Middlebrooks v. Teva Pharms. United States, Inc.
| Decision Date | 04 February 2019 |
| Docket Number | CIVIL ACTION NO. 17-412 |
| Parties | STEPHEN MIDDLEBROOKS v. TEVA PHARMACEUTICALS USA, INC. |
| Court | U.S. District Court — Eastern District of Pennsylvania |
A senior American executive claiming his long-time Israeli employer fired him because of his age or American national origin, or to retaliate against him for complaining about a work environment turned hostile bears the weight of convincing our jury of the fallacy in his former employer's reasons for firing him. True to their oath, our jury must evaluate witness credibility to decide whether the employer who controls the performance reviews - and its corroborating employee witnesses - fired the former executive for illegal reasons. After several days of testimony, our jury's evaluation of conflicting witness testimony led it to find the employer did not discriminate against its former executive based on his age or American national origin but also led the jury to find the employer created a retaliatory hostile work environment and then retaliated by finally firing him. The jury awarded compensatory damages for emotional distress, back pay, front pay, liquidated damages and $5 million in punitive damages. The employer now raises a variety of post-trial arguments asking for judgment in its favor or for a new trial. The employee seeks pre-judgment interest on his back pay. In the accompanying Order, and mindful of the ample evidence supporting the jury's findings, we reject the employer's arguments except we must reduce the punitive damages to $300,000 under Congress's $300,000 cap on damages for these type of employment cases. We also grant the employee's motion for prejudgment interest.
Stephen Middlebrooks sued Teva Pharmaceuticals Industries, Limited and Teva Pharmaceuticals USA, Inc. (collectively "Teva") under Title VII,1 the Age Discrimination in Employment Act ("ADEA"),2 and the Pennsylvania Human Relations Act ("PHRA"),3 alleging discrimination based on his age and national origin; hostile work environment on the basis of his age and national origin; retaliation for making complaints related to age and national origin; and a retaliatory hostile work environment for making complaints related to age and national origin discrimination.
Following a five-day trial, the jury returned a verdict in favor of Teva on Mr. Middlebrooks's claims of national origin and age discrimination, but found in his favor on his retaliation and retaliatory hostile work environment claims.4 The jury awarded Mr. Middlebrooks compensatory damages of $200,000; back pay of $332,000; front pay of $450,000; punitive damages of $5,000,000; and, for purposes of liquidated damages under ADEA, found Teva acted willfully in that it knew or showed reckless disregard for whether the law prohibits termination because of age or retaliation for complaining about age.5
Teva now moves for judgment as a matter of law in its favor on (1) Mr. Middlebrooks's retaliatory hostile work environment claims; and (2) vacating punitive damages based on the retaliation and retaliatory hostile work environment claims.6 Teva alternatively moves under Rule 59(a) for a new trial arguing (1) we committed reversible error by instructing the jury on both "pretext" and "mixed motive" relating to the national origin discrimination claim even though Teva defeated this claim; (2) we erred by instructing the jury it may award punitive damages and compounded this error by refusing to include a question on the verdict sheet regarding Teva's "good faith" defense under Title VII; (3) the jury improperly awarded damages for intentionaldiscrimination despite finding Teva did not intentionally discriminate; (4) the verdict sheet is confusing because it asked the jury to use two different start dates for calculation of back pay and the jury's calculation of back pay is not based on any evidence of record: (5) we committed reversible error by instructing the jury it may award damages for emotional distress and the jury's award of emotional distress is not based on evidence of record; (6) the jury's award of front pay is based on consideration of impermissible factors rather than evidence; and (7) if Teva's motion for new trial is not granted, the Court should not enter judgment for more than $200,000 in punitive damages based on the statutory cap on compensatory and punitive damages under Title VII.7
Mr. Middlebrooks moves to mold the judgment to include prejudgment interest on the jury's award of back pay.8 We will enter judgment following our rulings on Mr. Middlebrooks's pending motion for attorney's fees.
A. Evidence adduced at trial.
Mr. Middlebrooks's Teva career.
Teva hired Mr. Middlebrooks in 2001 as its director of facilities engineering at its North Wales, Pennsylvania facility.9 It fired him on February 29, 2016. From 2001 to January 2015, Mr. Middlebrooks received several promotions and performance reviews consistently achieving "exceeds [expectations]" or "meets [expectations]," performance categories constituting the second and third-best reviews a Teva employee could receive on Teva's five-scale ranking.10 Mr. Middlebrooks received bonuses and equity awards after all of his first thirteen years at Teva.11 Teva awarded Mr. Middlebrooks with the title of Director of Facilities Engineering by 2013.12 Teva tasked Mr. Middlebrooks with the responsibility of maintaining forty facilities and approximately fifty direct reports.13
At the end of 2013, Teva changed its management structure to require all regional facilities managers, like Mr. Middlebrooks, to report to one global facilities manager, an Israeli named Nir Aharoni.14 In late 2014, Teva promoted Mr. Middlebrooks to senior director of North American facilities management.15 Mr. Middlebrooks continued to report to Mr. Aharoni in his new position.16
Performance review and denial of equity in January 2015.
In early 2015, Mr. Aharoni provided Mr. Middlebrooks with his 2014 performance review assigning a "mostly meets" rating equivalent to a two out of five on Teva's review scale.17 Mr. Middlebrooks did not agree with the "mostly meets" review; by his calculation he should have received a "meets" based on the weight given to each goal on Teva's performance review form.18
Mr. Middlebrooks met his 2014 performance goals late in 2014.19 But Teva did not award Mr. Middlebrooks equity in 2015 for his performance in 2014.20 Mr. Middlebrooks testified Mr. Aharoni told him those who received a "mostly meets" review are not eligible for equity.21 Mr. Middlebrooks discussed this equity denial with Ray Duggan, Teva's director of security, who received a "meets" performance review but who did not receive an equity award despite eligibility for such an award.22 Mr. Middlebrooks testified Mr. Duggan questioned Mr. Aharoni why he (Mr. Duggan) did not receive equity. Mr. Aharoni told Mr. Duggan "equity is only designed for people who are going to stay with the company for a long period of time."23 Both Mr. Middlebrooks and Mr. Duggan were then 56 years old.24 Teva awarded equity to Troy Gaugler, who was about twenty years younger than Messrs. Middlebrooks and Duggan, and the only other member of Mr. Middlebrooks's group eligible for equity.25Mr. Middlebrooks's attempts to meet with Mr. Aharoni for a mid-year review
regarding 2015 goals.
In this 2014 performance review, Mr. Aharoni identified seven goals for Mr. Middlebrooks to meet by year end 2015.26 Teva assigned Mr. Middlebrooks an executive coach following his "mostly meets" review.27 Mr. Middlebrooks viewed working with an executive coach as an opportunity to improve his skills and met with the coach approximately six times in 2015.28 Mr. Middlebrooks expected he would review his progress with Mr. Aharoni in a mid-year review, based on his understanding employees receiving a "mostly meets" performance review should have a mid-year review in the first week of July.29 In July 2015, Mr. Middlebrooks called and emailed Mr. Aharoni seeking this mid-year review.30 Mr. Aharoni never responded. With no response from Mr. Aharoni, Mr. Middlebrooks sought the help of Teva's human resources to prompt Mr. Aharoni to provide a mid-year review. Mr. Middlebrooks received no response from human resources.31 Mr. Middlebrooks then emailed to Mr. Aharoni a self-evaluation of his mid-year performance.32 In the email, Mr. Middlebrooks assessed his own performance as having improved and either meeting or exceeding all seven goals set by Mr. Aharoni for 2015.33 Mr. Middlebrooks asked Mr. Aharoni for comments and suggestions for further improving performance.34 Mr. Middlebrooks included in his self-evaluation the additional savings goals imposed on his department in late 2014.35 Mr. Aharoni did not respond to Mr. Middlebrooks's email.36
Even though Mr. Middlebrooks met Teva's savings goals imposed after the "meets" review, Teva then added additional goals at the end of 2015.37 Mr. Middlebrooks referred to it as "mov[ing] the goalposts."38June 2015 meeting between Mr. Middlebrooks's team and the Israeli team.
In June 2015, two members of Teva's management team based in Israel, Shimrit Shemtov and Roni Kafre, came to the United States for a meeting.39 Ms. Shemtov, Teva's finance business partner, slammed shut the laptops of everyone at the meeting even though employees commonly used laptops at meetings.40 Later in the meeting, Ms. Shemtov put her hand in the face of an American employee who asked a question about the performance of Teva departments and "shushed" him, telling him he could not ask questions.41 Teva employee Troy Gaugler, present at the June 2015 meeting, testified the Israeli management dismissed the presentation of the North American finance leader.42
Other Teva employees present at the June 2015 meeting testified about other acts they perceived as discriminatory based on either national origin or age. Mr. Middlebrooks testified Mr. Aharoni complained to him the United States military did...
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