiff received the payment she was due for the missing four hours in late February or early March 2011. ( Id.; R. 65–3, Pl.'s Second Dep. at 26:3–12.) Plaintiff contends that this mix-up was in retaliation for her 2009 internal complaint. (R, 65–3, PL's Second Dep. at 25:1–9.) Plaintiff also believes that her performance reviews for the years 2009, 2010, and 2011 were negatively impacted in retaliation of her 2009 complaint. (Pl.'s Rule 56.1 Resp. ¶ 12.) Plaintiff's 2009 complaint did not allege discrimination on the basis of race or sex, however, and Plaintiff admits that no one made any statements about her race or gender with respect to this timekeeping incident. ( Id. at 27:15–18; Def.'s Facts ¶ 18.)

II. Plaintiff's Three–Week Absence from Work

Throughout her employment with Defendant, Plaintiff had a Paid Time Off (“PTO”) bank. (Pl.'s Rule 56.1 Resp. ¶ 19.) If Plaintiff wanted paid time off, she could request that time to be deducted from her PTO bank. ( Id.) Plaintiff had 28 days of PTO available to her in 2011, and she took and was paid for all 28 PTO days. ( Id. ¶58.) In Defendant's attendance policy, an “occurrence” is an incident when an employee takes time away from work that was not previously approved. (Def.'s Facts ¶ 23.) One occurrence represents eight hours of unscheduled and unapproved time away from work or four tardies. (R. 70, Pl.'s Supporting Docs., Tab 24, Attendance Guidelines.) Occurrences are tracked on a yearlong rolling basis; if an employee receives a certain number of occurrences, her job may be in jeopardy. (Pl.'s Rule 56.1 Resp. ¶ 24.) The number of occurrences an employee can receive without suffering negative consequences is determined by the employee's tenure with Defendant. ( Id.) In 2011, Plaintiff could incur five occurrences before being subject to disciplinary action. ( Id.)

Defendant's Timekeeping Department uses the code “PTON,” for Paid Time Off Non-scheduled, to indicate when employees take unscheduled time off from work that is paid. (Pl.'s Rule 56.1 Resp. ¶ 30.) The code “UNDU,” for Short-term Disability Unauthorized Unpaid, is used when employees take unscheduled time off from work that is not paid for short-term disability reasons. ( Id.) The code “PU,” for Personal Unpaid, is used when employees take unpaid unscheduled time off from work for personal reasons. ( Id.) Defendant's practice when employees have extended unscheduled absences is to code the first workweek of unscheduled time an employee takes off as PTON. ( Id. ¶32; R. 70, Pl.'s Supporting Docs., Tab 7, Manager's Job Aid.) If employees take more than one workweek of unscheduled time off from work, Defendant's practice is to use the code PU or UNDU, depending on the reason given for the time off. (Pl.'s Rule 56.1 Resp. ¶ 32; R. 70, Pl.'s Supporting Docs., Tab 7, Manager's Job Aid.) When no reason is given. Defendant's default code for the unscheduled time employees take off from work after the first workweek is UNDU. (Def.'s Facts ¶¶ 33–37; R. 65–7, Del Real Decl. ¶ 6; R. 65–8, Musser–Quist Decl. ¶ 6.) Emails between Sheena Turman, Manager of Timekeeping, and Lynn Murphy, Human Resources Senior Manager, indicate that the policy of entering the default code UNDU after more than five days absence is unwritten and was verbally communicated to Defendant's employees in the Human Resources Department. (R. 70, PL's Supporting Docs., Tab 14, Mar. 23, 2011 E-mails.)

Plaintiff knew that Defendant expected its employees to request PTO in advance when possible. (Def.'s Facts ¶ 20; R. 65–3, Pl.'s Second Dep. at 79:16–21.) In December 2010, Plaintiff requested PTO for January 4–6, 2011. (Def.'s Facts ¶ 21.) Plaintiff was waitlisted for those days, which meant she did not have approval to take the days off and was expected to go to work or else receive an occurrence for taking the time off without approval. ( Id.; Pl.'...

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